Infusionsoft Page Speed Test – How Fast Is Your Website?
If you are anything like me, you started using Infusionsoft in your online business to help automate your sales and to increase your conversion rates. And, again, if you are anything like me, Infusionsoft has never left you disappointed in fulfilment in any of the above.
But did you know that there is another (evidence-based and statistically proven) way for Infusionsoft users to increase their conversion rates even further?
The entire problem/solution is to be found in your Page Load Speed. Don’t worry, I’m going to back all this up with evidence and provide you with some pretty eye-opening statistics from Google and other authority sources.
Page Speed (Page Load Times) Directly Impact Sales
And that's a fact. Page speed has always been one of the most undervalued and disregarded aspects of a website. But ironically enough, studies and recent evidence tells us that page speed (page load time) is one of the topmost important factors we should have all been paying full attention to. We now know that there is a direct correlation to page load time relative to visitor “bounce rate” and conversion rates.
So, am I saying, simply, that a faster website equates to an increase in sales? And that I can prove it?
That’s exactly what I’m saying, yes.
Page Speed As Google Ranking Factor And Quality UX Indicator
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As of May 2021, page speed became a Google Ranking Factor and website and user experience (UX) quality indicator.
Why would Google make page load speed a ranking factor?
The short answer to that is in the same way that you want to give your customers exactly what they are looking for and, at the same time, to make that experience as satisfying as possible, Google wants to do the same for its customers.
It all really started and evolved from Google’s Mobile First Initiative back in March 2020. This was in response to the fact that more and more internet users conducted searches using mobile devices. Because mobile networks have reduced data transfer performance, this increased the necessity for more efficient, faster loading websites.
User Experience At The Forefront Of Your Marketing Plan
If I had to summarise Google’s whole purpose, and in facilitation of that purpose, to then summarise its core algorithm logic, it would go something like this:
“To satisfy user intent. To provide and deliver helpful, quality information users are looking for, and as accurately and as fast and efficiently as possible for that user.”
And this, of course, helps facilitate Google’s ultimate goal, which is:
“That users return to and keep returning to Google as a search engine provider.”
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Google has clearly put user experience at the forefront of its own marketing plan. And this means that we need to as well.
Google does still have the highest search engine market share (at 92%).
It could therefore be said that the likelihood that your website will be found on Google, as opposed to somewhere else, is the exact same as the above as a statistical degree. It is therefore that much more imperative that your website meets the standards outlined in Google’s Webmaster Guidelines. And today, we're obviously talking about Google's guidelines as it relates to site speed.
You can also think about all this in terms of your own experience and search behaviour. Let us say that you have put in your search term, and Google gives you a list of 10 websites on page 1. Upon clicking the first result, you discover that the page takes ages to load. Five seconds later, you let out a sigh of exasperation: it still hasn’t fully loaded. Six, seven seconds later, you lose all reasonable patience and bounce back out to Google.
Google has failed in its objectives by serving you this page in its index. So this is precisely why we now have Page Speed as a ranking factor.
The Direct Correlation To Page Speed And Bounce Rate
According to new analysis from Google, the average time it takes to fully load a mobile landing page is 22 seconds. Yet 53% of visits are abandoned if a mobile site takes longer than three seconds to load.
So I think you’ll agree that this is big problem and not without huge implication for sales and conversion rates!
Let’s have a look at visitor bounce rate probability in direct ratio to page load speed according to Google’s research:
Some Further Page Speed Statistics With Sources
Here are some quick page speed statistics for you to research further at your leisure. And below this, we will jump into the nitty-gritty so you can learn how to improve your website speed!
- 85% of Websites Worldwide Operate at Below Par Page Speed. (Source: Unbounce)
- 37% of Visitors Bounce When Your Site Takes Five Seconds to Load. (Source: Pingdom)
- 70% of Customers Say Site Speed Impacts their Purchasing Decisions. (Source: Search Engine Journal)
- A One-Second Delay Results in a 7% Drop in Conversions. (Source: SmallSeoTools)
- Three of the Top Four SEO UX Signals are Page Speed Dependent. (Source: SME)
- Most Websites Are Larger Than They Need to Be. (Source: MachMetrics)
- Compressing & Converting To Next Gen Images Could Reduce Your Website Size By Up to 1MB. (Source: ThinkWithGoogle)
What Is Your Own Website Page Speed?
