Have you heard about the AMP stories?
2 years ago, Google supported the Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) technology. They launched a new format of “Stories for the Web.”
Are you familiar with Facebook and Instagram stories?
It has the same virtual storytelling format, but it is solely designed for publishers. When publishers use the story format, their readers can easily tap on it. Web Stories provide an easy and mobile-friendly experience to readers.
Now, they have rebranded it to Web Stories. The AMP technology team renamed their service and announced that there are more upcoming features in the following months.
Are you familiar with Web Stories already? If not, let’s have a quick discussion about it.
Table of Contents
- Introduction to Google Web Stories
- Overview on the Features of Web Stories
- Benefits of Enabling Web Stories
Introduction to Google Web Stories
Like Facebook MyDay and Instagram Story, the Google Web Stories has a story format designed for the web. You may not know, but it is the updated form of Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) and supported by Google.
It offers the same format as what you see on your favorite social media platforms. Google Web Stories is designed to be consumed in small portions. On each page of the Web Story, it can only accommodate a maximum of 10 words. So, you have to be straightforward, accurate, and precise on the message you want to convey. Also, the recommended size of the Web Story is between 4 to 30 pages.
You can creatively create a short collection of pages that contains images, texts, sounds, and video. The readers can view the content either on mobile or from your website. Some marketers question this, “can I monetize the Web Stories?” The answer is, yes! You definitely can monetize your web stories with Google DV360 (Beta), Google Ad Manager, and affiliate links.
However, Web Stories have a distinct difference between the virtual storytelling format of Facebook and Instagram. Even though they provide the same experience to the readers, but, for publishers, they can embed the story on their website. Yes, you can easily integrate it on your site with an HTML iFrame.
But, would it only be available on your website? No, it can be found on Google search! Now, that’s a huge difference, isn’t it? Anybody can view your story without going to your website– they can easily see it when they are doing a web search!
Are you curious about more information? We have listed the excellent features of Google Web Stories.
Overview on the Features of Web Stories
You might be curious, what’s the hype is all about. Now, here are the amazing features of Web Stories that help every marketer and publisher gain more traffic to their site.
Rich Story
You already have an idea of what stories are, right? On Facebook and Instagram, it is a collection of videos, texts, and images. You can easily click on the story to view the next page. Google Web Story has the same format. But, they have a considerable difference. In Google Web Story, each of its stories has an URL.
It works like a web page, and you can embed it on your website. Also, since it is an URL, you can share it anywhere!
Available on Google Search
Believe it or not, you can find the Web Stories on Google search. If you are using a mobile, you can easily find the web stories in its dedicated section– “Top Stories”. Since web stories are treated as a web page, it can be indexed. That’s why you can see it on Google search.
Full Screen on Desktop Mode
Are you tired of watching on small screens? Web Stories is giving you an exceptional experience in viewing. You can consumer the stories on your desktop, and in full-screen mode! Surely, you can appreciate the images more and read the text on the context.
Call to Action
We all know how vital Call to Action features are, right? Luckily, Web Stories include a CTA feature. You can easily add it to y our stories and redirect them to your products or main website. Customize your page as how you desire it to be. Invite more readers to click on your CTA.
More Stories and Content
On the bookend feature, you can add links to other pages or stories of your website. Web Stories allow you to give your readers more content to consume.
Upcoming New Features
The AMP team are continually developing the Web Stories, and they claim to add more features like:
- Control stories with JavaScript API
- “Swipe Up” feature to redirect to the web content
- Add polls and quiz
Benefits of Enabling Web Stories
You might be wondering how the Google web stories will benefit you. Several publishers are using web stories to create visual and interactive content to their readers. It allows them to publish content with a mobile-focused format.
Google Web Stories offer a visually-rich and tap-through story content. Aside from the robust advertising opportunity for marketers, what benefits does the web story provides?
Visually Rich
Cut some slack in making content with long texts. Use the Web Stories format to provide short and concise information. The attention-grabbing visuals, entertaining animations, and videos will give the readers an immersive experience.
Images, texts, videos, and animations are different from the traditional long text content. More of the target audience prefers visuals with concise information than long texts.
Use Web Stories to provide the needs of your consumers.
Fast-loading
You might be worried because the stories are rich in media. But, they are fast-loading. They do not affect the loading page of your website. Its instant loading provides high-performance metrics. Target audience does not like slow pages, and there’s a greater chance that they would leave the page instantly.
But, AMP stories are fast-loading, which attracts more audiences to view their content.
Mobile-focused
For the past few years, people use their mobile phones than their desktops when searching on the web. With that, AMP developers have optimized the Web Stories for the mobile web. The stories are in full-screen and tap-through navigation, making it an interactive experience for the readers.
Even though the developers made the Web Stories mobile-focused, it will look equally beautiful in any device.
Search Engine-friendly
If you want to build effective audience engagement, the best option is to apply Web Stories for your content. Web Stories provides an increase in time-on-site and decrease in bounce rates. They attract more natural shares and links that converts to a positive result of search engine rankings.
Google started to feature their Web Stories in the Visual Stories section on their first page. If you have content in Web Stories or AMP format, there is a great possibility for your website to rank on competitive keywords.
Optimize your content with Web Stories. It has a huge advantage in SEO.
Easy to Consume
It is easier for readers to read and get the information they need from Web Stories. Content in the stories is highly-readable with engaging visuals. Your target readers don’t have to spend long minutes reading your content.
Also, Web Stories gets the attention of your target audience’s attention with its smooth and interactive navigation.
Save your consumers from information overload. Provide them with more visuals and fewer texts.
Easy to Create
Web stories use more visuals and texts on the content. It may look like you need a lot of work for it, but in reality, it saves the content creator from writing lengthy articles.
Also, technically speaking, Web Stories are easy to create with its preset formats and premade layout templates and standardized UI controls. Also, they have interactive elements to make content sharing a lot easier.
You have a lot of room to showcase your creative skills with Web Story.
It is more effective to present content in the form of a story, but it becomes full-blown when you make it more engaging with enhanced visuals. Visual storytelling turned out to be an effective way to expand and reach out to more readers and boost your revenue.
