Web Performance Optimization: The Silver Bullet of SEO and UX

Preview:

DESCRIPTION

How can companies increase conversion, drive more traffic, and increase customer satisfaction? By focusing on web site performance. It's like the silver bullet of customer experience! In this presentation at SMX Advanced 2012 in Seattle, Jonathon Colman, the in-house SEO at REI walks us through the business case around site speed optimization and shares five key tips to make your site perform faster for the benefit of your customers. There's also quite a few references to Twilight, Jacob Black, werewolves, and Taylor Lautner. You can learn more about Jonathon Colman at http://www.jonathoncolman.org/

Citation preview

Photo © Flickr user Nayara - Oliveira at flickr.com/photos/nayaraoliveira100/4616078239/

WEB PERFORMANCE OPTIMIZATION:

The Silver Bulletof SEO and UX

Photo © Flickr user eschipul at flickr.com/photos/eschipul/4160817135/

Jonathon ColmanTwitter @jcolman

Agile SEO for REIwww.REI.com

Photo © Flickr user Sonofabike at flickr.com/photos/oyj/2609205311

While you’re here, check out REI’s Flagship Store…

Then get out and explore our native forests and woodlands on a hike…

Photo © Flickr user sha-put-ski at flickr.com/photos/chelsea_nj/6095128551/

But watch out for…

WEREWOLVES!

Image found at twilightsaga.wikia.com/wiki/File:THE-WEREWOLVES-twilight-series-8392804-1920-1200.jpg

They’re snarly!And mean!

And shirtless!

Image found at ugo.com/movies/twilight-new-moon

And yet sovulnerable…

Image found at digitalcitizen.ca/2009/11/22/over-120-twilight-new-moon-printable-posters-8x12-to-20x24-inches/the-twilight-saga-new-moon-5/

Image found at themolly.wordpress.com/2009/11/21/new-moon-brings-out-hormones-in-women/

Some people find them oh

so attractive…

They even have their own fan

clubs!

Photo © Flickr user spacedustdesign at flickr.com/photos/spacedust_design/3433870864/sizes/m/in/photostream/

Image found at themolly.wordpress.com/2009/11/21/new-moon-brings-out-hormones-in-women/

What’s the only thing that can stop them?

A silver bullet!(or, uhh, love I suppose)

Photo © Flickr user eschipul at flickr.com/photos/eschipul/4160817135/

Site Speed is Your Silver Bullet For conversion rate optimization For customer experience and satisfaction For lowering bounce rate For increasing organic traffic for the most

competitive keywords For increasing overall competitiveness For saving money on operations For getting out even the toughest stains!

MAKE THE CASE FORWEB PERFORMANCEOPTIMIZATION

Tip: it’s easier thanyou might think…

Google uses speed as an organic search ranking factor for the top

1% of competitive queries.

1% Sources: Google, Matt Cutts [via Search Engine Land]

Customers expect your web site to load in 2 seconds or less.

2Source: Forrester/Akamai [via GetElastic]

40% of customers will abandonany site that takes longer than

3 seconds to load.

3Source: Forrester/Akamai [via GetElastic]

The average Fortune 500 company web site takes 7 seconds to load.

7Source: Andrew Davies, Web Performance: A Whistlestop Tour…

For every 1 second of load time, conversion drops by 7%.

7% Source: Strangeloop

For every 1 second of load time, user satisfaction drops by 16%.

16% Source: Strangeloop

“When [web sites] arefast, you feel good.

What that comes down tois that you feel in control.”

Matt MullenwegCo-founder of WordpressSource: Improving Performance in Mature Web Apps

“That feeling… translates to happiness.”

FYI: THIS IS NOT ACTUALLY MATT.

Image found at vintageyankee.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html

Image found at enter99.com/ryan-gosling-wallpaper-images-7847.html

Hey Girl, I’m convinced…

Image found at twilightsingapore.com/tag/david-slade/

Back off, Gosling. This is my show.

