Bharati Ahuja

Google Jamboard - The Integration of the Whiteboard and The Cloud

Google Jamboard is finally unveiled for sale after it was announced last October (2016) that it would reach the market pretty soon. Although, there has been a bit delay in its scheduled entry into the market nonetheless the much-awaited Jamboard from the search engine giant Google has finally and eventually hit the market big time in May’ 2017. It is being viewed as a direct response to the Microsoft Surface Hub. The Google Jamboard is a part of the G Suite family. It is an interactive cloud-based digital whiteboard from the house of Google. It comes at a price of $4,999 with a yearly support fee of $600.

With a 55’’ 4K touchscreen display, 120 Hz touch scan rate and 60Hz refresh rate, Google Jamboard is endowed with online collaboration and having cross-platform support enabled. There is the option of both mounting the display onto a wall and configuring it into a stand as well by default.

Google-Jamboard

Google Jamboard has the prudence of identifying and thereby detecting up to 16 touch points anywhere within. It has also got Wi-Fi connectivity, an HD front-facing camera, built-in speakers and microphone.

A dedicated stylus is present to control the touchscreen and for controlling the device as a whole. There is also an eraser to give the entity a complete shape in terms of use and functionality.

The Jamboard has an OS (Android 6.0 Marshmallow) coinciding with the G Suite ecosystem. Any G Suite compatible service can be performed on any connected device. The main functionality of the Google Jamboard is to facilitate users to join and work together on projects inside the available space. The access to Google Jamboard gives business meetings, corporate discussions and presentations a whole new dimension as not only multiple jamboards can be used in the same room but people can connect remotely also through Jamboard app on a phone or a tablet.

The best part of using Google Jamboard is that it feels exactly akin to writing on a traditional whiteboard with a highly responsive, pressure-sensitive and accurate display. Jamboard indeed is the centre of interest and activity in a creative workplace. Moreover, it is rather easy to move it around from one place to another with its portable stand and single-cable setup. Furthermore, to add to it, there is nothing to be wary of regarding running out of batteries or ink for there is a passive stylus which does not require any pairing but is a “plug-and play” design. Its working methodology is exactly like that of a whiteboard and hence in spite of drawing with a stylus, it can be easily removed with finger.

The Google Jamboard comes with a shape and handwriting recognition feature. The users of Google G Suite can log into a Jam Session (as Google terms it) via the Jamboard itself or on companion iOS and Android apps. However, no Microsoft companion app for Jamboard is there. Anyone having a G Suite account can go on and begin a Jam Session by clicking on the screen. The ones who are initiating the session can invite anyone to join the session. With Google Hangout, users with Jamboard companion apps can make edits or participate in the Jam by using their smartphones or tablets. Remote users with access to the app can add stuff to the Jamboard and it really takes a very short time to do so. Users who do not possess the Jamboard application too can be a part of the entire set-up but their participation in this context would only be limited to view-only mode i.e. passive as they won’t be having the permission to access the jamboard like other active users of the Jam who have got the jamboard application at their disposal.

The Google Jamboard is primarily and solely designed to expedite business collaboration. The two fields of operation where the Google Jamboard would find enormous application and the two fields which would benefit unprecedentedly from Google Jamboard are obviously business enterprises and the education sector.

With Google adding G Suite support to Jamboard, users can access and edit Docs, Sheets, Slides, Photos, etc. directly and with ease. With the Google Jamboard there is the provision of working with teammates and peers from across the world with Google Hangout and Google Cast in order to set up broadcasts and collaborations or work remotely by making use of the companion app to good effect.

In a word, with the Google Jamboard the orthodox whiteboard moves into the zone of cloud erasing boundaries and sharing ideas in a real-time scenario. For better and enhanced connections, the Jamboard has got its own phone and tablet app. The Jamboard is quite reflective. And the entire structure is pretty thick. The styluses that comes with it provides an aesthetic and serene feel. The Google Jamboard undoubtedly presents with a polished and well-thought-out software experience. The entire thing is controlled and managed by a panel which is stationed either on the left or right. The jamboard also at once can act as a video conferencing machine. The structure of the Google Jamboard is quite big indeed and is rectangular square in shape with a rounded plastic back. A small horizontal line is centred at the bottom as power indicator. Collaborative brainstorming done via whiteboard scribbling is essentially the fundamental function of Google Jamboard. The Google Jamboard is available in three different colours- blue, red and gray. The Google Jamboard offers some great flexibility. Everything gets saved to Google Drive as Jamboard doesn’t have any internal memory of its own. It has also got the unique ability to straighten the shapes, symbols, lines, etc. so as to make sure that everything looks neat, clean and tidy. Everything is under complete command with the Google Jamboard in hand. The Jamboard besides converting handwriting into type also can give drawings digital shapes on its own. For PC and MAC users to get into the thick of things, they need to sign in through Chrome.

