The Digital Marketing Podcast: Build Faster Websites

Hosts: Ciaran Rogers (A), John Henshaw (Raven Tools) (B)
Date: October 4, 2017
Episode Theme:
The episode explores how to build faster, user-friendly websites, with a deep dive into Google’s Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) project, its intentions, flaws, and concrete alternative strategies for boosting page speed and web UX.

Overview

This episode examines the state of the modern web, detailing how marketers and publishers have contributed to sluggish, bloated sites—especially on mobile. John Henshaw breaks down the origins and mechanics of AMP, critiques its implementation, and provides a practical five-point action plan that lets publishers achieve fast, high-quality sites without relying on Google’s restrictive framework. Along the way, the hosts highlight both the promise and the real-world limitations of AMP, driving home the case for better practices in development and user experience design.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Why AMP Exists and What It's Really Solving

• Web Degradation:
  The explosion of broadband led to web publishers overloading sites with JavaScript, oversized images, excessive ads, and intrusive popups, causing poor mobile experiences.
  John: "Amp is Google's response to all of us marketers basically ruining the web." (00:38)
• User Experience Crisis:
  Mobile now dominates web traffic, but most sites remain optimized for desktop, leading to "horrible" mobile experiences.
• AMP Basics:
  AMP is a stripped-down, controlled version of HTML that's optimized for speed and better UX on mobiles. It restricts custom JavaScript, enforces a single-column layout, and mandates lean assets.
  John: "They forced you into a single column presentation of content, which is what good UX is." (03:05)
• Google's Motivations:
  Ensures Google's mobile search dominance—"they're elevating it in the organic search results" for AMP pages.
  John: "They're elevating it in the organic search results ... that's because they're the ones putting it in front of your face and making sure it succeeds because they're the people with the finger on the button and they control everything." (05:10)

2. AMP Criticism: Control, Monetization, and User Experience

• Google Hosting & Caching:
  AMP pages are cached (and essentially hosted) by Google, reducing publisher control and keeping users within Google’s ecosystem rather than sending them to publisher sites.
  • Example: Sports scores shown on Google act as full-page experiences where the user never leaves Google.
    John: "You never got to show your own ads. AMP you get to show ads. But in this other experience that they're doing now, there's no ads, it's just all them using your data for free." (06:00)
• Loss of Publisher Value:
  Navigation, branding, and full monetization are limited; hard for publishers to build relationships or retain traffic.
• Broken Promise of AMP UX:
  Despite intentions, publishers use AMP to serve more ads, not fewer.
  • Forbes Example:
    John: "What AMP is really good for is just serving more ads faster... They've already lost the UX battle by the fact that that even exists... If any good can come out of this... it's going to be that hopefully this temporary time of AMP was the time that got people to clean their act up." (08:42, 28:45)
  • The promised user experience improvement didn’t materialize; John found "six to seven big ads" and persistent popups on an AMP-enabled Forbes article.

3. Devil’s Advocate: Is AMP the Tool or the Problem?

• Tool or Publisher’s Fault?
  Ciaran asks, isn’t AMP just a tool that can be misused?
  John: "The problem here is that we have a solution for something ... that we don't need ... We need HTML where people do it correctly." (11:39)
• True Solution:
  Quality UX and speed come from making sites lean and well-designed, not from switching HTML frameworks or surrendering control.

4. The 5 Essential Steps to Build Faster, Better Sites (No AMP Required)

John presents a practical action plan, also shared via his educational site makefastsites.com.

1. Refactor Your Code (12:51)

• Problem: Sites become bloated over time with unused plugins and heavy JavaScript.
• Solution: Audit all code, remove unnecessary plugins/libraries, only load scripts/css needed for each specific page.
  • Notable Quote:
    John: "Refactoring your code means identifying those things and cutting out all of it, only keeping what you need." (13:49)
  • Analogy:
    Ciaran: "Packing 15 rucksacks and only using one little thing — your sandwiches — to work." (13:39)

2. Optimize Font Usage (15:25)

• Problem: Web fonts (like Google Fonts) significantly increase page weights, especially with multiple weights/styles.
• Solution: Favor system fonts (like San Francisco for Mac, Segoe UI for Windows) for body text; limit web fonts to headlines or brand uses only.
  • Quote:
    John: "If you do different weights ... those are all their own files. Before you know it ... you've got 1.2 megabytes of a font." (16:59)

