Why WebSite Speed is Important
NOTE! This page is still in the writing!
Page speed is a critical factor that can make or break your website’s success. If your website takes more than three seconds to load, it can negatively impact user experience, causing frustration and annoyance among visitors. On the other hand, smooth loading content and images create a pleasant experience that encourages people to interact more with your website.
Despite its importance, many website owners tend to overlook page load speed. They assume that their website’s speed is satisfactory and fail to test it regularly, relying on user comments to address speed-related issues. However, this approach is not ideal since a slow-loading page can lead to high bounce rates, meaning users leave your website quickly, often without exploring internal links.
In addition, page load speed has a significant impact on average session time, which refers to the amount of time a user spends on your website during a single session. A fast-loading website encourages visitors to explore more content and engage deeper with the resources you have to offer. This engagement can make your site ‘sticky’, keeping users on your site for longer periods, increasing the likelihood of conversion, and ultimately, the success of your business.
Google research says: “As page load time goes from one second to 10 seconds, the probability of a mobile site visitor bouncing increases 123%.” Personally, I will never wait more than 3-4 seconds for a site to load. Shorter on a mobile device. I am quickly on to the next!
Google will reward a fast loading website. Meaning: The longer your site takes to load the fewer visitors you will get.
Key metrics for webpage load time:
- Time to first byte (TTFB): This metric being one of the most important, shows the time it takes to request a page from the server and for the first byte of data to arrive. A low TTFB indicates a fast server.
- Document complete: This indicator shows how long it takes for the page to load. The web page load time is shown by a low Document Complete time.
- First Contentful Paint
- Largest Contentful Paint
- CLS
Fast Servers!
A well optimize Apache server can be just as fast as a Lite Speed server. Unfortunately 95% of all Apache Servers are NOT optimized.
TTFB
Google says 200-500 ms.
Themes and Plugins
Fast themes
W3Tc
Fast Velocity Minify
Video Optimization
Show a thumbnail while video loads in the background.
Image Optimization
W3TC
Gimp Webp
Minimize 301 redirects
www – non www – http – https
Render blocking Java & CSS
Needs to be rearranges
HTTP2
No use for combining and any more. HTTP2 will parallel load requests. So by combining smaller chunks of code to larger you will ruin it for HTTP2!
Minification
Remove redundant information from the files.
CSS
Use Chrome Developer Tools to minimize CSS
Java Scripts
Generally load them as late as possible
CDN
Use of CDN for images and Videos.
CloudFlare
Only caches come elements
Web Site Test Pages
Gtmetrix
WebPageTest
Pingdom
Google PageSpeed https://pagespeed.web.dev/
URL Compression Test using mod_gzip or mod_deflate
Dotcom-Monitor https://www.dotcom-tools.com/website-speed-test
YSlow
GTmetrix
Chrome DevTools
Yellow Lab Tools
https://www.bitcatcha.com/report/
https://whichloadsfaster.zomdir.com/
https://www.uptrends.com/ 30 days free
https://yellowlab.tools/ https://yellowlab.tools/
https://performance.sucuri.net/
https://www.site24x7.com/web-page-analyzer.html
Don’t use HTML Validator Tools – They are not updated since 2012 and thus they do not understand HTTP2.
Visitors vs. Load Speed
According to OnlineMarketingInstitute a 1 second decrease in pagespeed/web page load time can increase your conversions by up to 27%!
More than 50% of mobile guests will abandon your website if it takes more than 3 seconds to load!
Google has come up with these stats: https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/consumer-insights/consumer-trends/mobile-page-speed-new-industry-benchmarks/
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