“Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” – Third-Party Cookies / Mark Twain

Google‘s plan to phase out support for third-party cookies in 2022-23 will now be delayed even further, until at least 2024, the company announced in a blog post on July 27th.

Back in 2020, the company announced that the cookiepocalypse — the demise of tracking cookies in its popular Chrome browser — was coming “within two years.”

By mid-2021, that timeline was extended to 2023. Now, the global tech giant says it will hold off until 2024 to replace what has been its primary means of targeted advertising.

“The most consistent feedback we’ve received is the need for more time to evaluate and test the new Privacy Sandbox technologies before deprecating third-party cookies in Chrome,” Anthony Chavez, Google’s Vice President of Privacy Sandbox, said Wednesday.

“As developers adopt these APIs, we now intend to begin phasing out third-party cookies in Chrome in the second half of 2024.”

Cookies are small pieces of code that websites deliver to a visitor’s browser. They stick around as the user visits other websites, tracking data and fueling much of the digital advertising ecosystem as we know it. But times are changing.

While cookies remain alive and well on Chrome, Google has long recognized that the needs of users, publishers and advertisers have evolved and require new strategies.

This week’s delay, like last year’s, was necessary because those new strategies are extraordinarily complex, and we are all in uncharted territory. It gives the digital advertising industry more time to develop multifaceted solutions for a more privacy-conscious web.

The second delay also comes at a turbulent time for Google and other tech giants, who have been hit hard by privacy changes from Apple’s iOS — which has already reduced targeting capabilities — and scrutinized by lawmakers in the U.S. and Europe over antitrust concerns.

Looking ahead, according to Chavez, Google is expanding the testing window for Privacy Sandbox APIs. Since its launch in 2019, the Privacy Sandbox has set out to find effective alternatives to cookies while mitigating the impact on publishers and advertisers.

Three years later, the current timeline looks like this:

• Stage 1: In late Q3 2023, a little over a year from now, Google expects its Privacy Sandbox APIs to be launched and generally available in Chrome.
• Stage 2: As publishers and developers adopt these APIs, the company will begin phasing out third-party cookies in Chrome in the second half of 2024.
• Stage 3: How long “phasing out” takes isn’t entirely clear, but here’s what it means: Chrome will gradually shorten the maximum duration of cookies (up to one year at present) from months to weeks to days to nothing at all.

Basically, this takes us to late 2024, or perhaps early 2025, assuming all goes according to plan.

What This Means For Publishers

Four words: More time, more money.

Obviously, that’s an oversimplification, but there’s some truth to it. More time to get this transition right is a good thing — both in the sense that we have two additional years of stability and targeting via this known commodity, and two additional years to pave a path forward.

While working with Google and other major industry players to help implement ideas like the Privacy Sandbox, Mediavine has invested heavily in its own solution, too.

Perhaps you’ve heard of it.

Grow With Mediavine

You can’t talk about the end of cookies without talking about first-party data, the information that the publisher (your website) provides to advertisers about a reader.

It’s called first-party data because the website a reader is on will provide the data directly to the advertiser, rather than via the reader’s browser history.

Third-party data is called that quite literally because we’re all relying on a third entity — the reader’s browser — to provide the data we need to complete the ad transaction between the advertiser and the website owner that makes money from ads.

Grow is Mediavine’s plan for this transition, and the best part is this: Whether cookies become a relic of the past in 2024 or 2034, it will help you earn more today.

As an audience engagement suite that encourages readers to log in and consent to personalized ads, Grow helps you build first-party data for the future, years ahead of the curve.

Consenting, or authenticated, users will be even more valuable than cookie-driven traffic — not just in 2024 but immediately. We’ve already seen this in action.

With iOS, as we mentioned, cookies are already extinct. Eventually, Chrome will follow. And regardless of when that happens, Grow is an instant value-add for reasons beyond data.

With significant improvements to user experience and ad performance, you can increase your user base, session duration, pages per session and more with Grow — now.

With features like Recommended Content, Search, Subscribe, and many more in the pipeline, thousands of publishers are already providing audiences with better experiences, reaping the financial benefits today and preparing for the future simultaneously.

