Core Web Vitals: Google Announces New Ranking Signals Next Year

Google has announced to businesses and SEO experts about its new ranking signals, which are set to launch in May 2021. SEO expert agencies can expect that Google’s Core Web Vitals are going to be combined with existing UX-related signals.

The signals, such as safe-browsing, mobile-friendliness, intrusive interstitial guidelines, and HTTPS-security will be combined with Page Experience signals and Core Web Vitals, which were made to measure user experience. This includes a page’s visual stability, responsiveness, and speed.

The following are defined as the Core Web Vitals:

First Input Delay (FID): This refers to the time it takes for a webpage to be interactive. The ideal measurement should be less than 100ms.

Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): This is the time that it takes for a webpage’s main content to fully load. The ideal measurement for LCP is 2.5 seconds or quicker.

Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): This refers to the amount of layout shift that a visual webpage may experience. The recommended measurement for this should be less than 0.1.

All these signals will measure the experience of the user when they are interacting with the webpage. By knowing how they perceive their experience, website owners and SEO experts can ensure that their visitors are getting the most useful and relevant content and accessing it without any issues.

These Core Web Vitals may change each year, depending on the standards or expectations of Google users.

Another update that Google announced is the addition of labels in search results. These labels will indicate which results provide a good page experience. The search engine giant is currently working on visual indicators that show which pages meet the page experience criteria list. For instance, in the LCP, it is categorised between “good”, “needs improvement”, and “poor”. The same goes for FID and CLS.

The testing of these labels is still in the works, and if successful, Google will launch the update in May 2021 along with the page experience update.

Currently, a lot of webpages may not qualify for this label because a study shows that only less than 15% of websites are optimised to pass the Core Web Vitals criteria. Because of this, many businesses and website owners are working with SEO expert agencies to prepare their webpages for the page experience signal update.

According to Google, there was a 70% increase in users engaging with Lighthouse and Page Speed Insights to assess page experience metrics. Many website owners are also using Search Console’s Core Web Vitals to improve their own SEO strategies.

One great way to prepare websites and webpages for the page experience signal is to have them optimised by using AMP. Google also suggests this method, as most AMP pages have great page experiences.

Lastly, Google announced that non-AMP webpages will also be eligible to show in Top Stories Carousel next year. This update will be launched on the same date as the page experience ranking signal update. Webpages that meet the Google News content policies and provide users with an excellent page experience will have higher chances of ranking in the Top Stories.

There are a few resources online to help you optimise your website in order to prepare them for the Core Web Vitals and page experience signal update. However, it takes time and effort to know everything there is about SEO, Google’s algorithm updates, tried-and-tested strategies, white hat techniques, and so on.

Position1SEO can help you prepare your business website for Google’s 2021 updates! Our team has been working in the SEO industry for many years, and we can offer you bespoke solutions that will perfectly suit your company’s needs.

You can dial 0141 404 7515 for any questions about our services. You may also email us at office@position1seo.co.uk for written enquiries.