The Google Jamboard is a mind-boggling innovation from Google and there is no denying the fact that it would have a far-reaching effect and a long-lasting impact especially and precisely on the educational sector and businesses.

Google / News - 06/20/2017

SEO Audit Checklist 2017

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Google / SEO - 05/29/2017

Understanding The Google AMP Cache

AMP is a way to build web pages for static content that render fast. Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) is an open content ecosystem which aims at giving the user a great reading and surfing experience.

Speed has always been the main quality criteria for Google as page load speed is the first impression that the user gets about the website.
The AMP ecosystem works entirely on the concept of caching. Hence, understanding the importance of the AMP cache is imperative for every SEO and online marketer who, advocate the implementation of AMP to their clients.

amp-project

AMP in action consists of three different parts:
• AMP HTML
• AMP JS
• Google AMP cache

AMP HTML

AMP HTML is a subset of HTML for authoring content pages such as news articles which helps improve UX by reducing the page load time.

AMP JS

To avoid the delay in page rendering AMP manages resource handling and asynchronous loading but third-party JavaScript is kept out of the critical path.

Google AMP Cache

The Google AMP Cache is a proxy-based content delivery network for delivering all valid AMP documents. It fetches AMP HTML pages, caches them, and improves page performance automatically.

What is a Cache server?

A cache server is a dedicated network server or service acting as a server that saves Web pages or other Internet content locally. By placing previously requested information in temporary storage, or cache, a cache server both speeds up access to data and reduces demand on an enterprise's bandwidth.

What is Google AMP Cache?

The Google AMP Cache is a cache of validated AMP documents published to the web. It is available for anyone to use. Google products, including Google Search, serve valid AMP documents and their resources from the cache to provide a fast user experience across the mobile web.

The concerns regarding AMP Cache are:

• The major concern for many is that their pages are served from a cached server which is out of their control.
• Many are also worried about the fact that the cached version served to the user may vary from the original version.
• Analytics attribution is another concern regarding AMP.

But, in fact there is no reason to worry about the AMP Cache delivery network.

• Every time the AMP content is served from the AMP Cache, the content is auto updated, and the updated version is served to the next user.
• The AMP cache uses the "stale-while-revalidate" model. It uses the original server caching headers, such as Max-Age, to judge the freshness of the content.
• The AMP cache model attributes the traffic to the publisher through the <amp-analytics> tag. The AMP supports a large number of analytics providers.
• When the AMP page is requested from the AMP cache, it is validated first. The page will not be served to the user if any problems are detected. Hence, it ensures quality pages are displayed on the user’s device.
• The main reason for a fast and user friendly experience is the pre-rendering feature. Due to pre-rendering the pages are served instantly.
• This is pre-rendering undoubtedly can be done from origin servers instead of the AMP cache but that uses up the bandwidth, CPU resources and battery of that server. This may affect the speed and contradict the main purpose of hosting AMP pages.
• The AMP cache also ensures security against XSS as in does not allow Cross-site scripting in the main document.
• Moreover, AMP is a win-win for users, publishers and advertisers. When you search on a search platform, the AMP pages as they come from the cache they do not associate the search term to it.
Optimizations, Modifications And HTML sanitization

The Google AMP Cache performs optimizations and modifications, such as the following:
• Validates if the content meets all the AMP norms.
• The AMP Cache along with the document caches images and fonts too.
• Optimizes image dimensions to prevent memory issues and poor responsiveness.
• The amp-img tag removes the EXIF data and some metadata which can create issues or may be invisible.
• Converts GIF, PNG, and JPEG format images to WebP in browsers that support WebP.
• Serves over a secure channel (HTTPS) and uses the latest web protocols (SPDY, HTTP/2).
• In making the above transformations, the Google AMP Cache disregards the “Cache-Control: no-transform” header.
• All HTML comments are removed.
• Tag and attribute names are rewritten in lowercase.
• Attribute values are consistently quoted and escaped.
• All tags are closed, except for HTML5 void elements.
• Whitespace inside tags is removed.
• Text is escaped.
• Encoded text characters are simplified, using UTF-8 equivalent characters.
• Elements that can only be in the body get moved into the body.
• Outbound links are made absolute so that they continue to work when the document is served from the Google AMP Cache origin instead of the publisher origin.