Perhaps the biggest challenge of first-party data is that it requires scale to be successful. We now have even more time to authenticate enough users to move the needle – and that’s on top of our huge head start, plus the optimizations of traffic and revenue that are immediate.

We’ve noticed a trend. Publishers, advertisers, readers and even Mediavine staff members are all asking the time-honored question of 2021: What is Grow?

Even for those of us who live and breathe Mediavine, it’s challenging to digest all the things Grow can do for publishers, let alone why readers should embrace it.

The short answer is it’s a lot. Like a lot a lot. The slightly longer but more helpful answer is this:

Grow is a set of tools built to help you collect first-party data but also grow your audience.

The reason these tools are ever-expanding is because every website is different and every reader interacts with content differently. You all have different goals.

But the very first hurdle any of us have to leap over is getting readers to use Grow. And in order to want to use it, they need to understand it a little bit better.

To help with that, allow us to introduce the Grow Product Tour.

What is the Grow Product Tour?

From this day forward, when a reader creates a Grow account for the first time, they’re taken back to your site for a Grow Product Tour.

The Product Tour will walk readers through the basic features of Grow, helping them understand exactly what they signed up for and how it works.

Readers will be introduced to the Grow widget in the corner of your site and shown how to favorite, retrieve existing bookmarks and update their account.

Want to see it for yourself? You’re in luck. Once again, we’ve prepared a few visuals using Mediavine’s preferred method of communication, the GIF!

Check out the Product Tour in action:

Pretty cool! But better yet, the Product Tour is just the start.

Ultimately, the goal of Grow is creating the best user experience, which helps publishers generate the first-party data advertisers need to drive the most value.

With 400,000 registered users and climbing, we know that helping people better understand and use Grow is paramount to its success.

Moreover, Grow is always changing, not only with the addition of new features but in an effort to become as reader-friendly as possible.

It’s a lot, as we said earlier. But we’re here to help.

Coming Soon: More Reader Education

At its core, Grow isn’t about the publisher.

To be sure, it helps the publisher by harnessing first-party data and authenticated traffic. But without offering real, tangible value to readers, it’s a moot point.

First and foremost, Grow has to provide the kind of user experience that makes visitors want to log in or there won’t be subscriptions or first-party data to be had.

So how can we improve the reader experience? We’re taking it from the top, with a more educational approach from the onset of the sign-up process.

New Sign-up Page

We’re currently testing a new, improved and user-friendly log in flow. When readers sign up, they’ll get a better explanation of Grow via its redesigned sign-in page.

This enhanced preview of Grow will be customized based on what drove the reader to sign up, whether it’s via Spotlight Subscribe, the upcoming Exclusive Content feature (where content is available only to subscribers), etc.

Better still, we’re working on ways for publishers to be able to “co-brand” the sign-up page — including your site’s logo along with Grow to further streamline the process.

Please, continue giving us feedback so that we can address every point where readers are stumbling. We’re proud of where Grow is today — the only first-party data solution of its kind — but it remains a work in progress, and together, we can make it vastly superior by the time third-party cookies vanish for good.

As we shared earlier this summer, Google delayed its roadmap for phasing out support for third-party cookies, moving its own timeline back by nearly two years.

Google shifted Chrome’s plan to deprecate third-party cookies because, to make a long story short, we need additional time as an industry to get it right.

One component of Google’s vision for a post-cookie world is its Privacy Sandbox initiative, which aims to build technologies that protect user privacy while still allowing for effective ad targeting.

As an industry, we can and should do hard things. But this is a particularly hard thing and will take considerably longer than Google’s original, early 2022 goal to be viable at scale.

Acknowledging this reality, Google released an updated timeline in late July 2021.

In general terms, the Privacy Sandbox will be rolled out in two phases:

• Phase 1: In late 2022, Chrome will test its Privacy Sandbox features and monitor for industry adoption — a stage expected to last nine months which will include evaluation by regulators.

• Phase 2: If Phase 1 goes according to plan and meets support from regulators, publishers and developers alike, Google will begin phasing out third-party cookies from Chrome.

When we say “phasing out,” we mean that Chrome will start to decrease the duration of third-party cookies (up to a year at present) from months to weeks to days to nothing at all.

That process will take place over the course of a year, bringing us to late 2023.

