“On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to meee…
...speed!”
Brett Riley-Tomlinson
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That’s right, website speed. There are so many different algorithms that could affect your SEO, but one of the main ones is your site’s design. If your website takes longer than a couple of seconds to load (dependent on whether you’re loading it using 3G, 4G or 5G), not only will potential customers click away from your site, Google will stop encouraging people to visit it in the first place, by moving you further down the search results.
With speed-checker websites, such as GTmetrix’s, you can better understand what is slowing down your website - and the best thing is, most of these services are free. More often than not, it will be the size of your images affecting your site’s speed.
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Displaying professional photos is always the best way. Having your own content on your website is better than using stock images, as you can effectively showcase your personality and services to your clients much more easily. Plus, you will be able to show potential clients who you are, which always helps to build a relationship.
Professional photos are often 6000 x 3000 pixels, if not more, which is roughly the size of your average bedroom wall. Imagine having four of these images on your home page; every time somebody tries to load up your website they will be loading four walls worth of images - which will likely take time. When adding photos to your website it’s important that the image you use is the same size as the container/frame you’re placing it in. If you do this, you will dramatically reduce the load speed of your site.
The image’s file type can also hugely affect your site’s speed. For example, a PNG file has a lot more information in it relating to the picture, in order that graphic designers and photographers can do more with the image in terms of editing, compared to a jPEG file. Even if a jPEG and a PNG file have the same amount of pixels, the PNG file will be bigger - so don’t forget to convert them before uploading them onto your website.
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Websites can be built on different platforms. Individual speed checkers are built for a particular platform, such as WordPress or Wix. If you use a WordPress speed checker on a Wix website, it will always show a much slower load speed; it’s because the speed checker will rank javascript, whereas the Wix speed checker won’t. Conduct a few speed checks using different speed-checking tools/platforms, then conduct a speed test on your phone. Calculate how long it takes to load the initial page, then how long it takes for the whole page and its assets to load.
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