Understanding the 2023 SEO landscape
In 2023, SEO is more important than ever. With the rise of voice search, and the increasing importance of mobile devices, it’s crucial that your website is optimised for search engines. One of the most important factors in SEO is page speed. In this article, we’ll explore why page speed matters so much in 2023.
What is page speed?
Page speed is a measurement of how fast the content on your website loads. It’s measured in seconds, and is a key metric for search engines like Google. There’s several ways to measure page speed called Core Web Vitals - defined as:
- Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): measures loading performance. To provide a good user experience, LCP should occur within 2.5 seconds of when the page first starts loading.
- First Input Delay (FID): measures interactivity. To provide a good user experience, pages should have a FID of less than 100 milliseconds.
- Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): measures visual stability. To provide a good user experience, pages should maintain a CLS of less than 0.1.
- Time to First Byte (TTFB): measures the time it takes for a browser to receive the first byte of page content from the web server. TTFB is a key metric for search engines, and is a good indicator of server performance.
You can read more about Core Web Vitals at web.dev.
The significance of page speed
Page speed is a key metric for search engines, and is seen by several as an indication of a website’s quality. In fact, Google has stated that page speed is a ranking factor (source). This means that if your website is slow, it’s likely to rank lower in search results. This is particularly important for mobile devices, where users are more likely to abandon a slow website.
The cost of a slow page
The cost of a slow page can’t be understated - research from Google shows that as page load times increase, so does the chance of a user bouncing (leaving the website). In fact, the probability of bounce increases 32% as page load time goes from 1 second to 3 seconds.
The cost of a bounce
The cost of a bounce can be significant, too. It’s not that a user loads your website then leaves, it’s that they give up before it’s even loaded. This means that you’ve instantly lost a potential customer, and they may well have gone to a competitor - all because of a largely fixable issue!
Diagnosing page speed issues
At Novatura, we’re specialists in building high-performance websites. As part of that, we’ve got a lot of experience diagnosing and resolving issues holding websites back and use a variety of methods to do so. Here’s some of our favourites:
Large file detection
One of the biggest culprits for slow websites is large files - usually images and videos. By auditing all the files on your website, we can identify find the largest files and optimise them for the web. This can have a huge impact on page speed, and is often a quick win.
When we build a website, we’ll always optimise your images for you automatically - even ones you upload yourself!
Server performance
Another common issue is server performance. If your server is slow, it doesn’t matter how fast your website is - it’ll still be slow. We can help you identify server performance issues, and recommend a solution. We can even host your website for you, and ensure it’s always fast.
Code quality
Finally, code quality can have a huge impact on page speed. If your website is built using a slow framework, or has a lot of unnecessary code, it’s likely to be slow. We can help you identify these issues, and recommend a solution. Even better, we can build you a new website that’s fast from the ground up!
Building for speed, by default
At Novatura, we pride ourselves on building high-performance websites without compromise. Our commitment to performance means that our websites are loved by users, never held back in search results and always fast.
When we’re working on a website, we’re focused on:
- Rigorously testing across multiple browsers and devices
- Using our audit-identify-fix cycle to iteratively improve performance
- Using the latest technologies to ensure your website is fast, now and in the future:
- Next-generation image formats (WebP, AVIF)
- Server optimisation (HTTP/2, HTTP/3)
- Code optimisation (minification, dead-code removal, etc.)
- And many more!
Conclusion
In conclusion, page speed is a crucial factor in SEO, and can have a huge impact on your business. By ensuring your website is fast, you can improve your search engine ranking, reduce bounce rate, and increase conversions. At Novatura, we’re experts in building high-performance websites, and we’d love to help you.
Get in touch today to discuss your requirements.