In more granular terms, Privacy Sandbox initiatives are split into four categories: combatting online spam/fraud, showing relevant content and ads, measuring digital ads and strengthening cross-site privacy boundaries.

Thus far, Mediavine has focused most on the bird-themed APIs designed to display relevant content and ads without cookies: FLoC and FLEDGE.

Currently, FLoC origin trials have closed, with widespread testing scheduled to begin later this year and adoption tentatively planned for late 2022, barring further delays.

What Do Mediavine Publishers Need to Do?

With regard to the Privacy Sandbox, Mediavine will keep you apprised of any changes to this timeline extension or developments with any of its specific elements.

What publishers need to remember is that the end of third-party cookies represents a fundamental shift in the ecosystem — and that Privacy Sandbox is just one part of the solution.

We’re grateful to have more time, as an industry, to ensure a smoother transition, but cookies are indeed going away, and ushering in a new, privacy-centric era requires a multifaceted approach.

The most important and actionable step you can take today is to start building first-party data.

Unlike Google’s Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC), or other concepts it can shoehorn into avian acronyms, this is a solution you can be part of without technical expertise or vast financial resources.

First-party data is information that the publisher (your site) gathers and provides to advertisers about readers rather than advertisers relying on third-party data via the cookies of today.

How do you do that? It all starts with Grow.

What is Grow?

Grow is Mediavine’s audience engagement suite, providing enhanced website experiences and features to readers so that they will log in — thus consenting to personalized ads.

Data from these consenting — or authenticated — users will be much more valuable than those cohorted by the Privacy Sandbox, or even readers targeted by cookies right now.

Why Worry About This Now if Cookies Are Still Around For Another Two Plus Years?

Glad you asked.

The most obvious answer is that iOS and other browsers have already axed cookies. Authenticating users will help you better monetize traffic from non-Chrome browsers immediately.

Secondly, many Grow features will improve user experiences of all readers, boosting your earning potential thanks to longer sessions and additional content consumed.

Most importantly of all, building first-party relationships with readers — and harnessing enough of the resulting first-party data to make a material difference — takes time.

Yes, we now have more of it, but authenticating even 5 to 10% of your website traffic (the ambitious goal we’ve set for Grow) is going to be a prolonged strategy.

With Google’s announcement, we have a longer period in which to reach the promised land — but time is still of the essence. If you’re a Mediavine publisher, why not enable Grow in your Dashboard today?

With features like Recommended Content, Search, Subscribe and more, thousands of MVPs are already providing audiences with enhanced experiences and improving website performance.

All while playing the long game and positioning themselves for success not just next month or next year, but in the privacy-first world that will be here soon enough.

Seriously, what are you waiting for?

If you monetize your website through advertising, you know that brands’ ability to track readers’ interests with third-party cookies is effective, lucrative and . . . soon to be a thing of the past.

The billion-dollar question all of us in the industry are asking is: What’s next?

Targeted campaigns are immensely valuable to Google and advertisers because they can be sold at a premium. The loss of cookies due to privacy concerns threatens this entire model.

Many browsers like Safari and Firefox already block them; Google is phasing them out in 2022 and is responding to this slow-moving funeral procession by workshopping alternatives in the meantime.

One of Google’s new solutions for tracking users — while protecting their privacy in ways that cookies don’t — is the avian-themed Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC) that we’ve discussed at length.

The idea is that FLoC anonymously assigns interests to web users based on their browsing patterns, then uses those patterns to categorize or cohort users into respective buckets.

While early FLoC testing is barely underway, the concept already has some industry players crying fowl, and not because it’s ineffective (which isn’t fully known yet).

Beyond the ongoing privacy questions regarding FLoC’s ability to securely track people’s data are even graver concerns surrounding how the system could be abused.

Numerous critics have gone so far as calling FLoC “nasty” and claiming that it enables “discrimination” and is a “dangerous step that harms user privacy.”

A bombshell article from the Electronic Frontier Foundation argued that grouping users based on browsing habits is a slippery slope and likely to facilitate discrimination regarding employment and housing “as well as predatory targeting of unsophisticated consumers.”

The controversy has extended to WordPress, where two developers have already published plugins that block FLoC from the widely popular content management platform.