The Google AMP cache not only ensures optimization of web pages but also validates them. Regarding Ads. Last year the Google AMP team laid out four core principles i.e speed, beauty, security and how to use all these 3 together.

If the AMP pages are being served from the cache then how will the ads be displayed?

The AMP Project announced the open source AMP for Ads initiative in July to work on the UX regarding ads on AMP pages. The initiative’s goal is to fix the foundation of digital advertising on the web, applying the principles of AMP to advertising and making ads faster, more beautiful and secure.

Since the announcement, AMP Ads have come a long way. Publishers across the world like The Washington Post, The Guardian, and USAToday have been testing AMP Ads experience for Publishers and users.

If the AMP pages are being served from the cache, then, what about the ads on the AMP pages?

There is still a long way to go and Google is yet exploring the use of AMP for ads.
According to Google, In the future:
• ads will be statically analyzable to be safe and behave well,
• they will be able to use a common set of functionality to significantly reduce bandwidth consumption,
• CPU usage will be limited to on-screen ads, maximizing battery life,
• and ads will be coordinated with the page making sure that primary content and functionality can always be buttery smooth at 60 frames per second.

Google says, we are trying to build a user-experience-first ecosystem for advertising on the web and, looking at the success of AMP in publishing, it might just work.

AMP - Accelerated Mobile Pages / Google / SEO - 03/07/2017

The Benefits of Combining Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) & Progressive Web Apps (PWA)

Google's core principle is: "Focus on the user and all else will follow." Page load time is a website's first impression for the user. That impression is directly correlated to the bounce rate of traffic to that website. User experience starts when the page loads and continues to be enriched with every tap or click. When each subsequent page loads like you are flipping a magazine, the user forms a positive impression of the whole experience of browsing that website. Undoubtedly, a seamless browsing experience leads to engaged users and results in more clicks, repeat visits, and more sales.

As traffic increasingly comes from mobile devices now, site speed is a crucial aspect of any website.

Google has been working on speeding up Google websites and has also been encouraging website owners to improve site speed with their latest developments: AMP and PWA. Both are different but can deliver amazing user experience when implemented together.

Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) are lightweight pages designed to load quickly on mobile devices. AMPs are served from the Google AMP Cache, which is a proxy-based content delivery network for delivering all valid AMP documents. It fetches AMP HTML pages, caches them, and improves page performance automatically.

AMP can ensure instant page load but cannot retain the same performance in case of complex functions like online payments and other dynamic functionality. That is where Progressive Web Apps (PWA) come to the rescue.

PWA adds the advantages of a native app to the website. PWA uses features like Service Workers, Push Notifications, and Web App Manifests.

What Is a Service Worker?

A Service Worker is a scriptable intermediate layer between the web page and the network. It is a script that the browser runs in the background, separate from a web page. It includes features like push notifications and background sync.

A Service Worker gives access to an API that provides a programmable network proxy within the client-side context. It makes it easier to create web applications that can handle network requests offline while browsing in varying network speeds. At times, an HTTP request is made but a response is not received on the mobile devices, which can happen when the user goes through a tunnel, or the network varies from 2G to 3G, or the user automatically joins a saturated WiFi network. The Service Worker allows developers to cache assets when connected and offers a seamless experience when offline so user experience is maintained.

Things to Note About a Service Worker

A Service Worker is not HTML or XML. It is a JavaScript Worker. Hence, the Service Worker does not access the DOM directly. The script communicates with the relevant pages by responding to messages sent by using the postMessage interface, and those pages can then access the DOM if required.
A Service Worker is basically a proxy server which serves between apps, browsers, and the network when available. It allows you to control and handle network requests from the pages.
The Service Worker script does not run when not in use, and restarts when it’s next needed. Hence, you cannot rely on global state handlers. If there is information that you need to reuse on restart, service workers do have access to the IndexedDB API, which stores data inside the user’s browser.
Service Workers use Javascript Promises on a large scale. Technically, a Promise is a proxy for a value not necessarily known when the promise is created.
The browser needs to support Service Workers. Service Workers are supported by Firefox and Opera. Microsoft Edge is now showing public support.

Web App Manifests

The web app manifest is a JSON file. It is a simple text file which has the metadata for the app. This JSON allows you:

to control the look and feel of the app
to control how the app is launched
to display icons for the user home screen and splash screen which is displayed while the app is loading

When the app is launched, you can specify which page gets loaded as well as the screen orientation (portrait/landscape view).

Why Do We Need to Take PWA Seriously?

MobileApps ios-android

In 2013, according to Flurry Analytics, 80% of the mobile user’s time was spent inside apps and 20% on the mobile web.

