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Google’s Top 3 Metrics for Evaluating User Experience

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googles top 3 metrics for evaluating user experience via mattgsouthern

Google has defined a set of metrics site owners should focus on when optimizing for user experience.

By defining these Core Web Vitals, Google aims to provide unified guidance for quality signals that Google says are “essential to delivering a great user experience on the web.”

“Optimizing for quality of user experience is key to the long-term success of any site on the web.

Whether you’re a business owner, marketer, or developer, Web Vitals can help you quantify the experience of your site and identify opportunities to improve.”

Google emphasizes the importance of Core Web Vitals over other metrics as they’re critical to all web experiences.

Users’ expectations for web experiences can vary according to site and context, but some remain consistent regardless of where they are on the web.

Core Web Vitals are the user experience needs that all websites should be striving to meet.

Specifically, Google identifies the core user experience needs as: loading, interactivity, and visual stability.

Here’s how those user experience needs are measured.

Measuring User Experience With Core Web Vitals

Google says site owners can measure the quality of their site’s user experience with these metrics:

  • Largest Contentful Paint: measures perceived load speed and marks the point in the page load timeline when the page’s main content has likely loaded.
  • First Input Delay: measures responsiveness and quantifies the experience users feel when trying to first interact with the page.
  • Cumulative Layout Shift: measures visual stability and quantifies the amount of unexpected layout shift of visible page content.

Google’s Top 3 Metrics for Evaluating User Experience

Google explains why these three metrics in particular are so important:

“All of these metrics capture important user-centric outcomes, are field measurable, and have supporting lab diagnostic metric equivalents and tooling.

For example, while Largest Contentful Paint is the topline loading metric, it is also highly dependent on First Contentful Paint (FCP) and Time to First Byte (TTFB), which remain critical to monitor and improve.”

How to Measure Core Web Vitals

Google aims to make it easy for all site owners to access and measure Core Web Vitals.

Chrome UX Report

Site owners can utilize the Chrome UX Report to quickly assess the performance of all signals.

Currently, the BigQuery dataset surfaces publicly accessible histograms for all Core Web Vitals.

Google is working on a new REST API that will make it easy to access both URL and origin level data.

Core Web Vitals Extension

Google is working on a Core Web Vitals extension for the Chrome browser that’s currently in developer preview.

The Chrome extension surfaces a visual indicator about the state of each vital as a user browses the web.

In future updates, the extensions will also allow users to view aggregated real-user insights (provided by Chrome UX Report) about the state of each core vital for the current URL and origin.

Updates to Existing Tools

Google is updating several of its tools to provide information specific to improving Core Web Vitals.

The following tools will be updated over the coming months:

  • Lighthouse
  • Chrome DevTools
  • PageSpeed Insights
  • Search Console’s Speed Report
  • and other popular tools

What About Other Valuable Metrics?

As important as the Core Web Vitals are, they’re not the only user experience metrics to focus on.

As Google improves its understanding of user experience going forward, it will update the Core Web Vitals on an annual basis.

Google will also provide updates on the future Web Vitals candidates, the motivation behind choosing them, and the implementation status.

For now, at least, the company is heavily invested in improving its understanding of page speed:

“Looking ahead towards 2021, we are investing in building better understanding and ability to measure page speed, and other critical user experience characteristics.

For example, extending the ability to measure input latency across all interactions, not just the first; new metrics to measure and quantify smoothness; primitives and supporting metrics that will enable delivery of instant and privacy preserving experiences on the web; and more.”

Source: Chromium Blog

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GOOGLE

Google Warns About Misuse of Its Indexing API

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Google Warns About Misuse of Its Indexing API

Google has updated its Indexing API documentation with a clear warning about spam detection and the possible consequences of misuse.

Warning Against API Misuse The new message in the guide says:

“All submissions through the Indexing API are checked for spam. Any misuse, like using multiple accounts or going over the usage limits, could lead to access being taken away.”

This warning is aimed at people trying to abuse the system by exceeding the API’s limits or breaking Google’s rules.

What Is the Indexing API? The Indexing API allows websites to tell Google when job posting or livestream video pages are added or removed. It helps websites with fast-changing content get their pages crawled and indexed quickly.

But it seems some users have been trying to abuse this by using multiple accounts to get more access.

Impact of the Update Google is now closely watching how people use the Indexing API. If someone breaks the rules, they might lose access to the tool, which could make it harder for them to keep their search results updated for time-sensitive content.

How To Stay Compliant To use the Indexing API properly, follow these rules:

  • Don’t go over the usage limits, and if you need more, ask Google instead of using multiple accounts.
  • Use the API only for job postings or livestream videos, and make sure your data is correct.
  • Follow all of Google’s API guidelines and spam policies.
  • Use sitemaps along with the API, not as a replacement.

Remember, the Indexing API isn’t a shortcut to faster indexing. Follow the rules to keep your access.

