| Read time 13 min read

Web Performance for New Website Owners

Test your site’s SEO and performance in 60 seconds! Good website design is critical to visitor engagement and conversions, but a slow website or performance errors can make even the best designed website underperform. Diib uses the power of big data to help you quickly and easily increase your traffic and rankings. As seen in Entrepreneur!

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Easy-to-use automated SEO tool

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Keyword and backlink monitoring + ideas

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Ensures speed, security, + Core Vitals tracking

Web Performance for New Website Owners

Read time 13 min read
Web performance

Test your site’s SEO and performance in 60 seconds! Good website design is critical to visitor engagement and conversions, but a slow website or performance errors can make even the best designed website underperform. Diib uses the power of big data to help you quickly and easily increase your traffic and rankings. As seen in Entrepreneur!

icon

Easy-to-use automated social media + SEO tool

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Automated ideas to improve Social Media traffic + sales

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Keyword and backlink monitoring + ideas

Today, site visitors are not going to wait long for your website to load. Research shows that website speeds can make a huge difference in customer satisfaction and sales conversions. As a matter of fact, 47% of consumers prefer websites that load in less than two seconds.

What Is Website Performance?

This is the speed with which the web pages are downloaded or displayed on your browser. In short, a website should load as quickly as possible. The ideal loading time is 1-2 seconds since 53% of site visitors leave if pages take more than three seconds to load.

Importance of Site Performance

A fast site speed results in better user experience. Eventually, slow websites result in a low number of conversions and a high bounce rate. Optimizing the web performance for new website owners is critical. Essentially, people will abandon a slow site since they don’t have the patience to wait for the website to load.

Speed is even more critical for small business owners that are looking to convert visitors to buyers. If the users have to navigate through a complex funnel, they will leave and opt for faster websites that are more user-friendly. There are many websites that can help you track your website speed, for instance PageSpeed Insights:

Web performance

(Image Credit: Google)

1. Importance of Site Speed in Social Media

Site speed is critical in social media sites such as Facebook and Pinterest. Facebook invested in an algorithmic change in August 2017 to prioritize the user experience.

Since ads are important to Facebook, the new algorithm was aimed at meeting the needs of a growing customer base. Not only did the algorithm improve the speed and user experience, but Facebook also reported an increase in revenue.

2. Site Speed’s Impact On Conversion

Site speed has a great impact on user experience and conversion. The speed has an influence on SEO and that’s why people bounce off the slow websites. A bounce refers to an instance where a user does not proceed to the next page on a site. Slow loading sites have high bounce rates. Such rates affect the ranking on Google, and that’s why speed should be a priority. Google Analytics has a way to track your bounce rate so you can fix it if need be:

Web performance

(Image Credit: OptinMonster)

How to Measure Web Performance

Site speed plays a key role when it comes to conversions. Typically, if people are bouncing from your website due to a slow load time, they will not convert. A page that gets people to the information they require should not give them more time to change their minds.

An easy-to-navigate site provides the right path to conversion once the visitors decide to purchase your products. With so many metrics that determine the web performance, you need to select the ones that relate to your users. The key performance indicators of most websites include:

1. Page Load

Page load refers to the amount of time that a website page takes to appear on your screen. For best results, ensure that every website page takes at most two seconds to load. If possible, have it load in milliseconds.

If the page load exceeds this threshold, you should implement site performance optimization techniques. Thus, it’s wise to prioritize the most important aspects of a website (such as contacts) and delay the loading of secondary elements (such as advertisements).

2. Render Time

Render time is the duration it takes to load the HTML document. It determines how long the visitors have to wait until something appears in the blank browser page.

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Slow render time indicates a problem with the CSS or JavaScript files. Getting rid of the bottlenecks in these metrics can improve the speed and user experience significantly.

3. First Meaningful Paint (FMP)

A partially loaded website is known as the first paint. Since it contains very limited information, it’s essential to determine the time it takes to display meaningful information. Having a preload is critical to improving the loading time so that the website can display a meaningful image fast. Here is an example of FMP:

Web performance

(Image Credit: Search Engine Land)

4. Server Time

Server time indicates how responsive the server is to the initial request. It’s akin to time-to-first-byte, (TTFB), which is time that elapses before the visitor receives the first piece of data.

Webpages that rely on databases have high server time, and must be configured or optimized properly. WordPress users can easily reduce their TTFB with the help of caching plugins such as the Cache Enabler.

Test your site’s SEO and performance in 60 seconds!

Good website design is critical to visitor engagement and conversions, but a slow website or performance errors can make even the best designed website underperform. Diib is one of the best website performance and SEO monitoring tools in the world. Diib uses the power of big data to help you quickly and easily increase your traffic and rankings. As seen in Entrepreneur!

