Website Load Speed and Google

There are so many things to think about when it comes to your website and SEO. Content, design, sitemaps, keywords, analytics, links, meta tags — most business owners don’t even know what all those things mean, let alone how they’ll affect your business. So you might not even have thought about one more thing: site load time.

A decade ago, you might have typed in a web address and gone to make yourself a cup of coffee while the site loaded. Now, if we have to wait more than a few seconds, we’re frustrated. People will even click away from your site if they have to wait very long.

Google tries to give users the best possible user experience, so you might wonder: will they rank a fast-loading site over a slow-loading one?

Simple answer: yes. More complicated answer: yes, they will, all things being equal in terms of content, design, sitemaps, keywords… In other words, site load time isn’t the first thing Google looks at, but if there are two sites with otherwise equal quality, then Google will prefer the faster site.

How can you make your site load more quickly? Choose your hosting wisely, but even more importantly: choose your designer wisely. A designer who is mostly an artist and doesn’t know much about development may not understand how to optimize your site for speed. At Oyova, we’re designers and developers; check out our web development services when you need either — or both.