Google Page Experience Update: A New SEO Opportunity!

By | Date posted: | Last updated: May 19, 2021

What a coincidence: Google is planning the Page Experience Update for 2021, which will primarily focus on the user-friendliness of websites. How exactly and according to which criteria Google will proceed is not known in detail. So-called core vitals will play an important role.

Google page experience update: Even more better reasons for accessibility

The subject of accessibility has already created great synergies with UX and SEO. It is said that user experience aka UX fits into SEO, because the way user feels on your website majorly affects your site ranking. In short, it is about making a website usable for people with disabilities. In addition to a clear and simple structure, it is also about machine readability. The requirements of a screen reader used by people with visual impairments largely coincide with those of a search engine crawler, for whom machine readability and labelling are just as important. So, you not only do something good and expand your potential customer group, but also cover often neglected SEO factors at the same time.

So far it has been the case that switching to accessibility could kill two birds with one stone:

  • Accessibility for people with disabilities (also as potential customers)
  • Tidy interface, better user experience for everyone, clean technical awards

Those alone are good reasons to make your own website accessible. And it has a very specific effect on conversions and sales figures through the parallel optimization of clarity and navigability (user experience). Now Google is going one better – the next update called “Page Experience” will give the user interface and usability of the website an even higher priority. usability of the website an even higher priority. Check out the Top 3 Metrics to Measure Google page Experience!

Google page experience update: New SEO opportunities with sufficient response time for website operators!

The timing couldn’t be better. This is perhaps the greatest opportunity for SEOs in a long time, because: Due to the Corona crisis, Google decided to warn website operators in advance of the update so that they can prepare.

In plain language: An investment in accessibility before the update comes into force (2021) offers promising chances of a ranking boost this time. Usually, Google updates tend to have the opposite effect, namely unpredictable ranking losses.

In all honesty: If you let this chance slip, you can no longer help.

Google page experience: Big opportunities for small brands

It is well known that Google takes brand awareness into account in its rankings. However, websites that are useful and work perfectly will be given much more consideration in the future. Companies with low brand awareness can benefit massively from this in the ranking competition.

The advantage: Small and medium-sized companies usually do not have to map the gigantic product and service portfolios of major brands. According to the motto “small but nice”, a tidy, reduced, but perfectly functioning website will be much easier for the little ones to achieve than for the big players. Admittedly, that caresses our ego, because in recent years we have increasingly focused on precisely these topics and are now being confirmed.

What now? There are no standards – or do they?

Google doesn’t provide us with a list of HTML tags and best practices that need to be followed in the future – that would be a bit too easy, too. So how should we know what exactly we have to implement?

And here we come full circle: In addition to the heuristics of user experience, there are also the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

It would be short-sighted to assume that Google would not have taken this into account – the search engine operator may even have been inspired by wide accessibility offensive; We will probably never know. But we can benefit from it.

Implement it now and benefit from Page Experience in 2021 – Thank you later!

Now is the perfect time to implement it. The market is largely calmed by Covid-19, we can use this compulsory pause for optimization – and then emerge stronger from the crisis.

Depending on how useful your current website foundation is, you either upgrade or do a relaunch right away. You pay attention to the WCAG, meet the requirements and design the most user-friendly interface in the world with a professional. You’re testing your UI with real users because that’s how it is done. You use modern technical infrastructure; your developers write high-performance and contemporary clean code. You reduce your loading times to a super-fast minimum. You mark everything neatly and because that’s not so much anymore, it works quite well. Google is installing its update. You take off and conquer the market!

We provide ADA Website Accessibility solutions including ADA website audit, ADA compliant website design, accessibility web development, ADA compliant mobile app and more. Do you need any help to improve user experience of your website? Explore our website design services! If you are looking for more traffic, more sales, quality SEO Strategies, search engine optimization services, content marketing strategies, SEO content optimization, online marketing, social media marketing, digital marketing services, PPC campaign management services and more, Please Explore our SEO Packages!

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Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) – How they can help to improve website ranking?

By | Date posted: | Last updated: May 7, 2021
accelerated-mobile-pages

An accelerated mobile page is the version of a document that is specially tailored for use on a smartphone. Because it should be fully loaded within a few milliseconds when it is called, the code must be reduced to a minimum – the CSS and Javascript of the actual website are not loaded and even the HTML is greatly reduced using special AMP tags.