With mobile devices becoming smarter, the time inside apps is surely going to increase.
The app needs to be installed on the mobile device which takes up a lot of storage space. PWA runs from the server leaving a lot of free space for the user on the mobile device.
According to a test, some native apps took up 460 MB of space whereas the PWA just needed 1 MB.
In the case of an app, the user needs to be notified to update it. The PWA lives on the server so there is no update distribution lag.
PWA can work offline.
PWA, being a website fortified with the benefits of an app, is linkable, searchable, and indexable.
flipkart.com had decided to discontinue their website and go app only, but that did not go well with the users. After their PWA named FlipKart Lite the statistics showed 40% returning visitors, +63 conversions from home screen visits, more time spent on FlipKart Lite. https://developers.google.com/web/showcase/2016/flipkart

The Mobile User Experience Journey From AMP to PWA

The Mobile user taps on the AMP search results and lands on the AMP page of your website.
The page loads instantly and the user starts reading the content.
The user taps on one the links on the AMP. This user gets navigated away from the AMP cache and is now served a page from the server.
The Service Worker script starts getting executed and an app-like experience is delivered to the user.
The user keeps reading the content as the script runs in the background and does not interfere with the user experience.
In fact, it enhances it by ensuring that the user is served the pages despite the network speed fluctuating. The user experience does not get affected in case the device switches to WiFi from Mobile Network or loses the internet connectivity for any reason. The PWA will further offer the option to the user to add the icon to the home screen just like a native app.
If the user adds the icon to the home screen, the user has access to app-like features and the website without installing the App.

Publications like the Washington Post have reported great success with PWA and AMP. The two technologies complement each other: “AMP is a way to start fast, and PWA is a way to stay fast and stay engaged."

AMP helps in getting content to users faster by improving page load performance. PWA uses modern web capabilities to deliver an app-like user experience. AMP is like putting the website on a diet to give a lean display, whereas PWA is the necessary protein given to the website for a continuous robust performance. AMP helps in creating the first positive impression but PWA helps in retaining it.

Image Credits

Featured Image: https://events.google.com

In post Images: http://flurrymobile.tumblr.com/

AMP - Accelerated Mobile Pages / SEO - 03/01/2017

Seven Priorities For SEO 2017

SEO in 2017 is more technical than ever before. The SEO industry has reached an era where, the true identity and importance of SEO services has started being spelt out.

Search engine algorithms now are more sophisticated and can see thru spam more efficiently. So, if you are trying to manipulate the search results using old black hat techniques then you should quit the SEO industry immediately.

seo-2017

The array of seven entities which will create the SEO spectrum for 2017 are:

1. Quality Content:

We all have heard since long that, Content is “King”. Content will continue to reign supreme. As, without quality content, no web presence can serve any purpose. Only when the content is original, informative, compelling, it answers the user queries and also is in the right format, the users will be interested in reading or viewing it. SEO efforts can only help in improving the search presence of the content. But if the bounce rates are high and the content does not serve the purpose of the user then the bots are also going to push the content back in the search results.

2. AMP Compliance and Mobile Friendly:

AMP is an open source initiative by Google launched in October 2015. After working on the AMP Project and indexing AMP, Google has started showing AMP in search results since September 2016.

Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) are lightweight pages designed to load quickly on mobile devices. AMP-compliant pages use a subset of HTML with a few extensions. AMP improves the user experience by reducing the page load time by displaying the lighter version of the web page. If in case the website is not AMP compliant then having a responsive website is a must because mobile-friendliness is a ranking factor.

There are more number of mobile devices than the number of people in the world. Google soon is going to have a separate index for mobile which will be a primary one. If your website is not mobile-friendly or responsive and is neither AMP compliant then having a good mobile search presence is just not possible.

3. Structured Data And Schemas:

Structured data refers to kinds of data with a high level of organization, such as information in a relational database. When information is highly structured and predictable, search engines can more easily organize and display it in creative ways.

Structured data markup is a text-based organization of data that is included in a file and served from the web. It typically uses the schema.org vocabulary—an open community effort to promote standard structured data in a variety of online applications.

Structured Data on a web page can be provided by using:

JSON-LD is the recommended format. Google is in the process of adding JSON-LD support for all markup-powered features. By adding structured data you are adding meaning and relevance to it for the search engines to correlate better.

Google also encourages the use of structured data by giving information regarding it in Search Console and by offering a structured data testing tool.