A contingent within the WordPress community has pushed back against FLoC and lobbied to use its platform to prevent what it sees as potential racism, sexism and anti-LGBTQ+ discrimination.

This fueled speculation that WordPress axed FLoC altogether, although that appears to be premature. Founder Matt Mullenweg tweeted that no decision has been made . . . yet.

“Contrary to headlines, WordPress hasn’t made any decisions or changes with regards to #FLoC,” he wrote. “It is more correct to say there is a proposal from a WP contributor to block FLoC by default.”

It’s true that WordPress’ developer community makes many proposals that don’t pan out and that if FLoC were to be banned, technical and broader questions would need to be answered.

There are conflicting schools of thought as to how WordPress would go about this — or whether standing against FLoC is even appropriate, given WP’s neutrality regarding third-party tracking.

All of that said, blocking FLoC appears to have strong support inside the core developer group and the general WordPress developer community, so it’s clearly possible, if not likely.

What Do Publishers Need to Do?

At this point, there’s not a lot you can do until we know more.

It’s important to note that FLoC testing is in its infancy; WordPress (or the segment of its community that wants this) is essentially talking about blocking something that’s a non-factor right now.

As we said above, it’s also unclear that a FLoC ban will happen or what it would look like. But assuming WordPress does go through with this, what does it mean for your website?

If and when WordPress takes any action on its end, Mediavine will build a solution for publishers to re-enable FLoC testing if they so choose. Right now, it’s too soon to say what that will entail.

Mediavine remains committed to building third-party cookie replacements and first-party data solutions in this rapidly evolving landscape, and FLoC is just one piece of that puzzle.

We also take seriously our commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. Allegations that FLoC is discriminatory along racist, sexist or anti-LGBTQ+ lines are alarming to say the least.

Potential third-party cookie replacements that unintentionally allow for discrimination are obviously not acceptable at Mediavine — and presumably, Google would take the same position.

In fact, at the time of proposal, Google published a white paper on the subject of discrimination and sensitivity of cohorts, along with potential solutions for the issue.

This is a serious accusation, and one we will monitor in the coming weeks and months as Google reveals more about the inner workings of FLoC and addresses these concerns.

Good news for publishers (or at least good news with a side of “we all panicked to make sure everyone had enough time for a re-crawl, when in reality we could’ve panicked slightly less”):

The slow rollout of the Google Page Experience update we expected in May has now been pushed back to mid-June, according to the Google Search Central Blog.

Since late last year, we’ve been preparing for the Page Experience update, ensuing that publishers and website owners are prepared to meet Google’s latest and greatest metrics.

Just last week, we published a comprehensive Core Web Vitals checklist for bloggers. Please read this as all of the guidance still applies; now you just have a little more time to prepare.

According to Google, the new Page Experience signals — which include Core Web Vitals — will factor into ranking systems beginning in mid-June 2021.

Moreover, the company says Core Web Vitals “won’t play its full role as part of those systems until the end of August.”

Why the two-and-a-half-month ramp-up period? Google likens this to adding flavoring to food you’re preparing gradually, rather than all at once. In other words, a gradual rollout allows the company to monitor the new Page Experience for any unexpected or unintended issues.

Google says its adjusted rollout schedule was made in part to give publishers more time to make changes with Page Experience in mind. While we can all breathe a little easier thanks to the new timeline, we encourage you to prepare for the rollout as soon as possible, particularly if you need Google to re-crawl your pages.

What Does the Page Experience Update Entail?

As we’ve discussed at length, the Page Experience update will consider several aspects of site performance that are already ranking factors but will now be under this new, rebranded umbrella — mobile-friendliness, safe browsing, HTTPS and making sure there are no intrusive interstitials.

The big change is that it will also include the three Core Web Vitals metrics:

1. Largest Contentful Paint (LCP)
2. First Input Delay (FID)
3. Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS)

Google Chrome’s updating of CLS measurements will also be reflected in the Page Experience update. Again, please see the links above for more on all of these metrics.

Beyond Core Web Vitals and their importance regarding pagespeed, as part of this update, AMP formatting is no longer required for posts to appear in previously AMP-only / Top Stories carousels.

