What exactly is meant by pagespeed?
Page operators know the phenomenon of pagespeed from their own internet use. A web page is called up and takes a long time for texts, images and other page elements to build up. The view shifts regularly, making it difficult to read the content that is already displayed. The result: after a few seconds, the user closes the website again and switches to a faster competitor’s website.
This fate should not befall one’s own website. Every operator should aim for the shortest possible time to build up each individual sub-page of their web presence. The faster it is fully displayed, the more likely it is to capture the interest of the site visitor. The speed of the page build-up is thus an important factor for consistently high traffic and possible customer conversion.
Pagespeed and sitespeed as important key figures
The term pagespeed refers to a single web page of a website. Sitespeed goes beyond this and evaluates the speed of all pages accessed on a website. This value is evaluated and documented by common analysis tools for website performance such as Google Analytics.
The sitespeed as a summary of the build-up speed of individual pages is an even more important key figure for page operators. It can be accepted that individual sub-pages with a wealth of content take longer to load. If this applies to all pages of the website, however, the fault lies in the system. Urgent action must be taken here so that performance does not suffer unnecessarily.
How can the speed be checked?
For a first, basic overview, it is worth using free online tools. The best-known providers and applications besides Google Analytics include:
- GTmetrix
- WebPagetest
- IsItWP
These tools do not simply evaluate the time span between the request to the server and the complete display in the user’s web browser. There is a detailed evaluation between individual levels of speed. When is the first text visible on the web page? When has the graphic framework of the page been built up? When is interaction with the website possible? Good tools carry out a separate evaluation of these speeds.
If the informative value and professionalism of the free tools is not enough, you should rely on an online marketing agency. This agency uses commercial SEO tools to boost the performance marketing of websites and achieve better rankings on Google or Bing. Increasing the pagespeed is one of the most important factors here.
Why is pagespeed so important for SEO?
Optimal pagespeed is important for page operators for two reasons:
- The human user: A large proportion of visitors leave a website again if it has not built up within three to four seconds. In the fast medium of the internet, there is a lack of patience until all content is visible. It is therefore pointless to make an effort in the design of a website or the pricing in an online shop. If the speed is not sufficient, customers will not stay as hoped.
- Search engines: Google, Bing and other search engines see the page speed factor as an important characteristic for the quality of a web presence. A website achieves higher relevance and thus better rankings if it does not keep its visitors waiting for long. Over the last few years, pagespeed has therefore become an important factor in search engine optimisation (SEO).
Advantages of the higher lateral speed
The most important advantages of accelerating your own website in the long term are derived from the above-mentioned properties and reasons:
- The chances of better Google rankings increase.
- The risk of jumping off after a few seconds decreases.
- Users benefit from better page performance.
- Traffic and conversion rates can be boosted.
The duration of the page load is therefore part of modern performance marketing. It is often small measures that can significantly increase the pagespeed. Here, it is primarily a matter of systematic adjustments that do not accelerate individual, larger sub-pages. Through clean programming and intelligent formatting of files, users experience the effect across the entire web presence.
Simple measures to speed up the website
1. data compression
Many files that can be downloaded from websites can be saved in compressed form. Various browsers allow direct compression of files, otherwise there are functional freeware solutions.
2. Image resolutions
More and more users are accessing websites on the move. Therefore, displayed images do not have to have an extremely high resolution. Since responsive programming checks which device the user is using to access the page, images should be integrated in lower resolutions for mobile devices.
3. Server change
On a technical level, the server has a great influence on the speed of page loading. A slow response of the server can be part of the concluded hosting package. Here, a changeover can be worthwhile in order to secure highspeed in technical terms.
4. Browser Caching
Many browsers, from Chrome to Safari, support the caching of page content and save content that has already been accessed by the user. This speeds up the page load considerably from the second time onwards and should be technically designed to last as long as possible until the cache is cleared.
5. Lean source text
Whether HTML, CSS or JavaScript – with clean and lean programming of the source code, processing by the browser is all the easier. Here it is advisable to rely on a professional developer. This can be done from the beginning or for subsequent optimisation of the page content.
With an advertising agency to higher speed
ONELINE sees high pagespeed as an essential aspect of contemporary search engine optimisation (SEO). For this reason, we take a close look at the structure and speed of the individual websites in our partners’ projects. The measures mentioned above represent only a fraction of the possibilities for significantly increasing pagespeed.
As an experienced online marketing agency, we complement the acceleration of the website with further steps of professional search engine optimisation. This gives our partners’ performance marketing a new, unexpected push and ideally leads to more page requests and lucrative deals in a timely manner.