The Semantic Web isn’t just about putting data on the web. It is about making links, so that a person or machine can explore the web of data. With linked data, when you have some of it, you can find other, related, data. Semantics or Structured Data add extra information to help you with the meaning of the information. Web sites using Schemas will be able to get more correlated to the contextual content.

seo-spectrum-2017

4. Artificial Intelligence/RankBrain:

RankBrain by Google, the machine-learning artificial intelligence system is a software which is integrated into the algorithm to mathematically connect words and phrases. RankBrain uses artificial intelligence to embed vast amounts of written language into mathematical entities — called vectors — that the computer can understand.

When a search takes place on Google, the search query now gets accessed by the RankBrain program/software to deliver more relevant search results. Especially if the query is a rare one.

By making the query accessible to software (RankBrain), the software will essentially become able to understand knowledge, think about knowledge via mathematical computations using word and phrase vectors, and create new knowledge. In other words, the software will be able to be more intelligent – not as intelligent as humans perhaps, but more intelligent than say, the word to word mapping is today. Especially for rare queries which need to be understood to deliver results.

For quality search results, Google wants to move away from word to word mapping and reach a level of, understanding the meaning behind the search query. Algorithms today are getting tuned to understand the intent of the user and display results which will be more useful for the user to take decisions or will give him more detailed information about the topic he is searching.

5. Voice Search:

Voice search is the next big frontier which needs to be given importance. The Mobile Voice Study by the Mountain View, CA, a provider of search, online advertising technologies and other Internet products and services found that 55 percent of teens aged 13-18 use voice search every day, while 56 percent of adults said using voice search makes them feel tech-savvy. Voice search is not about rankings or listings but being a part of the conversation.

As we can see that people prefer the video content more than text content when browsing from smartphones and mobile devices. The trend is moving to viewing content and to other formats which save time. Voice search avoids the hassle of keying in the query which is going to be a next big search revolution.

Google Webmaster Trends Analyst John Mueller said in a Google hangout, at the 23-minute mark, that Google is looking for ways to show webmasters in the Google Search Console how people are finding their pages through voice search. 2017 is the time to prepare for the voice search scenario.

6. Social Media Outreach & Engagement.

Social Media is a platform which is here to stay. The social media sites may gain or lose preference but people surely check the social media accounts to get an idea about the company approach towards its customers.

Search and Social integration will only become stronger by the day and search algorithms will also be smart to filter social spam. Social Media platforms also are working on making their search functionality stronger. Hence, if the user goes to search and then reaches the social media accounts for further information or the user goes to social media accounts and the uses its search/search engines for more details is not imperative. But, having a social media presence is a must for putting your best foot forward and your voice heard.

7. Security

It's been two years since Google started its active campaign for Web security and announced HTTP to be a ranking factor.

‘Trust’ is the icing of the multi layer semantic cake and signature and encryption as the two main structures. Ensuring security for the user can make the website trust worthy for the user.

semantic-layer

Secure sites generate a better CTR and users feel more confident in sharing personal data. eCommerce sites with payment gateways cannot underestimate the importance of having a secure site.

Security is a top priority for Google. Google also gives a ranking boost to HTTPS/SSL sites, provided the site has quality content. Security of a site influences the trust factor. But, moving from HTTP to HTTPS has a series of SEO repercussions which need to be kept in mind.

Just as white light consists of a collection of colors, white hat SEO in 2017 will be the result of the correct implementation of the above mentioned points.

SEO services are becoming niche and are getting a definite meaning and form eventually. Finally, the much-awaited era for genuine SEO is in the offing.

SEO - 01/10/2017

A Humble Request to Search Engine Land Editors

If you are passionate about SEO then www.searchengineland.com has to be on your priority list for latest search updates. Hence, being passionate about SEO and the search industry, I have been an avid reader of the searchenginland.com content. After the official Google Webmaster’s blog https://webmasters.googleblog.com/ the SEL blog is one of the most trusted and reliable sources for any SEO updates.

After my humble experience in this field, I have been a contributor to some reputed blogs like SEJ, SEW, MOZ, Level343 and of course my company blog. The Author profile links are as follows:

https://www.searchenginejournal.com/author/bharati-ahuja/

https://searchenginewatch.com/author/bharati-ahuja/

https://moz.com/community/users/170771?170771

http://level343.com/?s=bharati+ahuja&lang=en

https://www.webpro.in/blog/

I thank all the editors of these blogs for accepting my articles and publishing them. As 'guest posting' is a matter of great importance to every SEO, I would like to bring this to your notice. I do understand and respect the fact that, to accept or reject a post is entirely the prerogative of the editor and I surely respect that. I think all authors must have at times faced the dejection of their article being rejected. It is all part of the game.

