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How to rev up your page speed for better website performance

Improving page speed isn’t some arcane and mysterious dark art. Contributor Jeremy Knauff reviews everything from plug-ins to CDNs and points out what you can do to improve your page speed without a bunch of hocus-pocus.

Jeremy Knauff on August 10, 2018 at 10:24 am

Page speed is now a ranking factor on mobile search. That means it’s a critically important component in all of your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts because of its impact on user experience.

According to research conducted by Financial Times, a 1-second slower page results in a 5 percent reduction in reader engagement.

Google states over half of the visits made to mobile sites are abandoned if it takes more than 3 seconds for the screen to load.

The bottom line is simple: Page speed plays a significant role in performance, whether we’re talking about paid or organic search, reader engagement, sales or lead generation.

Fortunately, improving page speed isn’t some arcane and mysterious dark art. You won’t need to brew a special potion, summon demons, or sell your soul. You’ll just need to have a decent understanding of certain technologies and invest some good old-fashioned hard work to bring it all together.

Establish a baseline

The first step is to establish a baseline. By doing that, we can obtain a quantifiable measurement of speed and identify the work we’ll need to do to improve it. Some of the tools I use for this are:

[Read the full article on Search Engine Land.]

Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Marketing Land. Staff authors are listed here.

About The Author

Jeremy Knauff

Jeremy Knauff is the founder of Spartan Media, a digital marketing agency in Tampa, Florida. He's also a proud father, husband, and US Marine Corps veteran. After 18 years in the digital marketing industry, he's learned a thing or two, and today, while still serving his clients, he's working to share his knowledge with the industry to help even more people.