In a world obsessed with the internet, website page load speed is the invisible force that drives success. A slow-loading website not only annoys visitors but also tells Google to lower your position in the search engine result pages, negatively affecting website visibility as well as revenue.
Search engine algorithms favor fast-loading pages, and customers are much more willing to purchase from them. Therefore, irrespective of what you host, the web hosting provider you select is important. host.co.in’s Indian cheap web hosting provides a perfect combination of high-level performance and cost-effectiveness. At the same time, those who are using WordPress can experience lightning-fast website speeds with the fastest WordPress hosting India.
This blog shows how performance impacts SEO and conversion rates, and also highlights how choosing the right web hosting plan can help improve your online visibility.
Does Website Speed Actually Affect SEO?
The answer is: Yes! Your website speed does affect search engine optimization. Search engines consider page load speed as a major factor in ranking. It can also affect bounce rate and user engagement on your website, thereby affecting SEO.
What is Page Speed?
Page load speed is a measure that evaluates the time required to fully load a page. Contrary to website speed, which refers to the average. The loading time of a complete website and page speed are related to a particular page. Page load times depend on server performance, optimized images, file size, and much more.
Webpage Load Time Explained
Webpage load time or webpage speed refers to the time, in seconds or milliseconds, a web page takes to load completely. It is also referred to as the Time to First Byte (TTFB) or the server response time.
Page loading speeds differ based on different page factors like code, images, and videos. Here are a few examples of website elements that can negatively affect SEO:
- Server’s performance
- Internet service provider
- The browser and the network connection in use.
How Does Website Page Speed Affect SEO?
As per Google’s data, as of 2018, website loading speed became a key ranking factor for mobile search results and became a major ranking factor for all web pages when Google rolled out its Core Web Vitals update in June 2021.
Thus, besides Google, all the other search engines are inclined towards ranking web pages that offer an outstanding user experience. Hence, page speed is beneficial for SEO and plays an important role in how users experience a website.
For mobile searches, it is important to optimize your website. It is advised to never overlook this factor, as all the search engines have now prioritized mobile-first indexing by taking mobile page speed into account as a ranking factor.
Also, in 2019, besides this, Google Chrome started highlighting slow-loading websites in order to facilitate an excellent user experience. Some additional reasons why it is important to increase your website’s performance include:
- Reduction in bounce rate
- Increase in page views
- Extended user engagement
- Increased conversion rate
- Helps improve your SEO ranking.
Different Ways to Increase Your Website Speed
You can increase your website loading speed if you:
1. Turn on Browser Caching
Loading every page element can slow down your website speed, which can negatively affect website SEO. Because several page elements take time to load for first-time visitors. Therefore, when you turn on browser caching, it allows browsers to temporarily save different website assets such as JavaScript files, stylesheets, and images.
Browser caching increases website speed by storing page data for faster page loads. Another way is to use free plugins like W3 Total Cache or WP Super Cache. These plugins minimize the server requests and improve page load times.
2. Minimize Resources
When you use excessive CSS files, it leads to multiple HTTP requests, which might decrease website speed. Therefore, it is important to reduce your CSS files, which removes additional spaces, comments, and unwanted characters present in your website content.
If you own a WordPress website, we suggest you use the WP Rocket plugin in order to improve webpage loading speed.
3. Optimize Images
Big image files can also result in slow-loading websites. Therefore, turn on Gzip compression to decrease the download time for different files such as CSS, HTML, and JavaScript. The majority of the latest browsers today automatically handle Gzip compression for each HTTP request.
Conclusion
Each developer should focus on offering an outstanding user experience when developing and maintaining their websites. When your website loads slowly, the majority of users tend to abandon your website, which can negatively affect your SEO and conversion rate. If you’re looking for better web hosting providers, host.co.in has reliable and cheap hosting plans to meet your website needs.