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GOOGLE

This Week in Search News: Simple and Easy-to-Read Update

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This Week in Search News: Simple and Easy-to-Read Update

Here’s what happened in the world of Google and search engines this week:

1. Google’s June 2024 Spam Update

Google finished rolling out its June 2024 spam update over a period of seven days. This update aims to reduce spammy content in search results.

2. Changes to Google Search Interface

Google has removed the continuous scroll feature for search results. Instead, it’s back to the old system of pages.

3. New Features and Tests

  • Link Cards: Google is testing link cards at the top of AI-generated overviews.
  • Health Overviews: There are more AI-generated health overviews showing up in search results.
  • Local Panels: Google is testing AI overviews in local information panels.

4. Search Rankings and Quality

  • Improving Rankings: Google said it can improve its search ranking system but will only do so on a large scale.
  • Measuring Quality: Google’s Elizabeth Tucker shared how they measure search quality.

5. Advice for Content Creators

  • Brand Names in Reviews: Google advises not to avoid mentioning brand names in review content.
  • Fixing 404 Pages: Google explained when it’s important to fix 404 error pages.

6. New Search Features in Google Chrome

Google Chrome for mobile devices has added several new search features to enhance user experience.

7. New Tests and Features in Google Search

  • Credit Card Widget: Google is testing a new widget for credit card information in search results.
  • Sliding Search Results: When making a new search query, the results might slide to the right.

8. Bing’s New Feature

Bing is now using AI to write “People Also Ask” questions in search results.

9. Local Search Ranking Factors

Menu items and popular times might be factors that influence local search rankings on Google.

10. Google Ads Updates

  • Query Matching and Brand Controls: Google Ads updated its query matching and brand controls, and advertisers are happy with these changes.
  • Lead Credits: Google will automate lead credits for Local Service Ads. Google says this is a good change, but some advertisers are worried.
  • tROAS Insights Box: Google Ads is testing a new insights box for tROAS (Target Return on Ad Spend) in Performance Max and Standard Shopping campaigns.
  • WordPress Tag Code: There is a new conversion code for Google Ads on WordPress sites.

These updates highlight how Google and other search engines are continuously evolving to improve user experience and provide better advertising tools.

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Exploring the Evolution of Language Translation: A Comparative Analysis of AI Chatbots and Google Translate

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A Comparative Analysis of AI Chatbots and Google Translate

According to an article on PCMag, while Google Translate makes translating sentences into over 100 languages easy, regular users acknowledge that there’s still room for improvement.

In theory, large language models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT are expected to bring about a new era in language translation. These models consume vast amounts of text-based training data and real-time feedback from users worldwide, enabling them to quickly learn to generate coherent, human-like sentences in a wide range of languages.

However, despite the anticipation that ChatGPT would revolutionize translation, previous experiences have shown that such expectations are often inaccurate, posing challenges for translation accuracy. To put these claims to the test, PCMag conducted a blind test, asking fluent speakers of eight non-English languages to evaluate the translation results from various AI services.

The test compared ChatGPT (both the free and paid versions) to Google Translate, as well as to other competing chatbots such as Microsoft Copilot and Google Gemini. The evaluation involved comparing the translation quality for two test paragraphs across different languages, including Polish, French, Korean, Spanish, Arabic, Tagalog, and Amharic.

In the first test conducted in June 2023, participants consistently favored AI chatbots over Google Translate. ChatGPT, Google Bard (now Gemini), and Microsoft Bing outperformed Google Translate, with ChatGPT receiving the highest praise. ChatGPT demonstrated superior performance in converting colloquialisms, while Google Translate often provided literal translations that lacked cultural nuance.

For instance, ChatGPT accurately translated colloquial expressions like “blow off steam,” whereas Google Translate produced more literal translations that failed to resonate across cultures. Participants appreciated ChatGPT’s ability to maintain consistent levels of formality and its consideration of gender options in translations.

The success of AI chatbots like ChatGPT can be attributed to reinforcement learning with human feedback (RLHF), which allows these models to learn from human preferences and produce culturally appropriate translations, particularly for non-native speakers. However, it’s essential to note that while AI chatbots outperformed Google Translate, they still had limitations and occasional inaccuracies.

In a subsequent test, PCMag evaluated different versions of ChatGPT, including the free and paid versions, as well as language-specific AI agents from OpenAI’s GPTStore. The paid version of ChatGPT, known as ChatGPT Plus, consistently delivered the best translations across various languages. However, Google Translate also showed improvement, performing surprisingly well compared to previous tests.

Overall, while ChatGPT Plus emerged as the preferred choice for translation, Google Translate demonstrated notable improvement, challenging the notion that AI chatbots are always superior to traditional translation tools.


Source: https://www.pcmag.com/articles/google-translate-vs-chatgpt-which-is-the-best-language-translator

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