advanced Google Webmaster Blog intermediate mobile performance Uncategorized

Making smartphone sites load fast

John Mueller

Webmaster level: Intermediate

Users tell us they use smartphones to search online because it’s quick and convenient, but today’s average mobile page typically takes more than 7 seconds to load. Wouldn’t it be great if mobile pages loaded in under one second? Today we’re announcing new guidelines and an updated PageSpeed Insights tool to help webmasters optimize their mobile pages for best rendering performance.

Prioritizing above-the-fold content

Research shows that users’ flow is interrupted if pages take longer than one second to load. To deliver the best experience and keep the visitor engaged, our guidelines focus on rendering some content, known as the above-the-fold content, to users in one second (or less!) while the rest of the page continues to load and render in the background. The above-the-fold HTML, CSS, and JS is known as the critical rendering path.

We can achieve sub-second rendering of the above-the-fold content on mobile networks by applying the following best practices:

  • Server must render the response (< 200 ms)
  • Number of redirects should be minimized
  • Number of roundtrips to first render should be minimized
  • Avoid external blocking JavaScript and CSS in above-the-fold content
  • Reserve time for browser layout and rendering (200 ms)
  • Optimize JavaScript execution and rendering time

These are explained in more details in the mobile-specific help pages, and, when you’re ready, you can test your pages and the improvements you make using the PageSpeed Insights
tool.

As always, if you have any questions or feedback, please post in our discussion group.

Posted by Bryan McQuade, Software Engineer, and Pierre Far, Webmaster Trends Analyst

Channel: Local google maps app Google: AdWords Google: Maps & Local local paid search advertising Search Engine Land Uncategorized

New Local Ad View (And AdWords Click Type) Comes To Google Maps App

Ginny Marvin

Google is following up on the recent roll-out of its updated Google Maps app for Android and iOS devices with a new local ad view and click type. The ads appear at the bottom of the screen.  In addition to the standard title and ad text, the ads include the car icon link to get […]

Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

Google

The “Ultimate” List of Google Manual SPAM Action Viewer Messages

Andrew Shotland

Pure SPAMGoogle Webmaster Tools just launched the Manual SPAM Action Viewer which alerts webmasters to manual SPAM issues with their sites.  Like a good SEO consultant, I quickly ran through all of my clients and here are the various messages I encountered – ok, perhaps it’s not so “ultimate” – disavow me if you want: Pure […]

The post The “Ultimate” List of Google Manual SPAM Action Viewer Messages appeared first on Local SEO Guide.

Channel: SEO Google Google Webmaster Tools Google: Webmaster Central Search Engine Land search spam spam Top News Uncategorized webspam

Google Launches Manual Spam Actions Viewer, Streamlines Reconsideration Process

Matt McGee

Google is adding a new feature in Webmaster Tools that will leave no doubt when a site’s search rankings are affected by a manual webspam action. It’s called the Manual Actions viewer, and it’s available today under the “Search Traffic” tab. The new tool complements…

Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

adwords ad extensions Channel: SEM Google: AdWords paid search marketing PPC Search Engine Land Uncategorized

Google AdWords Testing New Drop-Down Navigation Ad Extension

Ginny Marvin

Have you seen this new ad extension keenly spotted by Kim Clinkunbroomer of Philly Marketing Labs? As Clinkunbroomer pointed out, the “I am Looking For” ad extension gives users a drop-down navigation menu with links — in this case 10 — to specific sections of an…

Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

advanced beginner Google Webmaster Blog intermediate Uncategorized webmaster guidelines webmaster tools

View manual webspam actions in Webmaster Tools

Google Webmaster Central
Webmaster level: All

We strive to keep spam out of our users’ search results. This includes both improving our webspam algorithms as well as taking manual action for violations of our quality guidelines. Many webmasters want to see if their sites are affected by a manual webspam action, so today we’re introducing a new feature that should help. The manual action viewer in Webmaster Tools shows information about actions taken by the manual webspam team that directly affect that site’s ranking in Google’s web search results. To try it out, go to Webmaster Tools and click on the “Manual Actions” link under “Search Traffic.”

You’ll probably see a message that says, “No manual webspam actions found.” A recent analysis of our index showed that well under 2% of domains we’ve seen are manually removed for webspam. If you see this message, then your site doesn’t have a manual removal or direct demotion for webspam reasons.

If your site is in the very small fraction that do have a manual spam action, chances are we’ve already notified you in Webmaster Tools. We’ll keep sending those notifications, but now you can also do a live check against our internal webspam systems. Here’s what it would look like if Google had taken manual action on a specific section of a site for “User-generated spam”:

Partial match. User-generated spam affects mattcutts.com/forum/

In this hypothetical example, there isn’t a site-wide match, but there is a “partial match.” A partial match means the action applies only to a specific section of a site. In this case, the webmaster has a problem with other people leaving spam on mattcutts.com/forum/. By fixing this common issue, the webmaster can not only help restore his forum’s rankings on Google, but also improve the experience for his users. Clicking the “Learn more” link will offer new resources for troubleshooting.

Once you’ve corrected any violations of Google’s quality guidelines, the next step is to request reconsideration. With this new feature, you’ll find a simpler and more streamlined reconsideration request process. Now, when you visit the reconsideration request page, you’ll be able to check your site for manual actions, and then request reconsideration only if there’s a manual action applied to your site. If you do have a webspam issue to address, you can do so directly from the Manual Actions page by clicking “Request a review.”

The manual action viewer delivers on a popular feature request. We hope it reassures the vast majority of webmasters who have nothing to worry about. For the small number of people who have real webspam issues to address, we hope this new information helps speed up the troubleshooting. If you have questions, come find us in the Webmaster Help Forum or stop by our Office Hours.

Posted by , Distinguished Engineer

bing Channel: Consumer FTC search engine guidelines update Google Google: User Interface Microsoft: Bing User Interface search engine advertising Search Engine Land Uncategorized Yahoo Yahoo: Search Ads

Bing: We Added A Border To Our Ads To Make Them More Visible

Ginny Marvin

In response to our post yesterday about the often-invisible background shading on ads in the search engine results, Derrick Connel, Corporate Vice President of Bing Program Management at Microsoft, followed up with Danny Sullivan on Facebook to say: As a small comment on Bing — the ads have 2…

Please visit Search Engine Land for the full article.

Content Theory

Embeddable Content Will Force SEO to Return to Its Roots

Michael Martinez

Embeddable content is gradually becoming more popular and homogeneous across the Web. Think of embedding a YouTube video, a Twitter widget, and a custom calculator widget on a page. In the old days we called these “mashup” pages. Today we call them — well, actually, we don’t call them anything. People have tried to move away from creating mashups with third-party content because the search engines came down hard on mashup sites for being too spammy, not unique enough, etc. And yet, as more people explore options for distributing content that doesn’t lead to a duplication of content we’re turning back to embeddable content. Really, you only have two choices when it comes to publishing content: host it on your site or use someone else’s remotely-hosted content on your site. And the search engines do tolerate embeddable content. But they are looking for that additional value that makes the content embedding secondary to the purpose of the page. Embedding Content Is a Fundamental Practice of Web Design You cannot get away from content embedding. We have been doing this as Web designers since the early 1990s when HTML tables were used to manage page layout and Netscape added frames to […]