Boost User Experience (UX) of Your WordPress Sites with Google AMP
About a couple of years back when Google launched a new technology called AMP, hardly one could guess that it will redefine mobile SEO in near future. If you’re yet not familiar with the term AMP, it is the shortened form of Accelerated Mobile Pages. This technology enables faster loading of mobile pages, particularly for the users, who use slow Internet connections like 3G.
Google Ensuring Better User Experience with AMP
Google is dedicated to provide optimum user experience to every category of users. Through the AMP technology, it ensures that the Internet users, who’re still stuck with slow connections, get to view their relevant content as fast as possible.
According to experts working on WordPress customization in India, AMP is a crucial technology to adapt for almost every website. Google leaves nothing in the hands of luck to encourage the use of AMP. Thus, the websites that are AMP-enabled are awarded prominent ranking on SERP. This is particularly true for news websites and blogs.
AMP and its Relevance in Search Engine Optimization
It is still obscure how much relevancy AMP holds for search engine optimisation. It may be recalled here in the ongoing context that Gary Illyes, who’s a Webmaster Trends Analyst at Google, was quoted to have said in mid 2016 that AMP was not then yet a ranking signal for the websites.
However, experts working at Induji Technologies Pvt Ltd - a renowned WordPress Development Company in India - have something to contribute in this context. According to them, Google is constantly evolving its search algorithm and much time has passed by, since Gary made that clarification. Therefore, chances are pretty high that by now it has already been incorporated as a major ranking signal.
If you look at it from the other end, you can’t deny this logic either. The majority of websites that are making it to the Google first-page are AMP-enabled. In other words, the correlation is pretty strong indeed. These days, users have turned smarter. Irrespective of whether or not AMP is a major Google ranking signal, the majority of users invariably look for that tiny lightening icon next to a link. This is because they know those web pages will load almost instantaneously as compared to the one’s not having that icon. Thus, they click on the links or pages that have enabled AMP.
How to Add AMP in WordPress Website
Enabling AMP for WordPress sites is pretty easy. It requires almost zero backend work and no coding. The procedure is so simple and easy as compared to its positive result that it is indeed difficult for any WordPress site-owner to ignore. To make the task even easier, WordPress has launched a plugin named AMP.
However, many WordPress plugin development companies in India and abroad have poorly rated this plugin. There’s another plugin, named AMP for WP that you may use.
After you install and activate the plugin, go through the installation wizard by clicking on the link you get in the WP Admin > AMP tab in the side menu. The wizard will allow you to select:
- A design format
- Add Google analytics tracking data and
- Post types for which you want to create AMP content
Once you’re done with this, your site will have mobile-optimised pages for the Google bot to crawl through.