This means not only will a better Page Experience help you improve search results across the board, but passing scores open up the possibility of appearing in areas previously off limits.

It’s a tremendous opportunity, although as we mentioned during our Core Web Vitals Facebook Live last week, Page Experience remains one of many factors that Google takes into account.

Writing great content should always come first. Without that, none of this matters.

On our end, Mediavine will do its part to keep you updated, solve for potential problems and make our products, themes and scripts the fastest, most lightweight and most efficient on the web.

Mediavine has always prided itself on being more than an ad management service.

Our mission — building sustainable businesses for content creators — means helping publishers and their websites grow holistically and efficiently by rising to all the challenges of the day.

This means not only optimizing for short-term revenue needs but also charting a long-term course for success in a dynamic, ever-changing ecosystem.

It’s a delicate balancing act, to be sure. Especially in the year 2021.

At this point, we don’t have to tell you that amid increasing privacy concerns and the demise of third-party cookies, the digital advertising world is facing a reckoning.

How do we maintain the kind of personalized targeting and revenue-producing ads content creators depend on while a seismic shift in the industry crumbles the almighty cookie?

By definition, privacy and targeted advertising cannot coexist — or so conventional wisdom would have you believe. But what if we’re approaching this paradox entirely the wrong way?

After extensive research, Mediavine uncovered the real issue with cookies: What if the problem isn’t that cookies are too prevalent but that not ENOUGH people have access to them?

In a world where privacy is quickly becoming everything, what if, instead, it was nothing?

The only real solution for authenticating traffic and building first-party relationships is to change the paradigm — break the fourth wall and eliminate the notion of privacy altogether.

Think about it: What could be more private than dismantling the entire idea of privacy? If everything is public, nothing needs to be private.

Yes, third-party cookies are flawed but not in the way you’ve been told.

Only after we truly open up cookies from the gatekeepers and walled gardens and deliver them to the ultimate fourth party — the world — will we usher in a new era of transparency.

Unlocking the secret was one thing but executing this vision is a heavy lift. That’s why Mediavine is proud to have worked with industry innovators to architect the Privacy Playground.

(Again, think about it: Who needs a Privacy Sandbox walling off personal information when, alternatively, you could send it sprawling across an entire Playground for all to experience and enjoy?)

How does it work?

Three words: Bye bye, birds.

You remember the usual avian suspects. PELICAN. PARAKEET. SPARROW. DOVEKEY. TURTLEDOVE. FLEDGE. PIGIN. FLoC. PARROT. TERN. Gone, gone, gone, gone. They’re all gone.

Seriously, why were there so many birds when there can be only one?

The Privacy Playground is an unregulated, non-secure utopia, where all bird-themed acronyms have gone extinct, save for one iconic, industry-changing avian innovation:

E.A.G.L.E.

Short for Every Actor Given Limitless Entry, E.A.G.L.E. ensures that every party in the programmatic ecosystem has the unalienable, equal right to access cookies that contain the personal data of anyone they want to reach.

Under the hood, via a single, lightweight line of JavaScript, E.A.G.L.E. is the Core Web Vitals-compliant engine that fuels the Privacy Playground, bringing fourth-party cookies to the masses.

No more encryption. No more security. Let Freedom Ring!

Fourth-party cookies are the future because on a World Wide Web founded on the right to be free, what could be more fundamental than universal access to everything?

TL;DR — Your entire browser history is on the blockchain.

Disclaimer: While we hope you enjoyed this April Fool’s Day joke, privacy is no laughing matter. Visit Grow to learn how Mediavine is meeting the challenges of first-party data in a cookie-less world.

Google quietly announced a small change in how it calculates Core Web Vitals data in Search Console this week.

This change in Google’s calculation methods for these all-important pagespeed metrics is so subtle you could easily miss it.

As of February 17, 2021, instead of using “less than” as a boundary for web page scores, Google is using “less than or equal to.”

While we’re talking about fractions of a second here, this entire exercise is about fractions of seconds and every little bit helps.

Google says this tiny adjustment can result in publishers seeing changes from red to yellow or yellow to green indicators.

Here’s the official wording, which we’ll translate below.

“The metrics defining the boundaries for LCP, FID, CLS, which used to be < (less than), are now defined as <= (less than or equal to). Therefore you might see a change in statuses (for the better) in this report.”