But, the most frustrating point is when you send a post as per the procedure mentioned on the site you want to contribute to, and:

You do not get any reply for more than 3 weeks
You don’t know if the post has been received or not
You do not have any idea if the post is under review or has been rejected

yesno

I have experienced this with SEL. I would like to bring to your notice that a lot of effort, time and resources are spent on writing a post. Especially for a reputed blog like yours, as every contributor would like to put their best foot forward. Hence if we get a timely reply for acceptance/rejection of the post, it would be very helpful. We can at least publish it on some other platform. I say timely response because as you know that due to the ever evolving nature of the SEO industry the post can be of less or no relevance if the publishing is delayed. This results in a sheer waste of valuable time and effort spent on writing that post.

I have also been communicating on Twitter and thanks for the replies but it does not lead to any definite answers.

https://twitter.com/sengineland/status/803287201681436672

As you mentioned in the Twitter conversation, you surely must be receiving many posts and it must be a challenging task to reply to all but I suggest that you at least mention the status (under review/rejected) of the post in some way. Or, mention that if the contributor does not receive a reply in a specific time he/she should assume that the post is rejected and will not be published.

I am sure every well written, in-depth post, when published, is a mutually beneficial proposition for the writer as well as the blog on which it gets published.

Last but not the least, "Wishing A Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays" to everyone at Search Engine Land.

SEO - 12/21/2016

Rich Cards Enriched with Local Restaurants and Online Courses Verticals

In May 2016 Google announced a new search result format “Rich Cards” for 2 categories, i.e Recipes and Movies. The Rich Cards used schema.org structured mark up, just like the Rich Snippets format. Yesterday, Google announced that they are expanding it to two new verticals for US-based sites: Local restaurants and Online courses.

card2 card1

Google has added: By building Rich Cards, you have a new opportunity to attract more engaged users to your page. Users can swipe through restaurant recommendations from sites like TripAdvisor, Thrillist, Time Out, Eater, and 10Best. In addition to food, users can browse through courses from sites like Coursera, LinkedIn Learning, EdX, Harvard, Udacity, FutureLearn, Edureka, Open University, Udemy, Canvas Network, and NPTEL. AMP HTML is not required for Local restaurant pages and Online Courses rich cards. But, Google recommends that you create AMP pages to further engage users. Users consuming AMP’d content will be able to swipe near instantly from restaurant to restaurant or from recipe to recipe within your site. Users who tap on your Rich Card will be taken near instantly to your AMP page, and be able to swipe between pages within your site. Google is soon moving to add Rich Cards to other verticals too .

News / SEO - 11/22/2016

Digital Performance Management---A Step Ahead, From Insights To Impact

The web is continuously evolving. Today, every business has a website and knows the importance of a holistic web presence. As digital presence providers, we have focused on the earned, paid, and owned presence platforms. We also have been measuring and monitoring the outreach and the inbound traffic to these platforms. The most commonly used tool being the Google Analytics. As the digital efforts mature and the digital presence starts to spread out to search, social, mobile and global, the need to measure, monitor, understand and study the user behavior becomes increasingly important. Once we reach out to the targeted audience and the inbound traffic starts increasing, the next logical step is to move on from:

Content to context
Monitoring analytics to using analytics data for management
Quantity analysis to quality analysis

Digital performance depends on upon three essential factors:

Customer/User experience
IT performance
The business outcome of the digital effort

This is where the Digital Performance Management (DPM) comes into the picture. It focuses on the challenge of connecting the gaps between the user experience, IT performance, and the business goals & results. DPM is performance monitoring which helps business to assess and manage the performance of their website. Usually, analytics and monitoring tools focus on any one of the above factors. These metrics are mostly quantitative and silo in nature. Digital Performance Management analytics focuses on the quality and the quantity metrics to help take decisions.

dpm-analytics

The success of any online business depends on how satisfying the customer journey has been. The customer journey begins when he starts his search on the internet and finds your digital business presence on any media (paid, organic or earned).Digital is not longer a word signifying a certain technology, it is the DNA of every organization. In 2015 Gartner noted that, 89% of companies primarily compete on the basis of customer experience, and that these interactions are becoming rapidly more digital. Forrester estimates that a one-point improvement in a US wireless provider’s Customer Experience Index score (CX Index™) results in an additional $175 million in revenue. The DPM approach thrives when all the following teams work with synergy and have a common goal in mind:

Marketing
Technology
eCommerce
Infrastructure & Operations
Product
Services

Traditional analytics gave data about the performance of a website or the mobile app.DPM analytics goes a step ahead and gives actionable insights to help in decision-making. As the mobile web expanded, from simple website analytics tools which offered visitor and location data we moved on to the Application Performance Management tools getting insights about the mobile applications. As the search engines evolved, the SEOs and search marketers included social media services and the content services into their range of services. I think in order to add more value to their services, the addition of the DPM is the much-needed extension.