AMP Website Pages

The alarm bells will now ring for webmasters with design demands – what should a website look like. After entering the relevant search terms, you can see the integration of the Accelerated Mobile Pages in the SERPs and call up some AMP pages that are already live.

Better rankings for mobile sites

The current AMP integration in the SERPs provides for an attention-grabbing and probably just as click-strong carousel box, which will in all probability pick up a lot of organic traffic from the regular organic mobile search results due to its prominent placement. It is currently unclear whether AMP pages will also appear in the regular organic search results and whether the current integration will continue.

AMP for WordPress Development

To make the implementation of Accelerated Mobile Pages a little easier for webmasters, Google recommends the AMP WordPress plug-in from Automatic. It provides a standardized template that automatically makes the technical implementation (Canonical & Co.) correct.

The template can and should be fine-tuned. Ideally, a subfolder called “AMP” is created in the main directory of the active theme first. Store the edited AMP template files here – this way the changes will not be overwritten with the next plugin update.

Order AMP templates

In the WordPress backend under Plugins, AMP can be selected in the sub-item “Editor” – the required template files are displayed here.

Attention: Please do not edit directly here, but put the affected files in a separate folder in the active theme via FTP!

The style file is primarily required for easy editing. Here, as usual, CSS instructions and classes can be added and edited – the display becomes a lot nicer.

Furthermore, the WordPress logo must of course be replaced by your own. For this you can either upload a site icon or edit /single.php and save the link to the desired icon in the $ site_icon_url.

For changes that require some programming expertise – for example the implementation of a custom header, etc. – detailed documentation is provided in the plug-in information on Github.

AMP and Google PageSpeed Insights

A few negative comments about the plugin make it clear: It becomes problematic if you try to check the AMP version of a page for its speed using Google PageSpeed Insights. The PageSpeed Insights algorithm checks the specified page for various best practices in terms of website performance, but the actual loading time and the weight of the page do not play a role in the scoring – the point score may show a rather mediocre result.

But don’t worry: if you check the actual page load time in tools, it looks a lot better thanks to the minimal number of requests and the greatly reduced page weight, and provide you with improved website performance.

Integrate Google Analytics on AMP pages

On the official Google developer pages there are some hints and sample code for implementing Google Analytics on Accelerated Mobile Pages. The standard analytics tracking code is not used here, but its own analytics tags.

An exemplary tracking code:

<AMP-analytics type = “googleanalytics” id = “analytics1”>
  <script type = “application / json”>
  {
   “vars”: {
      “account”: “UA-26110687-2”
   },
   “triggers”: {
       “trackPageview”: {
        “on”: “visible”,
        “request”: “pageview”
       },
       “trackEvent”: {
       “selector”: “# event-test”,
       “on”: “click”,
       “request”: “event”,
       “vars”: {
          “eventCategory”: “ui-components”,
          “eventAction”: “click”
        }
      }
    }
   }
   </script>
</AMP-analytics>

The Universal Analytics ID must be replaced with that of your own account. Google recommends creating a separate property for the AMP project within the Analytics account.

Attention: Comments within the Analytics code invalidate the JSON. So, if you copy the code from the Google documentation, the “Replace with your Property ID” comment must be deleted so that the tracking works – otherwise the error message “Analytics config could not be parsed” appears. Is it in a valid JSON format? In the JS console.

AMP and Ads/Monetization

Ad serving in the AMP project is based on exactly this statement. So, Google offers the possibility of integrating ads in various formats from a wide variety of ad servers – but gives direct guidelines that should be met. It’s no surprise that ads should load as quickly as possible. However, Google also wants ads in AMP to be “beautiful and innovative” and to use the https protocol. The group will certainly specify these guidelines in the near future and expand the advertising options – so it will remain exciting.

There is already an AMP-ad component that is supported by the following ad networks: A9, Adform, AdReactor, AdSense, AdTech, Dot and Media, Doubleclick, Smart AdServer, etc.

Conclusion

AMP is currently of particular interest for editorial-driven sites – the implementation is definitely worthwhile here, precisely because it can be integrated (at least for WordPress-based sites) with relatively little effort and will generate a high level of attention in the mobile SERPs.

It remains to be seen whether Google will provide an adequate solution for ecommerce store or whether AMP will only serve as a “Facebook Instant Articles” competitor in the future and, accordingly, should only be used for news and articles.

