Date
Apr 15
It's long been suspected and anectodally confirmed that the speed of the site loading is a factor when Google determines the ranking of the site for keywords. Simply put, if your site is slow to load, it will have less of a chance to rank than a site that loads quickly. Just recently, Google and Matt Cutts, the leader of Google's webspam team, have confirmed that the speed of the site loading is in fact, a factor in determining ranking.
What does this mean to you?
When VisionPoint Marketing designs and creates websites, we incorporate over a hundred known and assumed variables in the way the search engines index and rank your site into our process. We make sure that your code is clean, your meta-information is unique and relevant to the page, your navigation supports the keywords and of course, we make sure that your site loads quickly.
So while the revelation that Google's using site speed as a factor is now news in the fact that we now have official confirmation, it's not news in the sense that this is something that we've been doing since we started building websites for our clients and when we analyze existing sites.
Now, before this post becomes a blatantly self-promoting piece for our marketing agency, this announcement from Google underscores the philosophy that we adhere to every day.
Your Business Depends on the User's Experience
Let me break it down. Every business that markets themselves online needs to have traffic. In order to welcome that traffic every business needs to have a website. People need to be able to find that website. People need to be able to perform actions on that site. People need to be able to walk away from the experience with exactly what they wanted.
It's all about the people.
When we're doing web design and development, our focus is on the user. Who are they, what are their needs, what are their expectations and how can we deliver that to them. Through numerous studies, we've accepted as a fact that when you're designing for the user first, the goals and results are easier to attain.
When we're doing search engine marketing, we take a holistic view of the user. We research not only the keywords that will drive traffic, but the keywords that indicate intent. More and more people are now asking questions into the search engines.
- Where can I find a farmer's market in Raleigh?
- What kind of software does accounting and sales tracking?
- Which doctors in Raleigh specialize in oncology?
- When is the best time to visit the Outer Banks?
These are questions that people are asking online and these are the types of behaviors that are primed for action. We know that people are looking for information so we try to give it to them. We optimize for the experience of the user in both search engine optimization and paid per click. While it's true that you're targeting a smaller audience, it's this audience that is more likely to be ready to make a decision.
When we create social media marketing campaigns, we keep the focus on the consumer. While the overall ROI can be hard to pin down initially, we know that it's better to talk to you than to talk about us. We create campaigns that are based around listening to the needs of the community, and we give them a pathway to find that answer. We encourage and reward people who engage with us, and we let them know that we're the experts. Being a listener in a social media is important, but it misses the second half of the engagement process... to respond.
What Was This Article About Again? Oh, Right, Site Speed
I'll admit that I went off on a tangent for a little bit, but the point should be clear. It's not just the little things that count, it's the accumulation of little things that make marketing work. Site speed reduces frustration, it gives the person one less thing to be frustrated about, and it reduces the barriers between their desire and their resolution. That's why the confirmation by Google is important - it reinforces the concepts that we've baked in to every project.