Jason Bloomberg, President, Intellyx says:

Application Performance Management tools must evolve to become Digital Performance Management. As the definition of "application" is both expanding and becoming more vague, it's important for these tools to focus on the customer experience end-to-end. That's essentially what we mean by digital performance.

Ann Ruckstuhl, CMO, SOASTA says:

2016 will see the beginning of a mass transition from APM to DPM (Digital Performance Management) with emphasis on front-end performance measurement, testing, and optimization based on analytics insights gained from the holy trinity of data - real user, business outcome and ops metrics. The need of the hour is to offer insights into data, along with the analytics data. Every search marketer with this value-added service to the client is going to future proof its growth and existence. This requires a great understanding between the client and the digital presence provider.

Erwan Paccard, Director of Customer Experience Marketing, Dynatrace says:

DPM collected analytics are uniquely positioned to help break silos by providing detailed insight around user behavior, delivered experience quality and the supporting applications and infrastructure health and performance across channels.

DPM Answers the Following Questions:

Are the conversion goals and revenue targets defined?
Is the infrastructure nurturing the growth rather than becoming a bottleneck?
Are the customers happy?
Is there a synergy between all the teams with a common goal in mind.

As Google always says: “Focus on the user and all else will follow.”

How Does DPM Help in Shifting the Focus on the User/Customer

DPM helps you to facilitate and design a satisfying online journey for the user.
DPM offers insights into the user experience journey from the digital performance perspective.
DPM gives a holistic cohesive view of a company’s performance, aligning strategy, business goals and operations.
DPM helps in predictive analysis.

The DPM software helps the digital marketer to add that layer of intelligence in the reporting. These additional insights help the business owner identify the bottlenecks and issues in the whole online sale process. This kind of reporting, not only give the metrics but also adds the “why” to those metrics. The term “Performance Management” is not new for any business but “Digital Performance Management” has the synthesis of technology and operations at its core. This monitoring is the backbone on which the future online business will be determined for any company.

dpm-intelligence-layer

According to Forrester analysts Milan Hanson and James McCormick's report brief:

Digital Performance Management Is An Evolutionary Step Beyond APM - Digital performance management is APM with a companywide perspective. It goes beyond APM by managing performance in a customer and business context.
Understand The Customer To Understand Performance - Good or bad performance depends on the customer’s expectations, which can be influenced by a range of factors such as geography or even by the customer’s stage in a single transaction.
Adopt A DPM Approach For That Competitive Edge - DPM will subsume APM, providing better insights that lead to action that is more finely tuned to business improvement.

It is high time that the digital marketing agencies start adding this layer of intelligence to forge ahead in the industry. As the majority of the traffic is received from the organic platform, the organic presence providers should be the first one to adapt to this new trend and evolution. http://www.slideshare.net/JenniferFinney/a-new-era-of-digital-performance-management DPM can be implemented by using any specialized software or by creating customized dashboards on Google Analytics. Google Analytics gives us a plethora of data but usually, companies just read reports and are happy with the increase in traffic metrics. By creating dashboards offering quality and quantity metrics the company can identify issues posing as a hurdle for online growth.

Google too is going ahead in this direction by introducing Google Optimize

Yesterday Google sent an email invite to Google Analytics users introducing Google Optimize. The email says: Companies big and small face the same challenge today. With ever more data flooding in, how do marketers act on all the useful insights they've learned? That's where Optimize comes in. Optimize makes it easy to test new online experiences for your customers. It's easy to implement. It's easy to create more personal experiences. And most importantly, it's easy to understand and act on the results. With Optimize you can create and deploy A/B, multivariate or redirect site experiments with our powerful capabilities:

Built on Google Analytics. Test what matters. Use your existing Google Analytics goals and metrics to quickly get an experiment up and running.
Advanced Statistical Modeling. Optimize will model the real-world performance of your experiments for more accurate results.
Sophisticated targeting tools. Deliver the right experience to customers at the right time with advanced experiment targeting.

