While you are surfing from your smartphone, have you noticed on the Google results page a new thunderbolt icon next to a website? That means that website is AMP website-compatible and this is the new “thing” from Google.
AMP stands for Accelerated Mobile Page and it’s a project launched by Google few years ago to speed up website on mobile devices. According experts if a page takes more of 3 seconds to load, the user will leave your site. With AMP compatible sites, your site will take a fraction of a second.
Mary Fisher Design from a phone, notice the thunderbolt icon.
Let’s try a test!
You need to use your smartphone, because AMP works only on mobile devices and try search on google “mary fisher design“, the first result will be probably our website. First, you notice the thunderbolt icon, now click on it. How long did it take to open the site…Half second?
Now, try going directly to our site entering the full url https://www.fisherdesignandadvertising.com/ (not using google search). Even though we have a cool responsive design optimized for mobile phones, it will probably be much slower to open. So, what you think?
How an AMP site works?
An AMP website is reformatted to use special AMP tags, similar but different from regular HTML. Google now will take these new pages and embed into Google itself. The page will load super fast because you haven’t left Google at all! That’s the trick.
Is AMP compatible for every website?
JOI already use AMP. We converted this website last year
Well, yes, but it can be very hard to program a website that doesn’t use WordPress. For WordPress there are plugin to convert the site into this new system quite easily. However, this new language is very basic and doesn’t allow complex script, so most of the fancy things, animation, special effects can’t be used. In addition, if your website live off banners or affiliate banners they may not work properly.
What are the PROS of having an AMP site?
- Super fast loading speed for the first click on Google result
- Clean design and very easy to read
- Increase of Google ranking
- Possible implementation of AMP technology by SIRI and Google Now (but we don’t know for sure yet)
- Thunderbolt icon differentiates your site for others
What are the CONS of having an AMP site?
CNN and many sites are converting to AMP too
- Hard to implement without a WordPress plugin
- A copy of your site will be stored on Google’s server. In case you make a mistake on your website, you will need to wait for Google to refresh its catalog to view the updated page. It can take 1 or 2 days.
- Javascript and fancy programming scripts may not work
- It may go against the fundamental rule of internet, where different computers are connected. With AMP, people think that one day Google will own internet and will have the entire monopoly of the world wide web.
Conclusions
Google already rules the world wide web with its new ideas. We don’t know if this technology will become mainstream or it’s a just a Google fad. What I like is super fast loading speed of a website when I use my mobile phone. If you think the same then contact us to discuss if your website can be converted to a AMP!
