What is Site Speed?
Simply, your site speed (or page speed) is how long it takes for your content to appear on your readers’ screen. Site speed has a large impact on your user’s experience while browsing your site, the opinion of you they take away with them, and their likelihood to recommend your blog. Not only is site speed a heavy factor in the human experience, itâs also a significant Google ranking factor – and a slow site could be holding you back.
As a blogger, itâs safe to say youâre head over heels for producing content – and thatâs EXACTLY why Google loves you! But how much effort have you put into THINKING about how your blogâs load speed affects your visitors, let alone actually improving it?
Unfortunately, unless youâve taken steps to actively improve your site speed, chances are your blog isnât performing at itâs absolute best. Your next step towards a better blog is to optimise that content, and help show Google youâre delivering the best information, the second your audience wants it.
Nope, that wasnât a miss-type. I said the SECOND – not a few seconds, or tens of seconds, or minutes⊠Google has a cold hard fact for you – if your site takes longer than three seconds to load, your visitors are OUTTA there! Theyâre hitting that âXâ and are back to looking at cat videos before theyâve even SEEN your latest post. Not exactly the kind of thing you want to hear, right? Itâs okay, the solution is simple – and easier than you think.
What counts as a slow site?
While it could come down to a matter of personal opinion, or time availability (weâve all got heaps of time to wait around for the information we need, yeah?), Google and many other User Experience experts have got news for you – just a little slow, is still WAY too slow. A page load time of less than .5 seconds is ideal, and will dramatically increase your blogâs performance AND rankings. One of our bloggers saw her traffic jump by 80% only a matter of moments after improving her site speed. A matter of MOMENTS! The best thing? It was one of the easiest changes she could have made to her blog.
If youâre lurking between the .5 and 3 second load times, itâs okay – help is here and youâre only a few tweaks away from optimum performance. Your audience is currently struggling to get to your content, but theyâre still hanging around – itâs time you reward them ASAP for their patience and start delivering them the experience they deserve. We all hate sitting around waiting for a page to load, and Google does too – they donât want to their users to be unhappy while they wait for content to load on a site Google has recommended.
Google doesnât like slow blogs.
So how does Google avoid displeasing THEIR users? They donât recommend sites that are too slow. While there are hundreds of factors that Google evaluates and combines to form a ranking, load speed is a MAJOR indicator for Google – so while your post might be perfectly structured with the best content available, a slow load time could be the barrier between you and high rankings. Did you ever think that it could actually be your site speed thatâs keeping your blog stuck on page two? Improving your load times could be the one step between you and that #1 spot youâve been chasing for longer than youâd like to admit.
Measure your site speed:
Using the PageSpeed Insights Tool
If youâre part of our crew over in bloggersSEO Support, chances are youâve seen this tool MULTIPLE times – itâs called Page Speed Insights, and is a Google tool specifically designed to identify and recommend speed improvements across your site. Best of all, itâs easy as pie to use!
Head over to the PageSpeed Insights to get started. Then, all you need to do is paste your URL into the given box, and hit âAnalyzeâ – remember to enter your FULL URL, including www. and HTTPS if you have them. In a few seconds, youâll receive two scores – one for the Mobile version of your blog, and one for Desktop.
Depending on how your site is set up and any work youâve done, your Mobile and Desktop scores could be very similar – or WORLDS apart. Regardless of your score, donât stress just yet – youâre here to FIX these problems!
Below your scores, Google will give you a variety of possible optimisations first – these are in priority order, so fixing the first recommendation will have the biggest impact. Take note of these, as Mobile and Desktop may have different needs and priorities. You can also use PageSpeed Insights to test the speed of individual pages – helping you further optimise the worst offenders across your site, and measure the effectiveness of changes as you make them!
Why does your Mobile Speed Score Matter?
Most CMSâ and themes now include a responsive mobile adaptation of your site, which may mean you donât even realise there are actually two versions. If you open your blog on your phone AND your desktop, chances are the menus are laid out a little differently, buttons are bigger, and sections might be shifted. This is because Desktop and Mobile sites behave differently, and certain functions do not translate well from Desktop to Mobile – such as traditional menus and clickable options – these are adjusted to be easier to use on mobile devices. Not only does your blog change on mobile, your usersâ behaviour does too – users tend to have very different needs and behaviour patterns when using their mobile – theyâre often out and about, and donât have the time nor internet connection to go fishing through your site.
Google is changing the way they do things, and understanding that their audience is mostly using mobile devices – theyâre reporting that 60% of their annual searches are conducted on a mobile device. Soon, Googleâs index will undergo a dramatic shift and will be generated on the mobile versions of sites, rather than their desktop counterpart. Basically, if youâve got a whizbang Desktop version thatâs ranking well but a poor Mobile counterpart, you could be losing those rankings very soon.
Checking speed in Search Console
If you don’t have Search Console set up on your blog, follow our quick tutorial here. Then, itâs time to use Googleâs own information and determine how fast your site is loading. External tools are great and provide further information on how to improve and optimise your site, but Google is the one RANKING your site – itâs key to understand their opinion first.
In Search Console, go to âCrawlâ then âCrawl Statsâ in the lefthand menu. Youâll see three graphs. The green graph is âTime Spent Downloading A Pageâ, and is the most important here. Next to this graph, youâll see three sets of numbers – High, Average and Low. These are the millisecond measurements of time taken downloading your content. You may occasionally have high peaks, but your average needs to be between 500 – 3,000ms – thatâs .5 – 3 seconds.
How did your site hold up? If you’re lurking in the danger zone, it’s time to make changes ASAP – you’d be surprised at how easy it can be, with simple fixes making a world of difference. Prioritise the areas PageSpeed Insights has recommended, and get a helping hand. If your scores were encouraging, that’s great! It’s time for you to keep monitoring and working to keep your site fast – and get it even faster.
Want to fix your site speed, RIGHT NOW? Get the help you need with our Site Speed short course!