Google Optimize is easy to use, powerful, and free. Ready to discover better online experiences for your customers? Simple traditional analytics is maturing to a more holistic data analysis and visualization of user behavior, real-world performance of the online business entities thereby giving a direction to the operations and the IT team to improvise further. Just having an overall web presence and having a good website and a mobile application is not enough. The web and the user behavior is ever evolving. The intelligent monitoring and constant changes made to the user experience by analyzing such data is the key to online sustenance. This DPM approach is a recent development and at the initial stages, but it surely going to go a long way. The time to start thinking about it and work out a value-added service for our clients is the way to forge ahead. Let us understand the why behind the analytics metrics, rather than just view them superficially. It is all about capturing more data and delving deep into insights and moving ahead from insights to impact.

Others - 09/30/2016

How To Add Google Analytics To AMP Pages

AMP Pages are the future for mobile search results. Google has announced recently that they will be removing “mobile-friendly” labels from search results and they also announced that they are testing to show AMP pages with a AMP icon in the search results.

AMP-Preview-Results

Hence, soon the AMP pages will move out from the Top Stories section and will be a part of the SERPs. Considering how the mobile usage is exponentially increasing , making your site AMP compliant and tracking its performance is a necessity.

In order to add Google analytics to the AMP Pages, include the following script in the <head>, before the AMP JS library:

<script async custom-element="amp-analytics"
src="//cdn.ampproject.org/v0/amp-analytics-0.1.js"></script>

Add the amp-analytics element to the body of your page. Then to enable the built-in support for Google Analytics, set the type attribute of the amp-analytics element to 'googleanalytics'. It is recommended to include an id attribute so that you can easily identify each amp-analytics element (e.g. debugging).

<amp-analytics type="googleanalytics" id="analytics1">
...
</amp-analytics>
Note: It is recommended that you set up and use a separate property for AMP measurement.

Some other vendors offering Analytics For AMP Pages are:

Adobe Analytics - marketing.adobe.com
AFS Analytics - afsanalytics.com
AT Internet - developers.atinternet-solutions.com
Chartbeat - support.chartbeat.com
Clicky Web Analytics - clicky.com
Cxense - wiki.cxense.com
Google Analytics - developers.google.com
INFOnline / IVW - www.infonline.de
Krux - help.krux.com
Linkpulse - docs.linkpulse.com
Lotame - mylotame.force.com
mParticle - docs.mparticle.com
Parsely - parsely.com/docs
Piano - vx.piano.io
Quantcast Measurement - quantcast.com

Validation

To check if the analytics code is correctly added one can validate the AMP pages on https://validator.ampproject.org/

Related Posts On AMP:

What Is AMP? All About Accelerated Mobile Pages By Google

AMP Pages To Be Shown In Main Google Search Results – Preview The Experience

Google To Remove Mobile-Friendly Labels and Keep Check On Interstitials For A Better Mobile Search Experience

AMP - Accelerated Mobile Pages / Mobile / SEO - 08/30/2016

Google To Remove Mobile-Friendly Labels and Keep Check On Interstitials For A Better Mobile Search Experience

Google recently announced on their blog that they will soon remove the “Mobile-Friendly” labels from search results.

Google said that they have found that 85% of all pages in the mobile search results now meet this criteria and show the mobile-friendly label.

This does not mean that mobile-friendly criteria is not a ranking signal. It will continue to be a ranking signal but the label will be removed from search results to keep the search results uncluttered. Google will continue providing the mobile usability report in Search Console and the mobile-friendly test to help webmasters evaluate the effect of the mobile-friendly signal on their pages.

Google also added:

“To improve the mobile search experience, after January 10, 2017, pages where content is not easily accessible to a user on the transition from the mobile search results may not rank as highly.”

Pages that show intrusive interstitials provide a poorer experience to users than other pages where content is immediately accessible. This can be problematic on mobile devices where screens are often smaller.

Here are some examples of techniques that make content less accessible to a user:

Showing a popup that covers the main content, either immediately after the user navigates to a page from the search results, or while they are looking through the page.
Displaying a standalone interstitial that the user has to dismiss before accessing the main content.
Using a layout where the above-the-fold portion of the page appears similar to a standalone interstitial, but the original content has been inlined underneath the fold.

Examples of interstitials that make content less accessible

Examples of interstitials that make content less accessible

By contrast, here are some examples of techniques that, used responsibly, would not be affected by the new signal:

Interstitials that appear to be in response to a legal obligation, such as for cookie usage or for age verification.
Login dialogs on sites where content is not publicly indexable. For example, this would include private content such as email or unindexable content that is behind a paywall.
Banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space and are easily dismissible. For example, the app install banners provided by Safari and Chrome are examples of banners that use a reasonable amount of screen space.

Examples of interstitials that would not be affected by the new signal, if used responsibly

Examples of interstitials that would not be affected

AMP - Accelerated Mobile Pages / News / SEO - 08/27/2016

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