The latest Google algorithm change has made the load time for a website an important factor in regards to its SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and ranking. How fast does your website take to load in a browser window? Basically, your site should load in a browser window within 3 seconds.
I have been asked by clients many times to put heavy videos or flash galleries on the homepage of their websites. I always advise against doing the later. It is always a great idea to optimize every image before putting them on a website. I use Adobe Photoshop “Save for Web & Devices” feature under the “File” menu option. I optimize to 50% and notice very little difference in quality between the original image and the optimized one.
The following are some tools to check your website’s load speed:
- Test network connectivity to a server: http://tools.pingdom.com/ping/
- Test DNS servers and settings for a domain name: http://dnscheck.pingdom.com/
- Test the load time of a web page http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/
In this ever increasing competitive battle ground called the internet it is important to take all things in to consideration and to take the steps necessary to stay ahead of the rest of the pack. Websites are never done in terms of content. Content needs to be updated in order for a webpage not to be labeled an archive by the search engines and loose ranking in the search results. Content needs to always be unique and have no copies elsewhere on the web, hence you loose ranking due to duplicate content penalties. Websites need to be updated in order to stay current and up to date in regards to SEO and search engine algorithms. Slow continuous growth always wins out in the end.