The following was posted on Google’s Inside AdWords Blog by Jerry Dischler, Vice President, Product Management, Google.
Succeeding on mobile starts with getting the basics right. People choose brands that meet their needs instantly and seamlessly. That means no matter how great your site looks, if it loads slowly, users will leave and you’ll miss out.
Today we’re introducing two new ways to harness the speed of AMP to improve advertising performance. First, we’re launching a new AdWords beta that lets you use fast-loading AMP pages as the landing pages for your search ads. Second, we’re speeding up ads served across the Google Display Network by using the same technology that makes AMP pages so fast.
Improving campaign ROI with AMP landing pages
We’ve said before that the median page load time for an AMP page from Google Search is under one second. If that wasn’t already fast enough, last week we announced that these pages are now twice as fast. No wonder AMP has been so widely adopted – more than 2 billion AMP pages have been published from 900,000 domains. Advertisers like Johnson & Johnson, Toll Brothers and eBay have already seen increased engagement with their brand by directing people to AMP pages from organic search results.
The new AdWords beta brings the performance benefits of faster mobile pages to search campaigns. Now, when advertisers link their search ads to AMP landing pages, consumers will get the fast mobile web experiences they’ve come to expect from AMP pages on Google Search. If you’re interested in participating in the beta, sign up here.
“We understand the importance of speed in delivering effective advertising campaigns. That is why we’re incredibly excited to apply the speed of AMP to our paid campaigns in AdWords,” says Aaron Cocks, Online Marketing Optimization Manager at Toll Brothers
“Johnson & Johnson has seen great results in testing AMP with our product information pages. For specific pages, we’ve seen page speeds improve by 10x and engagement rates improve by 20%. J&J is looking forward to expanding our application of AMP,” says Paul Ortmayer, Head of Digital Analytics – EMEA at Johnson & Johnson
Ensuring display ads are seen with AMP
When ads load fast, people are more likely to see them. That means media budgets work more effectively and messaging strategies realize their full potential. Fast-loading ads also create better experiences for users.
To make ad experiences on the web a lot better and faster, the AMP Project launched the AMP Ads Initiative last year. The Initiative applies the technology powering fast-loading AMP pages to ads.
As of today, a significant number of ads shown on AMP pages across the Google Display Network are automatically converted and served in the new AMP ad format. We’ve found these ads load up to 5 seconds faster than regular ads even though the creative looks exactly the same. Ultimately, this ensures that your messages are actually seen by your intended audience and that the experience users have with your brand is seamless.
Speed matters. To meet the needs of today’s customers, you have to be fast. Bringing the speed and performance of AMP to advertising will help you deliver more effective campaigns that keep up with accelerating consumer expectations.
Posted by Jerry Dischler, Vice President, Product Management