What are Google Web Stories?
Google Web Stories are clickable pages with audio, video, and text that allow authors to interact with audiences and share information with them. Prior to becoming Web Stories, the format was known as AMP Stories.
According to Google, first-person narratives, evergreen or updating stories, live stories, instructional and immersive stories, as well as quizzes and polls, are the styles that function best with the format.
Web Stories can be included to newsletters, linked from social media, and displayed in carousels in Google Discover in addition to conventional Google Search results. A Web Story is displayed in Google Discover on the left and Google Search on the right in the image below.
Web Stories can be indexed and surfaced in relevant results because they are individual pages on your website. You can showcase them on your website as independent pieces of content or embed them like podcast or YouTube videos.
Google Web Stories Format
A poster, a cover page, and story pages are the three components of a web story.
The package is what Google refers to as the poster because it is the first thing someone sees while visiting your Story. Your cover page serves as the introduction to the substance of your story, and story pages are where you start telling your story and narrative using text, video, and other resources that you find most appealing.
You can have more than one story page, however there is only one poster and cover page per story.
Benefits of Google Web Stories
Have you yet come around to the notion of developing Google Web Stories for your business? Let’s discuss some of the advantages Google Web Stories may have for your business and why they might be superior to some of the social media alternatives if you’re still on a dilemma about using them.
It offers users a fresh approach to discover your website
The possibility for Google Web Stories to be visible in Google search results pages or in Google pictures is a strong incentive to take into consideration generating them due to Google’s potent search engine capabilities. It’s another way to improve your SEO strategy.
Moreover, you may include links or CTAs that direct visitors to your site because Google Web Stories are completely customizable.
The content is your
The primary difference between Google Web Stories and competing social media platforms is content ownership. You have the right to do whatever you want with the material because you developed it using AMP or a third-party platform.
You can share it however you like or embed it on your own website. Consider your intended use of Google Web Stories as well as how readers will discover yours. This may influence your artistic decisions as well. There are a plethora of solutions available to you.
They add realistic features to your website
Google Web Stories may give your website a new depth, whether you’ve been seeking for a method to spice up your blogging, tell a narrative on it, or just appreciate the way a full-screen experience looks.
Full-screen Google Web Stories can be seen by desktop and mobile users, reducing descriptions and enhancing the sense of immersion.
They amaze your audience
Americans use their mobile devices for five hours a day on average. People enjoy skimming over interesting topics.
Finding your specialty and sharing captivating, engaging stories can help you stand out from the noise and clutter of the internet and draw in new viewers.
They enable unique advertising opportunities
You should be aware that Google Web Stories can be combined with Google AdWords and other ad options. We shall get into this more in a moment. This might be a smart choice for some firms due to its strong SEO connection.
Where can you Discover Web Stories?
The fact that Google Web Stories can be viewed on the web sets them apart from the plethora of story-telling features present in apps.
On Your Website
Google’s Web Stories can be hosted on a creator’s own website, in contrast to the likes of Instagram Stories, which must be seen on that platform. As there are no content restrictions, unlike many applications, this provides publishers more latitude over the content of the article.
Additionally, it implies that the story is not restricted to the social media applications‘ walled garden and can be used to promote your website.
In the Search Results
The accessibility of Google Stories from the SERPs is one of the key advantages over competing social media story formats. Like a web page, Google Web Stories can be indexed and returned as a search result.
In Google Discover
Google declared that they would add Web Stories to Google Discover feeds in India, Brazil, and the US in October 2020. At the top of Discover is a collection of stories that Google refers to as a “shelf.” The user can swipe through the list of stories by tapping the story, which expands to full-screen.
In Your Online Publications
Web Stories are hosted on your own servers, so you may use the information in other digital assets as well, including emails and digital brochures.
On Multiple Devices
Web stories can be accessed on mobile, tablet, and desktop browsers even if the AMP technology they are based on is intended for mobile consumption.
As a result, responsive assets like websites don’t require the development of desktop-friendly equivalents, increasing their usefulness.
How to create Google Web Stories?
Making your own Web Story is simple and only requires five steps. Here is a closer look at the approach:
Select a visual editor
A visual editor is an application that lets you create and edit graphics, movies, and other visual content. You don’t need to be an expert in video editing or design to create stunning and interesting content because they frequently include straightforward functionality and built-in themes. You may try Web Stories for WordPress, MakeStories, or Newsroom AI, to name a few.
Draft your story
The finest Web Stories maintain the reader’s interest by telling a complete story from the minute they are published. Because every page of a story is published all at once, it’s critical to plan out your Web Story’s narrative in the same approach you would for a blog or video.
Though everyone’s creative process is different, we advise outlining your web story on Google Docs. The Storytime team utilizes this script template to plan the text, videos, images, and animations we want to include on each page.
Identify the visual assets
An engaging Web Story must be created by carefully selecting the images and videos to use. However, if you’ve been blogging, you presumably already have videos or other photos you can utilize. This can be the most time-consuming step. It’s crucial to keep in mind that full-page videos must always be presented vertically. Your Web Story will load faster and consume less bandwidth if you do this.
Create the Web Story
It’s time to begin building once you have your plot written and all of your resources gathered in one area. The quickest and simplest way to develop your Web Story when you’re first starting out is to use the pre-made templates in your visual editor. In order to get your viewers interested in clicking to learn more, you should first drag an arresting video or image into the tool.
Inherently participatory forms of media include stories. To interact, viewers can navigate the pages by clicking ahead and backward and by clicking on links. To increase connection and engagement, you can also try incorporating tests and polls.
Publish Your Web Story
It’s time to publish your Web Story if you’re satisfied with the images, design, and text. This is as simple as pressing the Publish button when using a visual editor.
You will have your first Web Story once you complete these steps.
Google Web Stories Examples
Today, you can find examples of various Google web stories on a variety of e-commerce, advertising, learning, and news websites, as well as on the Google Search discover page. Below are a few instances that we will give.
How Money is Made
How Money Is Made is one of several posts from Refinery29’s How Stuff Is Made series. It’s the kind of narrative that initially seems very dull, but if some excellent content, videos, and photographs are added, it becomes captivating. You’re curious to know what will happen next.
The burger sisters of Kenya
Two sisters who run a well-known burger food truck in Kenya are the subject of the web story The Burger Sisters of Kenya. This Story is a terrific source of inspiration since it has high-quality video and imagery, a first-person narrative that reads like a conversation, and it considers accessibility with captions and audio transcriptions.
5 Destinations to see wildlife with your kids
Travel, animal, and children’s stories all beg to be conveyed in a visual medium like Google Web Stories. In this article on taking kids on field trips to explore wildlife, Lonely Planet has taken it to heart.
The above examples are listed in Google Web Stories with Featured Section.
Ad Opportunities on Google Web Stories
Traditionally, content creators have made money by selling ad space. This is true for both print newspapers and online news blogs. Google Web Stories can use the same principle as programmatic advertisements.
Web Stories have full-screen, single-page advertisements called Story Ads. With a simple tap, advertisers and publishers can invite people to a website, an AMP page, or an app. A story advertisement has a large, flexible canvas that can include any mix of photos, videos, animations, or all three.
You can create rich, compelling stories with advertising that flow naturally with the rest of your story. You can include CTA boxes, links to landing sites, and links to product pages depending on your reason for building a story.
Conclusion:
A rich, captivating content format, Google Web Stories has a lot of potential for marketers. Web Stories do not have a time limit or are platform-independent like other social media narrative formats. It’s worthwhile to investigate the advantages of brand exposure through Google products like Search and Discover.