GOOGLE PAGE EXPERIENCE: DID IT BITE?Google Page Experience: Did it Bite?

Google is trying to bring more value to the web experiences of users, thus setting new standards for websites to follow. How will businesses benefit from the Google Page Experience update though?

The people behind the new Google Page Experience update have taken things further by taking certain factors into account, such as a website’s performance, visual errors or aberrations, interactiveness and other security-related aspects. A huge focus has also been placed on “mobile-friendliness” since the month of April, where Google has included this as a determining factor in website rankings. This will consequently make it much easier for web surfers to get more relevant and accurate results. However, all of these are changing the rankings and dynamics of search results and in turn requiring quick adaptation and attention to these factors especially for smaller local business owners and individuals. Users, however, will be getting better high-quality content with more interactive stable website experiences. Some factors in the Google Page Experience update, such as the Cumulative Layout Shift analyze a website’s visual stability, thus eliminating experiences of instability and errors due to third party ads in websites that do not render correctly, or incorrect parameters. 

How This Update Will Affect Businesses

The main driving force behind this update is to satisfy users, it is up to Google to provide the most optimised and accurate results to the users that trust Google. Hence, it is the responsibility of Google to ensure the performance and quality of the results. Google is offering the most premium and high ranking spots to those websites which qualify, going beyond the realm of high quality or engaging content. Google wishes to narrow results even further and provide results with websites that perform well in their metrics. Businesses that won’t follow through with the modifications necessary to pass the benchmarks or protocols will definitely lag behind in ranking and it will reflect in search results heavily. However, businesses that satisfy Google’s updated norms will profit greatly from this as Google only wants to show high quality and relevant content to its users. 

The click-through rate will definitely see an increase in better-performing websites, as Google will always provide the most relevant and high-quality content to offer a satisfactory user experience.

The new metrics mean that businesses have to optimise themselves more and put increased focus on their websites with the promise from Google that it will monitor and put the best performing websites on top. Businesses can take advantage of this by making sure that they score well in the signals and existing sub-signals that have gotten introduced with the Google Page Experience update. These signals help determine how well a local business will perform by showing up for more interested buyers nearby or how many more users across the globe can websites reach out to through relevant searches on Google.

Google believes in expertise, trustworthiness and authority, thus ensuring that the websites which indicate an acceptable score in the ranking signals gain the exposure they need based on relevant searches.

Google wishes to provide a visual indicator for websites that exceed Google Page Experience benchmarks, further enhancing the reliability and trustability of websites with these indicators in search results. These positive visual indicators will definitely increase more clicks and visits to businesses and websites, further improving organic rankings and ad reach or positioning as well. The Google Page Experience update also puts increased focus on mobile traffic and mobile experiences of users, hence prioritising businesses with mobile-friendly websites. With the amount of mobile usage increasing for everyday work and especially with users using their mobile phones for about 60% of the total searches on Google, websites that are optimised for mobiles and are more responsive will definitely get the cake. As of 2020, 68.1% of the total website visits globally were from mobile devices; Google Page Experience ensures that well-optimised websites get the reach they deserve. This will heavily impact local businesses as most of the local searches are done on mobiles, such as looking for a restaurant or a cafe, checking the best stores nearby or online products. 

Some Things Businesses Need To Know...

With the benefits the Google Page Experience brings to web-masters, it has also increased the responsibility of developers and website owners to optimise and upgrade their pages to satisfy Google’s benchmarks. Even though webmasters can hire experts in this field, one can definitely learn about how to get better conversion rates and more business on their own. One must view the new updates as an opportunity to gain more visibility and to increase sales. Here are some factors that businesses and webmasters need to consider when wondering about how to perform better in the search signals.

Speed

A delay in loading can lead to a massive decrease in conversion rates. For instance, a 100-millisecond delay can lead to a 7% drop in conversion rates. 40 percent of users abandon pages that do not load within 3 seconds and with 47 percent of users expecting web pages to load in less than 2 seconds, enormous importance should be placed on speed and factors that affect the loading time of pages. Both smaller and larger businesses can lose out on sales or visits from interested consumers while websites can lose out on traffic for ads due to delay. In order to clear the benchmark for performance, websites need to strive for a 2.5-second LCP, which stands for Largest Contentful Paint. This determines the average time required for the main content to load.

Responsiveness and Interactiveness

FID or First Input Delay stands for the duration taken from the first interaction with a page till the time the page is able to deliver or process a response to the interaction.

The FID should be less than 100 milliseconds and this can be ensured by checking if JavaScript elements or JavaScript-powered events are being parsed and loaded for too long. This can be avoided by keeping a track of events occurring that are leading to delays.
This metric can only be troubleshooted by a real user and is not automated. The responsiveness of the pages also plays a huge role in the user experience and in total visits as satisfied visitors re-visit responsive websites that work well across all kinds of devices. Webmasters must also now ensure that their web pages are mobile-friendly to secure good spots in search results.

Picture by Pixabay taken from Pexels.

Stability

Stability is one of the biggest determining signals for Google. The Cumulative Layout Shift or CLS measures the visual stability of web pages and requires websites to have a score of 0.1 or less. The visual stability of a webpage is determined by the ratio of the total individual layout shifts and the unexpected layout shifts. This score is acquired by analysing the movements of any set of unstable elements within two frames which have been rendered. The final scores are determined by the impact and distance fraction of these movements.

Other Factors

There are many pre-existing benchmarks and prerequisites that Google demands on the updated Google Page Experience which are definitely very important. Even for a business, the consumers should be able to navigate around with ease on the website of the business and find the information that is required or necessary. Pages should be administered well to not contain deceptive, malicious or unsafe content as well as maintain transparency. SSL certificates should be issued with pages being directed through HTTPS, making the connection secure. These are fundamentals of getting the website live and open for business and having a positive impact on the consumer base and future visitors. 

Key-Takeaways

Google wishes to provide the most accurate and accessible environment for information, to do this, it is focusing on the user’s experience more than ever. Google is providing enough room for most websites and businesses who meet the requirements to prosper and benefit from this update, while sites that fail to follow through shall face challenges. Most of these concerns can be handled by reputable agencies and individuals with expertise in this field, making this a very easy transition.

Business owners might not need to master Google’s Web Vitals and the process of maintaining the signals as demanded by the new Google Page Experience, however, these changes and updates from Google’s end require action from business owners and need them to invest in new strategies for more conversion and sales, fundamentally needing to show up in more results in better positions.

The introduction of Web Vitals and the metrics that go along with it have definitely encouraged business and website owners to take things further in the areas of user experience and measure up to certain standards, however, it can be looked at with a positive perspective, trusting Google’s better judgement and going along with the requirements to yield the best possible results from the web.