3. Image Optimization & Responsiveness (18:09)

• Problem: Developers confuse 'responsive' images (resize visually) with 'optimized' images (right format, right size for device); PNGs and large images slow loads.
• Solution: Use correct formats (JPEG, SVG), leverage the srcset attribute for device-specific images, use tools/plugins (like EWWW Image Optimizer, source set plugins for WordPress).
  • Quote:
    John: "A responsive image is not an optimized image ... The image you’re using on desktop ... could be 800 kilobytes. Well, guess what? When it resizes ... it's still 800 kilobytes." (18:55)

4. Use a CDN and HTTP/2 (21:06)

• Problem: Physical server distance and traditional HTTP lead to sluggish global load times.
• Solution: Distribute your site with a content delivery network (CDN); use HTTP/2 for multiplexed connections (quicker delivery of many assets).
  • Free services like Cloudflare offer both CDN and HTTP/2 upgrades (plus free SSL).
  • Quote:
    John: "If you have a hundred things on your site ... HTTP/2 puts it all into one connection ... so you're seeing results ... from four seconds to 0.2 seconds." (23:05)

5. Focus on True User Experience (UX) (24:46)

• Principle: Don't punish visitors for sales goals with disruptive ads or popups. Well-made, unobtrusive calls to action and restraint build trust, loyalty, and long-term success.
  • Good Example: Vice News – minimal ads, non-blocking email call-to-action, easy to read and navigate.
    John: "[Vice News] prove that you don't need AMP. You just need to make a fast site and you need to make it more user friendly." (28:45)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Marketers “Ruining” the Web:
  "We've been ruining it ever since with loading up our sites with JavaScript, using huge images, trashing it with more ads than you know what to do with."
  — John Henshaw (00:38)

• On the Real Issue:
  "People's sites aren't fast. That's the real issue."
  — John Henshaw (07:40)

• On AMP’s True Utility:
  "What AMP is really good for is just serving more ads faster ... AMP is not the solution. The solution is that publishers need to go back and start making a good user experience and need to make their sites faster."
  — John Henshaw (08:42)

• On Fonts & Creative Teams:
  "Now this is gonna result in big arguments with the creative teams because they do love their fonts ... very often they come from a background of print design."
  — Ciaran Rogers (17:35)

• On UX Trust:
  "I'm probably going to even be more apt to give [Vice News] my email ... because they're not spamming me in the article. So they probably won't spam me via email ... They are differentiating themselves against all the other publishers by not making the user experience so awful."
  — John Henshaw (27:48)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• 00:38: Why AMP exists — Google’s response to slow, bloated sites
• 03:05: How AMP works — enforced speed and UX
• 05:10: Google’s motivations and search ranking impact
• 07:40: AMP’s limitations — Google hosts your content and restricts control
• 08:42: Forbes AMP example — ad-heavy, poor UX: “AMP is not the solution”
• 12:51: Five essential site speed/UX strategies
• 13:39: Refactoring code analogy — "15 rucksacks"
• 15:25: Why system fonts beat web fonts
• 18:09: Image optimization best practices
• 21:06: CDN and HTTP/2 explained
• 24:46: The value of thoughtful, restrained UX
• 27:48: Case study: Vice News' good UX builds trust and loyalty
• 28:45: Final thoughts: Google's intentions, but publisher responsibility

Resources Mentioned

• makefastsites.com — John Henshaw’s educational microsite on practical site optimization
• EWWW Image Optimizer (WordPress)
• Source Set plugin (WordPress for responsive images)
• Cloudflare (Free CDN, SSL, HTTP/2)
• Vice News — As an example of outstanding publisher UX

Tone & Language

The episode maintains a conversational, sometimes humorous, and slightly irreverent tone ("donkey-powered internet," "15 rucksacks and one packet of sandwiches"), but is packed with actionable advice and critical, candid assessments of current industry trends.

Summary Flow & Takeaway

Even for those unfamiliar with AMP or technical aspects, this episode serves as both a critique of old web marketing habits and a pragmatic, forward-looking guide to building leaner, faster, and friendlier websites — all without ceding control to Google. For publishers and marketers, the enduring message is clear: Quality coding, design restraint, and putting users first are the enduring path to web success.