This is obviously the best question to start with. Because, as they say, “if it's not broken, don't try to fix it”, right? So how does your own site fair in page load speed? Is it excellent, fair, or REALLY BAD?!
Most people are finding that they fall into the latter category there. So let's check it out:
Click the PageSpeed Insights image below to access Google's Page Speed Insights Tool (opens in a new tab).
So how did you get on with your page speed test for your own Infusionsoft website? Probably not great, right?
Another unfortunate part of the problem is that most people (meaning anyone without a sufficient technical background) find it quite difficult to fix their website speed. This is because it is not one single thing which is impacting their website's page speed. But it is in fact a culmination of many things. And some of these elements are easier to fix than others. So we'll address each individually below.
It's possible that the results of your own PageSpeed Insights test have left you feeling overwhelmed and slightly clueless. Depending on your own level of knowledge, you may already feel that there is no hope of you ever fixing your website speed on your own. And if that's you, then don't worry. The solution is provided for you below.
The Simplest Page Speed Improvement Method:
Let's Improve Your Infusionsoft Website Speed. Enter Your Details Below And I Will Provide You With A Site Speed Audit
The Single Largest Factors To Impact Site Speed
As previously mentioned, it would be nice if it were just one thing slowing down your site. But it's not; it's a culmination of things.
However, with that being said, there are definitely aspects that we can prioritize upon an order of magnitude. Confirmation of this fact is also highlighted in your speed test reports.
There are many speed test tools you can use. GT Metrix, Pingdom, WebPageTest, as well as Google Page Speed Insights, are some of the most popular right now to analyse fully and completely the individual issues affecting your speed performance. Each one of these tools will output your greatest impact, highest priority issues at the top of the report. These are the issues you want to focus on first.
However, I would like to address a few important considerations before you (potentially) fall into what can be a “need for speed” trap and common pitfall.
- You don't need to fanatically chase after 100% perfect scores.
- Least of all do you need to chase perfect scores across multiple speed test tools. Pick one or two test tools that you like, and stick with those.
- There is a big difference between “Realtime, User Perceived Performance” and all the technical wizardry behind your speed performance “stats”. Remember the objective: User Experience Enhancement. (Interesting UX studies here, if you want to read them.)
- Scores will vary, so don't test once or take a score as a final and absolute. Run the test a few times and look at the average (more on this later as we address server response times and shared server performance).
- Speed test location matters. This is because it is all relative to the data center where your website is hosted, Time To First Byte (TTFB), and network latency. It is important, therefore, to test your site both from a location that is close to your data center and one that is far away. But then be consistent with your choice thereafter.
- Focus on your mobile score, as this is the most important metric. In your tests, a throttling is applied to simulate a mid-tier mobile phone (a 4x CPU slowdown) and a slow 4G connection. Unless you have a pro account with GT Metrix or Pingdom, you won't be able to see this. In which case, use Google Page Speed Insights.
We will explore further testing protocols moving forward. But consideration of the above should help you approach the task of speed testing with the correct expectations, and with better consistency, in and around your primary objective.
Want To Find A Problem – Start At The Top
Have you ever heard that expression “A fish rots from the head down”? It is intended to mean that a problem starts at the top, its founding base, and that subsequent “problems” can often result as a cause and effect manifestation. You could apply this concept equally to an organization, a physical object, a process of development, or even a website. But in every essence here, we're saying “begin at the beginning” and see if subsequent problems can be traced, primarily, to that source point and upon which everything else hinges.
Is Your Server Serving You Well Enough?
By way of analogy, here is a perfect example. I once had a very standard, run of the mill PC. I'm dependent upon some rather heavy programs, all running at once, and that PC was frustratingly slow. I decided to invest in a 8 Core AMD Ryzen. In terms of its total specification, it's more akin to a spaceship. The point is, it runs those exact same programs as before (and more) at lightning speed. It executes these same processes SO MUCH FASTER that it never affects my ‘user experience' with slow loading or any latency in the slightest.
Technically speaking, the programs I'm running could be quite inefficient, and not optimally coded. So what was the real source of the problem here? Was it the PC, is it still the programs (but now overcome with a bypass), or is it a bit of both?
You website server is affectively and identical scenario as above. According to Elementor (one of the largest, most popular WordPress Page Builders available), your servers are at the top of the list when it comes to factors which affect your website speed.
