People can now be found on their phones more than on their desktop computers or laptops. Some have even wholly ditched their computers to rely entirely on their mobile devices. While most spend their time on mobile applications, many use their smartphones to connect to search engines and look for any website that they are seeking.

In a recent study, more people are doing searches on their mobile devices than on desktop. Around  50.13% of the searches done worldwide are made using mobile devices, while only 47.06% of searches are done on a desktop computer. The remaining percentage is made using tablet devices.

With the number of people relying on their phone to visit a website, it is necessary to make sure that your site is optimized for mobile searches. If it takes too long to long, prospect visitors will abandon your site and move on to your competitors. Your website’s average loading time should only take about 3 seconds; if it takes longer than that, your competitors will overshadow your site. If you have been experiencing a slow browse on your data, you can bank on AMP to keep your website on track.

What is Accelerated Mobile Page?

Accelerated mobile pages or AMP is an open-source HTML framework that can make your website load faster and smoother on mobile devices. AMP ensures that your website operates at an optimal speed, increasing and enhancing user experience (UX).

AMP is a collaborative effort of Google, Twitter, and other leading publishers, aiming to make a page become mobile-friendly and make it load quicker than the average speed.  AMP also wants to improve the readability of mobile web pages, making it fruitful for SEO purposes. Google’s AMP also aims to give the best user experience for mobile users who are expected to get big in numbers as the year passes on.

AMP comes as a stripped-down version of your perfect designed HTMP web page to make it lightweight, making it beneficial for companies and enterprises that have massive business websites. This innovation makes your web pages load quicker and boost readability among smartphone users.

Advantages Of Using Accelerated Mobile Page

If you are having doubts about whether to try AMP or not, here are some benefits that you can get when leveraging this technological innovation.

1. Increase Load Time

According to researches made by experts, your webpages should only take 3 seconds to load for your visitors to stay put. Longer times or waiting time of more than 3 seconds will prompt them to leave and abandon your website. Accelerated mobile pages try to help address this issue by storing pre-rendered pages with Google and then loading it instantly when a search is done.

Leveraging AMP can draw in possible visitors to read your content, thus increasing your online presence. This move can improve the user experience within your website as it eliminates the page content’s load time.

2. Aid Your SEO Efforts

According to experts, AMP does not have any direct influence over your SEO rankings.  It is not an established ranking factor. However, one of the most crucial elements in making your site or any of your webpages rank high in search engines is on its load time speed and mobile-friendliness.

As AMP improves your load time speed and making your website more mobile-friendly, it can play a significant factor in helping you rank high in mobile search results. It aids your SEO efforts and helps you grow visibility among your audience, earn trust among your visitors, and enhance your conversion rates.

3. Make Your Website Mobile Optimized

When mobile searches are far more utilized than those done over desktops these days, there is no question whether you need to keep your webpages optimized for mobile use or not. AMP can make your website well mobile optimized as it makes your page load quicker. If any of your website audience is using a mobile device, AMP can improve their experience, making it better for brand retention.

4. Improve Click-Through Rates

AMP makes your web pages load faster and enhances the user experience (UX) of your visitors. Since it makes your website stable, readable, and easily accessible across mobile browsers, it can drive more clicks, improve conversation rates, and rake in more revenue. AMP decreases your bounce rates, which means your visitors will likely click on links on your sites, improving your overall website performance.

Disadvantages of Using Accelerated Mobile Page

While many web developers and website owners have already started incorporating AMP on their web pages, some are still skeptical because of the cons that come with this innovation.

1. Hard To Implement

Many are still having seconds doubts about joining the bandwagon of implementing AMP on their website.  One of the reasons some are skipping this framework is because of how hard it is to apply. AMP implementation a bit tough that is why despite the advantages and potentials it can offer, they opt to do performance boost on their HTML web pages instead. The constant template updates and confliction information about AMP made it even worse as many users scratch their heads in confusion.

2. Loads Save Cached Pages

To make your website load faster, Google saves a cached version or pre-rendered your AMP-enabled pages. These cached pages appear in mobile search results when people look for your website or a topic on your site. Since Google holds these pages, you do not serve your content but just a mere copy of your web page.

Some publishers fear that they might lose control over the distribution rights, making them lost their ad revenue. Though it is initially created to help businesses make their efforts grow exponentially, publishers and industry analysts experts voiced their concern over the real intention and position of Google with these pre-rendered pages.

3. Does Not Produce Leads and Subscribers

AMP strips down your web pages to the most basic, and it will not show any of your pop-ups that help gather leads, opt-in forms, your sidebar widgets, or even your social share buttons. All of these essentials help you produce leads and gain subscribers; without these on your web pages, you can decrease your lead production.

Final Thoughts: Should You Get AMP For Your Website?

These days, the number of people relying on the smartphone is growing immensely. Consumers are now spending time on their mobile devices to browse for information, do shopping online, and get valuable insights on the internet. Enhancing your website performance for the mobile audience should be on top of your list.

However, this does not necessarily mean that you should apply AMP right away. Depending on the type of website you have, whether your web pages are light or not, you can help determine if you should leverage AMP. If your site is lightweight, load fast, and you do not have thick and heavy content that affects your site’s speed, you may not need to lean on AMP. You can optimize your web pages to be mobile friendly with plugins and responsive themes.

On the other note, if most of your website visitors use mobile devices or smartphones to access your site, you should consider banking on AMP to help your website’s overall performance.

This article is contributed by Maricar Morga , Content Writing at Softvire Australia