  • Easy-to-use automated SEO tool
  • Keyword and backlink monitoring + ideas
  • Ensures speed, security, + Core Vitals tracking
  • Intelligently suggests ideas to improve SEO
  • Over 500,000 global members
  • Built-in benchmarking and competitor analysis

For example “www.diib.com”

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5. Speed Index

The Google speed index is a vital standard for measuring the web performance. According to Google, the speed index is the total amount of time it takes for all elements in the browser to display.

The speed index is calculated in milliseconds by the WebPageTest that captures a video of the webpage as it loads. This speed index is a good determinant of the user experience since it indicates how quickly the visitor actually sees content. For instance:

Web performance

(Image Credit: Web.dev)

6. Bytes In

Bytes in is a synonym for page size. Large web pages have millions of kilobytes needed to completely download the contents in a page. Page sizes have a tendency to increase over time, which is why people upgrade their servers.

7. Time to Complete a Transaction

It’s difficult to calculate how long it takes for a user to complete a particular transaction since the process typically involves multiple steps across several pages. Website monitoring services come in handy since they allow developers to conduct an array of mockups for such purposes.

8. Time it takes To Interact

Users usually start to scroll and click even before webpages can finish loading. You can determine the user experience (UX) by narrowing down to the point a visitor starts engaging with your application. With the help of JavaScript events and handlers, you can pick out the dead spots on your webpages and consider getting rid of items that receive minimal attention from the users.

How to Increase Your Website Speed

When it comes to web performance for new website owners, there are tons of factors that influence how long each page on your site takes to load. Luckily, there are various steps you can take to increase your speed and improve the user experience. Take advantage of the following best practices to decrease your load time and improve your site’s performance:

  1. Enable compression
  2. Minify the CSS, JavaScript, and HTML
  3. Reduce the redirects
  4. Eliminate render-blocking JavaScript
  5. Use the asynchronous loading for the JavaScript and CSS files
  6. Leverage the browser caching
  7. Improve the server response time
  8. Defer the JavaScript loading

1. Enable Compression

Though there are several on-page optimization techniques, the most essential element comes down to file size. No matter how good your website is, you will experience frustrating load time if your files are bulky and large.

Essentially, this google site performance technique shrinks the files, such as images, documents, and audio files, to a compressed state. Compression allows the website to access and load all the files fast as it reduces the number of tasks that must be completed in order to display a webpage. If you are using an app or website such as Photoshop or Canva make sure to shrink your file to the smallest size, for example:

Web performance

The trick is to eliminate the unnecessary elements that bog down your load time. Compression also helps to reduce the rendering time.

Colorful and flashy JPEG images are quite large, and if they aren’t compressed properly, they will slow your website. You can prevent this disaster by compressing them to 70kb.

There are lots of image compressors online that reduce the size without sacrificing quality. You can also compress the files by:

  • Grouping CSS files and selectors
  • Removing the html code whitespace
  • Zipping your website files

2. Minifying The CSS, JavaScript, And HTML

Minification is the process of reducing code and markup in all your script files and web pages. This google site performance method helps to lower the load time and bandwidth usage on the websites.

Minification automatically improves site speed and improves the accessibility, directly resulting in a better user experience. You can minify the CSS and JavaScript in the following ways:

  • Determine the code to be minified and delete the characters that don’t serve any purpose other than improving the readability.
  • Consolidate all your code in the Editor section if you are using WordPress.
  • Post your compressed code in the CSS minifier and click “Minify”.
  • Test your minification by running it on PageSpeed Insights.
  • Create a backup for your work.

3. Reduce Redirects

Redirects are the channels that link your visitors to the right pages of the website. However, without the proper google page optimization strategies, the process causes the pages to load slower than they should. Small business owners that are looking to improve the traffic in their websites rely on the redirects, but they must remember to tone them down.

Instead of taking your visitors through multiple pages, business owners should aim to give them a direct route to their websites. It’s possible to reduce the redirects if you:

  • Avoid linking to a page that has a redirect on it since it will only lead to multiple redirects frustrated visitors.
  • Clear the plugins that you do not need since they can result in unnecessary redirects.
  • Scan your website for old redirects that link to pages you no longer require.

4. Remove Render-Blocking JavaScript

Whenever a website starts loading, it sends out calls to various scripts in a queue. The number of scripts in the queue (render-blocking JavaScript and CSS files) determines how long the website will take to respond.

In most cases, some of these scripts aren’t necessary for the website to perform optimally. The trick is to identify the primary files so that you can get rid of the redundant ones. With the help of google page optimization techniques, you can identify the scripts that are slowing down your page by simply entering your URL.

You can remove the render-blocking JavaScript by:

  • Minifying your CSS and JavaScript and removing all whitespace and redundant comments in the code.
  • Combining your JavaScript and CSS

Web performance

(Image Credit: HubSpot Blog)

5. Rely on Asynchronous Loading for the JavaScript and CSS Files

If you are struggling with performance site optimization is paramount. Whenever the browser encounters a script, it stops loading the other elements until that page has been fully loaded.

