{"id":26658,"date":"2015-08-31T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-08-31T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.brickmarketing.com\/blog\/?p=26658"},"modified":"2025-06-30T18:27:50","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T18:27:50","slug":"website-speed-seo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.brickmarketing.com\/blog\/website-speed-seo","title":{"rendered":"Website Speed and How it Relates to SEO"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

Google\u2019s web page ranking algorithm consists of a multitude of different factors; content quality and relevance, titles, metadata, and many other factors all influence a website\u2019s placement in Google search results. With click through rates dropping from 28% for the first place result, to 15.7% for the result appearing second, it\u2019s crucial to optimize every factor of your website to strive for the first place ranking.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

How does page speed affect Google search ranking?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Does the speed at which your website loads really affect your website\u2019s rank in search results?<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

In short, yes!<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Google, as well as other major search engines, consider the speed of a website to be a direct search ranking factor. Both page load and overall website speed are major elements of the user experience of any website, and Google weighs user experience very heavily when determining page rank in its search results. It has been proven that Google rewards websites that have faster load times with higher placements in its search results pages.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Users prefer faster websites too; bounce rates, or how quickly a visitor leaves your website after they visit, jump dramatically if a web page takes too long to load. In fact, studies have shown that bounce rates increase 90% as website load times go from 1 second to 5 seconds, and 123% if the website takes up to 10 seconds.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

How to check your website\u2019s page speed<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

One of the easiest ways to check an individual web page\u2019s load speed is to use Google\u2019s PageSpeed Insights, or PSI, tool. This tool will rank the web page on a scale from 0 to 100 according to Google\u2019s performance recommendations, and give you suggestions on ways you can improve the page\u2019s load time. While this tool will provide you with good recommendations, it\u2019s important to not get caught up trying to achieve a perfect 100; instead, more emphasis should be placed on improving the metrics denoted as \u201cCore Web Vitals\u201d.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Another helpful tool is GTMetrix, a website speed checking tool. This tool breaks down your page\u2019s performance data in a detailed summary, and can also send you alerts if your web pages are loading slowly. While this tool provides some of the same data as Google\u2019s PageSpeed Insights tool, it can be useful to run tests using multiple tools to ensure the most accurate results.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Screaming Frog is another useful tool in the successful marketing expert\u2019s toolbox. Screaming Frog creates an audit of all the pages on your website, allowing you to see which pages require more immediate attention than others.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

How can I improve my website\u2019s page speed?<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Now that you have a basic understanding of the metrics that affect your page speed, it\u2019s time to take actionable steps towards improving the performance of your website.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Browser caching<\/h3>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

The moment a user visits your website for the first time, resources like photos, videos, and application data are fetched over the network, often requiring multiple trips back and forth to the server. This slows down processing, and may delay the rendering of a web page\u2019s content.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n

Instead, it\u2019s better to create a specific caching policy for all server resources. This policy should include:<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n