This sentiment is widely acknowledged by even the very best WordPress coding engineers out there with the ability to produce the fastest, most efficient coding that the industry has to offer. One of my favourite analogies (which I have here borrowed) is that loading webpages is like pushing a car uphill. Either you increase the engine power (increase webserver performance) or lighten the car (decrease the amount code used in the website pages).
The ‘Trade Off” And Balance Between Function And Performance
Performance costs money. This statement is true of just about most things in life, and your server package is no exception. Shared hosting is the most common option for web owners and small businesses because it is cheap.
The reason that hosting providers can offer you a server package at such attractive price is because they will attempt to cram as many clients as they feasibly can onto that server space. TTFB and server response times therefore will vary and fluctuate depending on how many processes are being requested of this shared server, sometimes all at once, sometimes not.
Whilst server performance and server configuration should be at the top your list, it probably won't be at the top your list.
Dedicated server hosting does not come cheap. Like most people, you'll probably end up looking at your server last, if or when you really have exhausted every other option to increase your website speed satisfactorily.
In an effort to make dedicated servers more affordable, providers will offer varying product levels to suit a wider range of budgets and physical requirements. But, effectively, what is happening here is they are still therefore dialling down performance and/or offering less resources in the trade-off which will always exist between function and performance.
If your business can afford it, you can have lightning fast website speed tomorrow and all by way of a simple click of an ‘upgrade now' button in your server administration area. Mostly all dire, dire website loading speeds can be traced back to a less than optimum server and/or server configuration. And in most cases, a server upgrade will fix most of your problems.
I do use the word “most” quite deliberately, though. In the same way that a performance car relies on insane BHP output, it doesn't rely on that exclusively. And as much thought and engineering excellence has been put equally into aerodynamics and total bodyweight. We can look at the problems of website page loading speed in exactly the same way.
Removing Bloat And Excessive DOM (Document Object Markup)
We're now looking at the factor with next most significant impact on your website page loading speed. So, by way of our analogy, we're now looking at the physical weight of the body and components and each one's aerodynamic properties to move efficiently through the air, providing the least ‘resistance'. We're talking about all the code and elements (the markup) which it takes to build these pages: the css styling, the javascript functions, images, video, etc.
Not All Theme Builders And Templates Are Created Equally
To provide you with a visual example of this, refer to the image on the right. Here is an analysis of 4 popular WordPress theme builders: Beaver Builder; DIVI; Oxygen; and Elementor.
What you're looking at here are the levels of bloat (document markup and code) that the visual theme builder uses to generate a BLANK page. So this means before adding any text, images, before using Google Fonts and Javascript elements, etc. At the time of writing, if you do use Elementor, for example, it is an unfortunate fact that it is highly unlikely you will be able to achieve satisfactory, Google Benchmark Speed Scores. Excessive DOM is something that Elementor is currently racing to fix. And you will see evidence of that, for example, in the latest Elementor update by way of some new, advanced configuration options. This is what these new options look like:
Do these advanced configuration options work? In a word, no.
It all still falls very short to requirements and Elementor has a lot of work to do.
As a consequence, a growing number of WordPress users are de-Elementor-ing their websites and supplanting with more code-efficient page builders, such as Oxygen, Gutenberg, Site Origin. and other alternatives.
The most DOM excessive elements of an Elementor built theme are the header, footer, and menu elements. Removing and hard-coding the menus is a (not so simple, not so cheap) solution to this problem. Do remember, though, that we're still in very much a fast-evolving space where companies such as Elementor are highly motivated through commercial incentive to fix their problems fast. It hasn't happened yet, but progress could always be just around the corner.
If you have already invested heavily in an Elementor-built website, then you may want bear this in mind before paying what will be quite high development costs to fix the excessive DOM output of your pages. You can visit the Elementor Help Center and sign up for notifications of new features, latest releases, and news.
Top 2 Speed Issues Covered – Now For The Rest
These were our two, topmost issues:
Choose the best, highest performance hosting package you can realistically afford … CHECK!
Use the most lightweight, DOM optimum theme/template that you can … CHECK!
Here's what we have left:
- Optimize image size.
- Minify JS and CSS files.
- Use advanced cache mechanism.
- Use a CDN (Content Delivery Network)
- Enable GZIP compression.
- Clean and upgrade WordPress database.
- Find and eliminate slow plugins
- Disable Hotlinking