Furthermore, Google AMP are enhancing digital marketing strategies, increase rankings and provide better mobile-friendly experience! If you wanted to stay competitive in the mobile market, you should be AMP optimized. If you are looking to convert your website or online store in AMP or in a mobile-friendly experience, explore our website design services!

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Top Website Speed Optimization Best Practices!

By | Date posted: | Last updated: April 19, 2021

The driving force that skyrockets the performance of any business on the online platform is Website Speed Optimization. It is also a prominent factor that affects the ranking of the search engine results. The experience of a visitor on your website must not include waiting or disruption at any point on your website. It not only kills a pre-qualified lead but also affects the search engine ranking of your website.

So, to ensure that your business stays at the top in bestowing the smooth experiences of the customers, ranking results, and others, get started with the ultimate guide to boost website speed and performance optimization.

Best practices for Website Speed Optimization

Update to a Best Suited Hosting Plan

A variety of Website Hosting is available in the market ranging from economical options to expensive ones with high-end features. Survey the requirements of your online platform to upgrade it to various kinds of plans like a dedicated server, VPS (Virtual Private Server) Hosting, and others. It will help you for faster load times of the web pages, processing power, and better performance of many other parameters.

Image Optimization

Images are an integral part of any Website Speed Optimization Guide. It enhances engagement and gives a better perspective to the visitor about your product. But, large size images on one’s website can slow down the loading speed of that particular web page or the entire website. Images with a size greater than 100 kb tend to take more time to load, thus disrupting the user experience on your online platform. To rectify this issue, you can compress the image to deliver a flash loading speed of the web page for the user.

Utilize lazy Loading to speed up website

Lazy Loading is the technique in which a particular section of the web page loads at the time when the visitor scrolls down to see it. It drastically reduces the website loading speed and thus offers a smooth experience to the user. For instance, up to a 1 % hike in revenue in noticed in ecommerce websites with every 100ms of page speed optimization. It drops down the server bills and saves on the bandwidth for the parts of the website that are not viewed by the user.

Implement Caching section

Caching refers to the storage of a file on temporary storage so that you can retrieve it whenever required. It is a crucial practice of website speed optimization and website maintenance. With the utilization of this feature on your website, the data is saved instead of reloading every time for a particular user when they access your website. Various forms of caching are available that you can utilize as per the demand of your website. These are browser caching, page caching, and database caching. It is activated on your website through manual code, general settings, and others.

Loading Speed Optimization for Mobiles

Smartphones have become more accessible and are used in a higher percentage to explore one’s website. The performance of your website must be the same on the desktop as well as the mobile. It should be highly efficient and offer the same functionality on both devices. Google has launched an AMP (Accelerated Mobile Pages) project for optimized mobile web browsing, and AMP pages load even in slow network. Apart from these benefits, Accelerated Mobile Pages helps in improving website ranking as well.

Shorten the redirects

Redirects are a functional tool that takes the user to the live pages of your website in case you eliminate any content from your website. But, a high number of redirects can become a hurdle in the faster loading speed of your website. It is due to the reason that extra HTTP requests are needed in the redirects. Maintain a significant number of redirects on your website as per the need so that it does not affect the loading speed.

Minimal use of JavaScript, CSS, and HTML

Reduce the number of files on your website as, more the number of files, the more is the loading speed of any section of the website. Ensure that you maintain consistency in the HTML and CSS code. You can also choose to rework on your HTML and other code to eliminate any points of disruption in the web speed optimization.

Use CDN for website performance optimization

CDN or Content Delivery Network is a way to supercharge your website performance that stores multiple copies of the website at various geographic locations. The content loads at a faster pace with the help of the nearest server location to the user. This way, web traffic is dispersed, and loading time increases. It also enhances the overall ranking of the website in search engine results.

Utilize various tools after you imply all the website speed optimization tips mentioned above on your website to check the performance of the same. It will help you check the efficiency of your website to drive a lead to the sales funnel and get you a payable customer.

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Importance of Canonical Tags in Ecommerce Store SEO!

By | Date posted: | Last updated: May 19, 2021

Canonical tags are the whole and sole for any website search engine optimization for any issues regarding content duplication. Probably the best part of the decade, thanks to Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo! There are loads and loads of URLs out there. In case if a customer misses a single alphabet, an ecommerce store may face issues like duplicate content search penalties, sales reduction and the list goes on.

