This Week’s Industry News
Compiled by the Rocket Clicks Team
Top Stories
Search Console Web Light Pages
Google Search Console now shows data about web light search results. That data can be found in the “search appearance” report where users will now see a filter for Web Light. These pages are faster and lighter and are shown to people searching on slow mobile connection. Google converts web pages into this version for slow networks so that the pages load faster while saving data. AMP may be modified into Web Light pages because they are faster. You can set your header to “Cache-Control: no transform” if you don’t want your pages to be trans-coded. Source: Search Engine Journal
Snapchat Adds AR Lenses to Self-Serve Ad Tool
In an effort to grow their online sales business, Snapchat is will be continually rolling out their self-serve tools and “investing to create a frictionless buying experience.” In doing this, Snapchat has expanded on their Self-Serve Ad Tool by including AR Lenses. These will run on a cost-per-impression bases which can typically run from $8 to $20. In addition to this, Snapchat is rolling out Sponsored Snappables which is a branded version of the platform’s two-player AR selfie games. Snapchat has recruited well-known brands like Dunkin Donuts, Candy Crush developer King, and Bud Light to test drive their Sponsored Snappable ads. Source: Marketing Land
Instagram Shopping Icon
Instagram expanded its shopping beyond feeds into Stories. You can now see a sticker with a shopping bag icon to tap and see more details about the product in the story. Clicking the shopping bag can display various types of product information, including more images of the featured product, images of other products contained in the story, descriptions, pricing information and links that lead directly to the brand’s website. Source: Marketing Land
LinkedIn Launches Sponsored Content Carousel Ads
A new type of Sponsored Content ad format has been launched to support a carousel of up to 10 customized, swipeable cards. LinkedIn stated that “because carousel ads are interactive and have eye-catching visuals, they stand out in the newsfeed. Your stories become tangible and encourage your audience to engage with your brand on both desktop and mobile.” With the 300 advertisers included in the beta run for carousel ads, nearly 75 percent of them saw increased click-through-rates compared to standard Sponsored Content ads. When viewing metrics within the LinkedIn ad interface, users will be able to see click and impression data for each card contained within the Sponsored Content carousel ad. Source: Marketing Land
Analysis
Image SEO
With updates to Google Images, image SEO is making a comeback. In order to optimize your images for SEO, give your image files a relevant name. File names can be seen when you open an image in a new tab or when you hover over the image. Once you upload a photo to your site, the name gets directly incorporated into your URL structure. Google collects file name data to understand the context of the image. Visually impaired users would use alt text to understand an image, so these need to be descriptive as well. Compress your images before uploading to reduce a user’s page loading time. Source: Search Engine Journal