Will Page Speed Become A Ranking Factor For Google In 2018?
Reading Time: 5 minutes When the year 2018 starts, most of the SEO experts speculate that page speed will become a ranking factor for Google. Will it really happen?
Yes Indeed,
To be precise, Google announced at the end of January that a website’s page speed will be a ranking factor for all the mobile searches from July 2018. So, fellas, it is now official. If you have an online audience that uses mobile devices and you rely on online mobile devices for advertising, you need to pay attention.
Just want to be clear, in the year 2016, mobile traffic officially cross over the desktop traffic. I will be surprised if you aren’t paying attention to mobile search optimization.
In this post, you will learn everything about the page speed update of Google. In addition to that, you will also learn about how you can ensure that nothing negative affects your business with this update.
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The Page Speed Update Of Google
Don’t think that page speed was never a ranking factor before this announcement. It was a ranking factor from 2009. Then what this announcement is? Is it a hoax? No of course not. Page ranking becomes a ranking factor officially for the first time. And the main point in all this is it will be a factor for mobile searches.
Page speed always has an impact on the SEO rankings of a website. But it was always side kicked by major updates such as RankBrain. Now, for instance, RankBrain update is an AI. It drops the rank of the website whose bounce rate is high. Why will a website have a high bounce rate? Speed here is a subfactor.
The point is, page speed was always there as a ranking factor. It was just overshadowed by bigger factors or terms. Now, this announcement proves to be one of the biggest updates in 2018. This will surely bring a lot of negative impact on those websites which gives slow user experience to their users.
Let’s move on to the next point which is,
Adjusting Your SEO Strategies For The Page Speed Update
You must be wondering whether your website will take that hit or not. Lucky for you, there are many tools that can help you evaluate your page speed. Not just the speed but also the elements where you can improve.
GTMetrix and TestMySite are some of the tools which will help you in evaluating the page speed and the factors that are affecting it. TestMySite uses a 3G connection which is most common in every part of the globe. It will identify the areas where your website needs improvement.
These tools do not need admin login for the website, so you can also use them to analyze your competitors as well. This study can help you in improving your own website and rank better than your competitors.
Now, let’s move on to the SEO strategies you need to adapt in order to avoid any penalties. Here you go,
You Need To Switch To AMP
AMP, Accelerated Mobile Pages is an apt technology that is always preferred by Google. An AMP is a necessary alteration for the source code of your website. In the simplest term, Accelerated Mobile Pages are super fast in loading. They can cut down your page load time to 85% (I know that is astonishing!!!).
However, there is one more point worth noting that you don’t need an AMP page to make your website’s mobile experience super fast–however, if you are looking for a quick shot to speed your page loading time, then yes it is worth a try!
Did You Think About The Intent Of Mobile Search?
This is a point that really is important. Think it like that, you are in a movie theatre and want to know the IMDB rating of the movie. Instead of typing “IMDB Rating Of The Movie”, you will go for “The Movie”. That’s it. So you see the change in the keyword.
Apart from that, the timing of the info is crucial. You must want to know the rating instantly. So, yes faster page speed all over again.
One of the studies finds out that over 40% of the mobile searches intent for local information. So, you need to make your local pages fast. It is conclusive. Now you know where to look.
Leverage PageSpeed Insights.
How fast can you check issues about your mobile pages usability and speed? With PageSpeed Insights and Search Console, it is very quick and efficient. For usability of your website, you can use Search Console. It will help you find all the crawl errors on your website which might be affecting your website’s usability. It will also help you find how crawlers see your website. You can find this option on “Fetch on Google”.
For the speed of your web page, you can leverage PageSpeed Insights. You will get the grade for your website’s speed and you can speculate and fix the errors to improve your grade gradually.
Is There Any Impact On Your Google AdWord Account?
I bet there is. You might be wondering that what you have to do with the page speed of your website through ads as they will redirect your users to the landing page. Now, Google has clearly communicated that you must decrease the page load time or the visibility of your ad will decrease drastically.
Their guidelines are like this,
- Make relevant and compelling content
- Project yourself as trustworthy
- Keep the navigation simple
- Must decrease your page load time (That’s the one I am talking about)
- Make Your Website Faster (This one too)
Over To You
So, now you know what is at stake here. A huge chunk of mobile users which can be your potential prospects and your AdWord campaign which can fall into oblivion if you didn’t act on your page speed.
You need to make sure that your page speed is fast and the usability of your website for the mobile user is ideal. Only then you can rank better in SERPs.
Do you like the post? Give me your views on this Google Page Speed Update via my social media channels. Till then Adios!!!
Author Bio: Sarah Clarke works as a writer for Media Fortress, an SEO Agency offering cost-effective search engine optimisation services in Perth. She is a web addict and spends too much time in front of the computer. When she actually manages to get away for more than 10 minutes, she is usually reading books, traveling or shooting photos. For more blogs, you can follow her on Google+, Facebook, and Twitter.
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