In the world of digital, every second counts. This statement is very important when it comes to the speed of your website. KissMetrics published an article stating that if your web page has a 1 (one!) second delay in loading it can result in a 7% reduction in conversions.
Not only can conversion rate be affected by a slow website, also affected is how Google perceives and ranks your website.
Fortunately, Google host a great tool for checking your website’s load speed.
The PageSpeed Insights tools is great for checking the most important factors which can be slowing down your website. However, don’t be hung up on obtaining a perfect score. As long as your score is out of the red, then you’re likely at the point of diminishing returns. For example, if the main point holding you back is “Optimize CSS delivery”, then forget about it, as it’ll be more hassle than it’s worth to implement. (To solve this problem often requires reworking your frontend codebase and can impact code maintainability in the long-term.)
Optimising Image Assets for Speed
Usually, the main culprit in hampering page load speed is under optimised image assets. So make that your first point of attack and re-test to see an immediate and often drastic increase in your load times. Google’s aforementioned tool provides a really easy way to optimise your assets, which is often overlooked. Simply click the link near the bottom of your results labelled “Download optimized image, JavaScript, and CSS resources for this page.” to get a ZIP containing your optimised assets ready for usage.
Have you tried this on your own website yet? Now is the time to make sure your website is performing inline with your competitors. We always run extensive page speed optimisation on our websites so if you need any expert assistance with the finer points we’re always available.
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