Asynchronous loading enables numerous files to load simultaneously, speeding up the website performance. Loading files asynchronously helps to speed up your website significantly. So, even when loading a slow script your web page can render without having to wait.

However, you have to load the initial pages synchronously. You introduce the asynchronous scripts by unblocking the frozen pages so that multiple scripts can load at once.

You can use asynchronous files to load:

  • Heavy files such as JavaScripts and CSS
  • Websites with a large customer base such as Google AdSense and Google Analytics
  • Social media platforms such as Pinterest, Facebook, and Twitter

We hope that you found this article useful.

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6. Leverage Browser Caching

For business owners that are looking to improve the performance of site development must take advantage of the latest innovation in the industry. The browser cache saves information (data, images and HTML) that is necessary for the user to see the website. Once the cache saves this information, it helps the website to load automatically without any delays. You can improve your website performance by learning how to leverage the browser caching with plugins or htaccess. This involves going to the file manager on your webhost.

Browser caching helps customers to move through the site easily and it helps to keep people on your website since they can easily click around. You can leverage the browser catching once you:

  • Open the File Manager and access the public_html directory
  • Double-click on htaccess file and insert the code (designed by a web developer)
  • Save the changes (the new codes will expire after 1 year)

7. Improve Server Response Time

If you are looking for optimum performance site web developers must find the right ways to reduce the loading time. Server response time, which is the time the server takes to respond to a client’s request, is measured by TTFB. TTFB stands for Time to First Byte. Reducing the server response time must be a primary goal of every website owner and SEO expert. The consequence of high TTFB is a slow website. Google developed the PageSpeed Insights tool to reduce the server response time. You can improve the server response time by:

  • Using reliable and fast web hosting services by investing in a fast server that caters for your customers’ needs and steers clear of free web hosting services.
  • Using a Content Delivery Network (CDN) to distribute data to every user fast; you need a service provider that has invested in servers across the globe for quick distribution.
  • Optimizing the databases to enable the website to respond quickly; a web developer can identify the lagging databases and optimize them accordingly.

8. Defer JavaScript Loading

When it comes to performance, web developers take a lot of things into account.

JavaScript is a scripting language that goes hand in hand with HTML. JavaScript is critical for its ability to enable dynamic content to be executed on a webpage. Since JavaScript is quite heavy, it is designed as a standalone tool.

Deferring a JavaScript file entails preventing it from loading until the primary HTML files have loaded. If you defer the large files, such as JavaScript, you enable the rest of your content to load without a delay.

You can defer the JavaScript loading by:

  • Asking a web developer to create a code that causes the entire document to load (defer.js)
  • Copying the code and paste it in your HTML file
  • Ticking the box adjacent to Load JS Files Deferred
  • Forcing the large files to delay rendering until everything else on the page is ready

Diib®: Enhanced Web Performance Fast!

There is no doubt that fast websites promote high customer satisfaction and higher sales conversions. Frankly, if you are not turning site visitors into buyers at a high rate, you are still stuck in the below-average bucket list. With Diib Digital on your side, you will easily see the enhancement and conversions you seek. Here are some of the features of our User Dashboard we’re sure you’ll love:

  • Customized Objectives designed to enhance website performance
  • Alerts that tell you about your Domain Authority other technical SEO issues
  • Broken pages where you have backlinks (404 checker)
  • Keyword, backlink, and indexing monitoring and tracking tools
  • User experience and mobile speed optimization
  • Bounce rate monitoring
  • Post performance

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FAQ’s

Web performance affects the overall user experience on a website. The browser used to find your website and the devices people use all impact the way they view your site.

It has never been more important for your website to load as fast as possible. The ideal time to load a mobile site is 1In short, your website should load as fast as possible! Ideal website load time for mobile sites is 1-2 seconds. If a page takes longer than 3 seconds to load, the bounce rate has been known to go up to 87%.

The browser a searcher uses can affect the load speed. Older versions of browsers can struggle to load newer websites with code that isn’t compatible. If you don’t have your browser set to cache specific items from a website you visit frequently, this can also slow page loading speeds.

First of all, make sure your device isn’t in airplane mode. Also, make sure your computer is connected to the home network. Check all connections to make sure they’re secure.

Yes, the higher the bandwidth, the faster the data is transferred and pages can load. If your website doesn’t have enough bandwidth, it will take more time to load it completely and will cause a higher bounce rate.

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Daniel Urmann

Author Bio:

Daniel Urmann is the co-founder of Diib.com. Over the past 17 years Daniel has helped thousands of business grow online through SEO, social media, and paid advertising. Today, Diib helps over 150,000 business globally grow online with their SaaS offerings. Daniel’s interest include SMB analytics, big data, predictive analytics, enterprise and SMB search engine optimization (SEO), CRO optimization, social media advertising, A/B testing, programatic and geo-targeting, PPC, and e-commerce. He holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) focused in Finance and E-commerce from Cornell University – S.C. Johnson Graduate School of Management.

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