Google's Fast-Loading AMP Content Earns 35% More Engagement than Mobile Web Content

NEW YORK, NY--(Marketwired - June 05, 2017) - Chartbeat, the leading content intelligence platform for publishers, today released an industry-first research study quantifying the impact of those high speed mobile experiences brought to the web by Google's Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) Project and Facebook's Instant Articles (FIA). Chartbeat evaluated mobile audience behaviors and content interactions on AMP and FIA from June 2016 to May 2017 across more than 360 sites, and the findings are conclusive: speed matters and leads to deeper engagement with content.

Even though readers expect a seamless experience across screens, slow-loading mobile pages and a fragmented mobile technology ecosystem have left publishers struggling to keep readers engaged. AMP and FIA were launched in 2016 to improve the consumer mobile experience caused by bloated web pages. Both AMP and FIA enable media companies to publish streamlined, quick-loading versions of their articles and test new monetization strategies, both of which are increasingly important now that more than 50% of publisher traffic is mobile.

Chartbeat evaluated the first year of audience interactions with AMP and FIA content on sites actively using Chartbeat's platform integrations, to see just how well these high speed mobile experiences are succeeding, and if and how publishers are benefiting.

In studying traffic driven to publisher sites from articles on AMP and FIA, Chartbeat found:

• A typical publisher who implemented AMP now sees about 16% of their mobile traffic on AMP content and those with FIA see about 14.8% of mobile traffic on Instant Articles.
• Both formats are garnering a roughly equal share of mobile traffic
• About 3x more articles per day are consumed on AMP than on FIA. This mirrors what we see in search vs social generally, and is due to the fact that articles on search have a longer lifespan than those on social. Conversely, fewer articles are consumed on FIA, but articles on FIA tend to drive more traffic.

Specific to user experience and engagement, Chartbeat found:

• Both AMP and FIA formats are much faster than the mobile web, with AMP loading roughly four times faster than the standard mobile site experience, and Instant Articles loading even more quickly.
• Readers landing on AMP content engage for 35% longer than those landing on standard mobile web content.
• On average, standard mobile readers engage for 31.5 seconds and mobile search readers engage for 35.6 seconds. AMP readers, however, engage for 48.2 seconds.

The fact that readers are engaging much longer than they normally would suggests that a faster mobile experience really does matter in catching and holding attention. According to Chartbeat case studies, longer engagement translates to many impactful results, such as higher viewability, increased loyalty and long-term audience growth. There are still many challenges, but these results so far signal strong potential ahead for high speed mobile experiences.

For more details on Chartbeat's new research, download the complete report here.

ABOUT CHARTBEAT
Chartbeat, the content intelligence platform for publishers, believes that today's content creators need mission-critical insights, in real time and across desktop, social and mobile platforms, to turn visitors into a loyal audience. That's why our software goes beyond clicks and pageviews so content creators can understand what, within their content, is keeping people engaged. Partnering with over 50,000 sites across 60+ countries, Chartbeat's software and front-line tools help the world's leading media companies understand, measure, and value the attention earned by their content.