Basically, instead of being flagged as “Needs Improvement” if you’re right on the number, Google now gives you the green light.

Here are the boundaries:

If Google loves one thing in this world, it’s acronyms. If it loves two things, it’s acronyms and performance metrics.

Core Web Vitals, integrated into Lighthouse 6 in mid-2020, delivers on both fronts! They are comprised of three important metrics:

• Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): A measure of load performance, or whether your largest content load happens within 2.5 seconds.
• First Input Delay (FID): A measure of interactivity; when a user taps on something, the web browser should respond as close to instantly as possible, defined as within 100 milliseconds.
• Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): You know this when you see it. CLS is a measure of visual stability, or the idea that items within the browser window shouldn’t move around while a page loads. The ideal score is defined by Google as 0.1 or lower.

These figures have been the targets all along, but now that “equal or less than” puts you in the green, at least you have the extra millisecond(s).

In other words, scores of 2.5 for LCP, 100 ms for PID and 0.1 for CLS all qualify as good now, thanks to this change.

Before, you needed 2.49, 99 and 0.099 respectively. Again, that’s not as significant as it seems given the speeds we’re talking about.

We wouldn’t be surprised if some of you see more green based on this subtle shift when reporting updates in a few days.

Behind the scenes, Mediavine is working to ensure that all of our products help publishers attain and maintain optimal scores.

Trellis, Create and Grow are optimized for LCP, FID and CLS alike, while Mediavine ads are already optimized for LCP and FID; we’re currently testing a CLS solution that we hope to release soon!

Please see the above links for even more details on Web Vitals and check out our additional pagespeed resources.

You’ve heard us talk about pagespeed a time or 300 because these scores impact rankings, user experience and earning potential.

Faster sites are better sites. One nanosecond at a time.

Mediavine is incredibly proud to be recognized as one of Business Insider’s 18 Hottest Ad Tech Companies of 2020.

Appearing on this list alongside fellow industry innovators — including our valued partners like The Trade Desk (TTD), TripleLift and LiveRamp — is both an honor and validation of the initiatives we’re pioneering at Mediavine.

Business Insider’s recognition is especially meaningful in 2020, perhaps the most unprecedented year in the history of precedents.

The shutdown of the economy last spring left publishers dependent on ad spend and treading uncharted waters already awash with change.

Revenue declined as advertiser spending halted, then shifted in some ways inexorably, leaving fewer dollars to go around. It wasn’t just the pandemic roiling the ecosystem, either.

Perhaps the most daunting challenge faced by the ad tech industry is the impending demise of third-party cookies, which will forever alter longstanding ad targeting practices as we know them.

Throw in increased competition and wild seasonal swings in revenue and it’s been a tumultuous year — but we’ve come through it stronger, and earning a spot on Business Insider’s list is a testament to that.

Here’s what the publication said about Mediavine, one of 18 Ad Tech companies that are best adapting to all these changes and more:

Mediavine handles programmatic advertising for thousands of small media companies and also runs sites like The Hollywood Gossip and Food Fanatic.

The publisher-facing ad tech space has gotten increasingly competitive with shrinking margins and lookalike products, but Mediavine has carved out a niche by focusing on publishers’ big ad operations problems.

Business Insider goes on to note that Mediavine, led by our “Star to Know,” CEO Eric Hochberger, expanded its work with other big ad tech players whose forward-thinking priorities are similarly aligned.

As we recently announced, and BI recognized, we’ve partnered with our friends at GumGum to pioneer cookie-free contextual targeting.

We’ve also joined forces with LiveRamp in rolling out strategies to help publishers collect first-party data in our new privacy-first world.

Most recently, we integrated with The Trade Desk’s Unified ID 2.0 initiative aimed at replacing cookies. Mediavine’s integration with TTD was the first within the publishing community.

We’re proud to partner with leading firms in the field to architect some of the privacy and identity solutions that will define the next decade, and we’re grateful to be recognized as a leader in this field.

There’s lots more work to be done in 2021. We look forward to continued innovation and helping lead our community forward.

Earlier this year, Google announced that Page Experience signals would soon be included in Google Search rankings.