GRRRRR…

Image found at aladyrevealsnothing.com/2012/03/dont-play-jokes-on-ryan-gosling-he-is.html/

5 KEY STEPSFOR OPTIMIZINGWEB PERFORMANCE

You – yes, you! – can get started today…

EXAMPLE HEADER:

Expires: Tue, 06 June 2023 22:00:00 GMT

Set a far-future Expires header

RATIONALE:

Helps with re-loads of static page objects and components by caching them. Use across all content types.

Source: http://developer.yahoo.com/performance/rules.html#expires

ON-PAGE CODE EXAMPLE:<script type="text/javascript" src="taylor.js"></script>…<script type="text/javascript" src="taylor.js"></script>

Don’t dupe JS, remove unused CSS

RATIONALE:Creates unnecessary HTTP requests and wasteful JS execution. As team size/code complexity increases, so do duplicates and unused code! Refactor or remove code you’re not actively using.

Sources: http://developer.yahoo.com/performance/rules.html#js_dupes and http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/docs/payload.html#RemoveUnusedCSS

ON-PAGE CODE EXAMPLE:

<link rel="stylesheet" href="jacob.css">

<link rel="stylesheet" href="edward.css">

<link> your CSS, avoid @import

RATIONALE:

Allows for parallel downloading and avoids additional delays.

Source: http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/docs/rtt.html#AvoidCssImport

Avoid redirects

RATIONALE:

Cuts down on wait time for users by avoiding an entire request-response cycle and the latency that goes with it.

Source: http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/docs/rtt.html#AvoidRedirects; Image found at doobious.org/pop-icon-of-the-day-taylor-lautner/

WTF?!

CSS sprites reduce HTTP requests

Source: http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/docs/rtt.html#SpriteImages

CSS PROPERTIES USED:background-image: url(img/twilight-icons.png);background-position: 0 0;

RATIONALE:Reducing total HTTP requests greatly improves site performance. Combining common images into “sprites” reduces requests, latency, overhead, and total page file size.

Best practices for CSS sprites

Source: http://code.google.com/speed/page-speed/docs/rtt.html#SpriteImages

Combine images into sprites when:

Images load together

Images have similar color palettes

Images are PNGs and/or GIFs

Images are both small and cacheable

Do not use for large JPGs/photos.

Here’s a site-wide sprite on REI.com

Source: http://www.rei.com/img/sprite_rei1.png

Implementing these CSS sprites saved us nearly a

whole second of avg. page load time.

Source: http://www.google.com/doodles/jim-hensons-75th-birthday

Here’s a complex Google example

Source: http://www.google.com/logos/2011/henson11-hp-6ea.png

This sprite is a 60-frame animation!

RESULTSOF OPTIMIZINGWEB PERFORMANCE

“Racing down the road like that had been amazing. The feel of the wind in my face,

the speed and the freedom…”

A -50% decrease in the time it took for Google to crawl an average page.

A +100% increase in the amount of total pages Google crawled per day.

We saved customers -1.5 seconds per page view. Multiplied by all page views…

We saved customers 22 years of time.

Image found at parajunkee.com/2012/05/read-along-fifty-shades-grey-chapter-14.html

Time they’ll spend outside vs. online

Image found at blogs.pioneerlocal.com/entertainment/2008/11/twilight_movie_minus_snags_fai.html

In Conclusion Requiem: The site performance business case isn’t

just about SEO – it’s about customer UX

Plan a budget/time for performance work

Start with quick wins, “shrink the change”

Set speed targets for all new features

Measure, celebrate, repeat And release a sequel in two separate parts

Thank you!Jonathon ColmanAgile SEO for REI

Home: www.jonathoncolman.org

Twitter: @jcolman

E-mail: jcolman@rei.com

We’re

hiring!

bit.ly/

rei-jobs

Note: no werewolves were harmed in the making of this presentation.