For e.g., Look at the following URLs:
www.example.com
example.com
http://example.com
http://example.com/
https://example.com
https://www.example.com
http://www.example.com
https://www.example.com/index.html

Do they look same to you?
Yes, you are right! The URLs look similar; But search engine bots consider these as different URLs!

The same issue applies to URL parameters generated for tracking purposes as well:

https://www.example.com/?utm_source=google&utm_campaign=shopping

They might deal with similar content and hence can easily mislead any customer & consider this as a duplicate content. Search Engine Optimization for an Ecommerce Store is like having an accurate address of your shop on Google Maps; one wrong turn and snap, you end up nowhere or somewhere you did not want to. Any which way the eCommerce store owner has to face it.

Ecommerce Store SEO is the keywords entered by customers that best suits their search and hence provide the perfect internet shopping experience. The store lost its customer with a risk of getting sued for content duplication. This is where Canonical Tags in SEO and Canonical URLs in SEO play an important role.

Online stores gain attention and tremendous sales based on various factors. Albeit this is a tough job because most of them deal with similar content and products. Canonical tags help you separate from this rat race and stand out for best ranking when Google segregates them. The penalty is not an actual problem here, just in case your content matches; it is just that no one likes extra working hours including Google! And you better get enlightened on what happens when the rankings of your page catch a downfall.

So how does all of this work?

The basic job of a Canonical Tag is to resolve content duplication and lead the search engines to capture pages that rank better. All of these somehow revolve around Search Engine Optimization and hence comes the role of Canonical Tags in SEO. As mentioned above, your customer misses an alphabet and whoop! You lost him. So why miss a chance just for the sake of duplication? Also, why mess with Google which at the end of the day would lead you at the bottom of the rankings? Long story short, you can directly convey Google to check a particular page and not its twin. Giving more job to it may get you jobless. If not properly addressed, the SEO vulnerability and a pile of different URLs can create more and more havoc. Everywhere you go, a duplicate URL follows. To save us from all of these, there is a host or a parent URL called Canonical URL.

Ecommerce SEO

Canonical tags for an ecommerce solution

By now it would be pretty clear to you on how this system works and what are the areas to tackle. Canonical tags are of great importance for anyone who wishes to stand tall in the online business. Take an example of any famous online store. Now imagine the case of duplication as discussed earlier. Like there is a similar website or URL with a small difference in the domain. That small change may lead customers of an eCommerce website to something random and ultimately lose their interest. No one sets a goal so complicated. The best ecommerce practice can overcome this issue by setting up few pages with rel=”canonical” tags.

As a prerequisite, the following things should be implemented first:

  • Category pages with pagination
  • Blog/Article/Product Tags pages
  • One Product, Multiple Category
  • Layered Navigation with filter or sorting
  • URLs with search parameters
  • CMS Pages (Informational)

Content Duplication & SERPs

A parent tag is the only solution to duplication. That is why we have SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). By being specific on the canonical tag, you are showing Google the correct path towards the page/website that you wish to give utter value. For this, your page shall consist of the exact keywords to rank at the top.

To guide someone towards the accurate destination and tackle the perfect keyword or SEO, you need to be well versed with the usage of canonical tags. You won’t be master of it all in a day. It is ongoing learning and earning process.

Now the question that arises is, why am I not ranked even after working on the canonical tags and Search Engine Optimization part of my online store? This is where you need to peep at the neighbours. Competitors or perhaps someone who has reached far on what you just started.

Keeping up with the competitors!

How do you know the changes required on whatever you are doing? By comparing it with the best, right? Only when you see your friend earns more, you understand or invest time on enhancing your skills at work! Similarly, how do you know if your eCommerce store is missing on something? Simple. You check on how the competitors are doing it. Always keep a close eye on how they work when it comes to canonical tags or what makes it to the point when it comes to optimization? Begin with the keywords. See what keywords they tackle to gain maximum attention and minimum duplication at the same time. Remember, no duplication! And hence don’t go for the exact keywords but something different and of higher ranking. Check out the complete guide on how to fix duplicate content for Higher Search Engine Rankings.

Also, check how and what strategies the competitors are using in terms of canonical tags. What makes them unique? How come their customers are not directed to anything irrelevant or misleading? Once this is clear then comes the implementation part. Can you apply the same to your online store, to your procedures and especially to your canonical tag? Keep a track of everything. A record on the keywords used for various products or URLs created will be of great value.

P.S – You can check if there is a content duplication on canonical URL checkers available. It will also help you know how to attract the search crawlers. Thank us later!

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