Once again, the world’s biggest search engine is changing the game – so what does the arrival of Google Core Web Vitals mean for your brand’s online presence?
In simple terms, the new module has been designed to measure how users experience a website’s speed, responsiveness and visual stability – or just one more layer to the puzzle of reaching the top of the search engine’s results.
With the update scheduled for release in May 2021, marketers and brands alike are scrambling to ensure that the changes don’t negatively affect their current web position. If you are looking to do the same, what do you need to know about Google Core Web Vitals?
Understanding Google Core Web Vitals
Once the update is rolled out, Google Core Web Vitals will join the hundreds of other signals used by the search engine to determine results. Like all of the current modules, it’s designed to deliver only the very best results to users that are deemed “authentic”.
The current web vitals that are used to dictate ranking scores include how mobile friendly your page is, how safe browsing on your website is deemed to be, no intrusive interstitials (too many pop ups), and whether you use hypertext transfer protocol secure (HTTPS).
However, there will soon be three more factors that will join the party next year including:
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) – Measures Loading Performance
The time interval between the start of a page load, to when the largest image or text block in a user’s viewport is fully rendered. While you might see the score change as your page loads and when content is visible, but the largest node is still in the backlog yet to be displayed.
First Input Delay (FID) – Measures Interactivity
The amount of time it takes for a page to be ready for user interactivity. What this translates to is that as pages are assembling, Google measures how long it takes for the page to respond to clicks, scrolls, or keyboard input processing their corresponding event handlers.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) – Measures Visual Stability
The measured distance and fraction of the viewport which shifts due to DOM manipulation, or the lack of dimension attributes for major media elements. When we fail to define the dimensions for our hero images, i.e text on our pages first appears only to be displaced, this causes a disruptive content layout “shift” for our users.
How To Measure Your Google Core Web Vitals
Thankfully, brands and businesses still have plenty of time to ensure that their websites are up to scratch by the May roll out. If you aren’t quite sure where to start, the good news is that there are plenty of free resources available out there to measure the overall performance of your website.
Page Speed Insights – You don’t have to be a genius to give this a spin: simply type in a website, and hit go. Google PSI analyzes the content of a web page, then provides suggestions for speed improvement.
Chrome Web Vitals – If you’re already using Google Chrome, all you need to do is download this free web plug in and let it measure the metrics for you. Simply head directly to any website, and fire up the extension.
Google Search Console – If you really want to get stuck into the nitty gritty of your website, then it’s important to measure it from the ground up via the Google Search Console. This is the most in depth form of analytics out there, and provides detailed data to work with.
Where To Find Help In Getting Your Website Up To Speed
In order to make sure that your website is going to pass the tests linked to Google Core Web Vitals, it’s going to need a solid infrastructure first. Producing quality, consistent and on brand content that’s SEO and ultimately Google friendly takes time, effort, experience and resources – and you’re not alone if you can’t quite commit to that. Avoiding the use of Search Engine Optimisation, keywords and content marketing all together may actually be doing your brand a disservice, but thankfully – investing in a solid content marketing strategy has never been easier.
Here at Content Hive, producing top quality digital content is exactly what we do best. We have itemised a list of digital content services, and allocated credits next to each of these. This means that each month, you can use your credits with us to produce digital content such as social media posts, blog articles, videos and even animated Instagram stories.
We believe that this model means we can produce high quality content in faster than normal delivery times. It also means that because you have a monthly credit, you are going to want to make sure you use these up – and so do we – meaning that your digital content is always consistent.
If you aren’t quite sure where to start on your digital marketing journey and would like to speak to a professional, why not book in a free discovery call with us at Content Hive today to discuss how we can get your brand buzzing online.