This week, Google announced the rollout date for these new ranking signals. We can expect them to take effect starting in May 2021.

As their name implies, Google Page Experience signals measure how readers interact with a web page, in order to gauge (and reward) the relative quality of user experiences across the web.

We’ve known these changes were coming for some time, and still have another six months to go. Below, we’ll talk about what publishers can expect and what you can do to prepare.

What is Google Page Experience?

Page Experience involves numerous existing, relatively obvious ranking signals like mobile-friendliness, HTTPS, safe browsing and a lack of intrusive interstitials on a given website.

Important Note: Mediavine recently announced the return of mobile interstitials. Rest assured, these new ad units will pass Google’s strict guidelines (and could earn you additional revenue)!

Page Experience will combine the above factors with Core Web Vitals.

These much-discussed vital signs are basically the old PageSpeed Insights such as the First Input Delay, a retooled Largest Contentful Paint (LCP) and the new Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS).

Google Search Console already uses these metrics, which are also now incorporated into Lighthouse 6 and PageSpeed Insights.

TL;DR/too many acronyms and fake-sounding words — Core Web Vitals are the new pagespeed metrics Google wants us all to hit.

We encourage publishers to check out this article Mediavine’s Director of Product Jordan Cauley wrote about Core Web Vitals to learn what all of these mean — and how to optimize for them — in detail.

Our CEO Eric Hochberger also recently published this helpful guide to solving for Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS) specifically.

Visual Indicators Will Highlight Page Experience

Google’s blog post regarding the release of Page Experience contains an interesting and telling section on how the success of publishers at these metrics will be communicated on screen:

[Providing information] about the quality of a web page’s experience can be helpful to users in choosing the search result that they want to visit.

On results, the snippet or image preview helps provide topical context for users to know what information a page can provide.

Visual indicators on the results are another way to do the same, and we are working on one that identifies pages that have met all of the page experience criteria. We plan to test this soon and [if successful], it will launch in May 2021 and we’ll share more details [in the coming months].

Google’s goal has always been to provide users with quality content they are searching for, and this indicates how important Page Experience is becoming. If your user experience is deemed top-notch, Google will let readers know with more visual cues.

How Much Will Page Experience Influence Rankings?

Only Google can truly answer that, but we’re confident in saying: a lot.

If you’re a Mediavine publisher, or tuned in to the web publishing world at all, you know that site speed has been an important ranking factor for years and is only becoming more critical.

Google using Page Experience as a ranking factor that is more heavily weighted than ever is as safe a bet as you’ll find.

In a previous blog post, Google even said that Page Experience is more important for Search when ranking pages with similar content.

For a company whose explanations of products can be opaque, to put it nicely, this is pretty straightforward. Look for Page Experience to be as influential as we’ve predicted and then some.

What About AMP Pages?

Until now, the only way to be eligible for Google’s Top Stories carousel was to be a Google News publisher and run AMP pages.

You’ll still need to be a Google News publisher to qualify come May 2021, but Page Experience guidelines will take the place of AMP pages, which marks a significant change in the overall calculus.

While Google says AMP remains an easy and cost-effective path to great page experiences, our recommendation is to make Page Experience a priority across your entire site, not just AMP.

AMP is, in essence, a second version of your pages. Our philosophy is to solve for Page Experience site-wide, maintaining full control of your site and only maintaining one version of it.

It not only makes for a better experience for publishers and users alike, but because you (and Mediavine) will have greater control over monetization, revenues should increase as well.

The long and short of it: Solve for Page Experience and you won’t need AMP.

Gearing Up For the Requirements

If you’re a reader of the Mediavine blog, chances are good that your site is already mobile-friendly, secure and free of invasive, obnoxious advertising.

And perhaps you’ve heard us champion the virtues of pagespeed once, maybe even two or three times.

We will make certain that our Script Wrapper is optimized for these new Web Vitals goals, along with our plugins Create and Grow.

Oh, and it should go without saying that Trellis will help you hit the Web Vital scores you need.

We’ll be monitoring any further developments and passing along any new details, but remember, changes impacting site speed and improving the web are something we’re prepared for and advocate for.

Page Experience is no different, and we’ve got this together.

Grow and First-Party Data

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