One Year Later: How Google AMP Changed SEO for Small Businesses | 2017-09-05

Sept. 5, 2017—Last year, Google announced the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) project, poised to change the mobile web experience. One year later, Business 2 Community evaluated AMP and how it’s changed SEO opportunities for small businesses.

Shortly after Google rolled out the first deployment, Google said the AMPs weren’t drawn into results, just an improvement on the user experience. They have said AMP is not an official ranking factor, however, because AMPs improve site load time, which is a ranking factor, they have played a role in SEO.

Here’s what Business 2 Community found out about AMP:

1. AMP pages are placed higher in the results. AMPs show higher in the mobile search results so users don’t have to vertically scroll. They’re formatted so they show in a horizontal carousel for easy swiping, which gives any top ranked AMP pages great visibility.
2. Most people are actually reading the content. People who click on AMP pages are more likely to engage with the content and less likely to bounce. This makes it a great option for people who use long-form content to cultivate relationships with readers.
3. AMP isn’t solely static. Though they are a stripped-down version of the technology used on the full web, you can still include dynamic content, video, audio, and social sharing buttons. As time goes on, we’ll see additional more complex page elements added.
4. Google Analytics supports Google AMP. Because of this, you can see how users are responding to the AMP versions of your pages. You can track page views, clicks on various parts of your landing pages, and social interactions.
5. AMP Pages won’t generate leads. Until the ability to add opt-in forms comes to AMP, you won’t be able to build leads with it. If that’s your primary focus, you won’t really see any benefit from implementing AMP on your website.
6. AMP could hamper link building efforts. The URL of AMP pages is still rooted in Google.com, so if you get links to your AMP pages, you won’t get the same link juice and benefit you would than if someone linked to your regular page. Since link building plays a major role in good SEO, this is a problem for many websites.
7. Your HTML needs to be flawless. Google won’t cache your AMP pages on the web unless they are 100% free of code errors, so unless you are, or can hire a professional to do the work for you, you may not be able to capitalize on AMP.
8. AMP doesn’t really help eCommerce websites. AMP focuses mostly on long-form content and articles. Generally, this doesn’t provide answers to questions your customers would ask. Unless your business website has a substantial library of blog posts and articles, there isn’t much use for AMP HTML yet.