Technical SEO
Site Speed Optimisation For Search And Conversion
Make pages load fast enough that speed stops costing you conversions.
Site speed is a commercial problem before it is an SEO one. Every additional second of load time costs conversions, and on mobile connections the difference between a well-built page and a typical one is frequently several seconds.
You probably need this if
- Time to first byte is over 600ms
- The page carries multiple render-blocking stylesheets and scripts
- Third-party tags outweigh your own code
- Images are served full-size and in legacy formats
What you get
- Waterfall analysis identifying what actually delays the render
- Server response and caching improvements
- Critical CSS and render path optimisation
- Image pipeline: modern formats, correct sizing, lazy loading below the fold
- Third-party script audit with a keep, defer or remove decision on each
How we approach it
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Measure honestly
Test on a throttled mobile connection, because testing on office broadband tells you nothing about how most people experience the site.
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Fix the server first
No amount of front-end work compensates for a slow time to first byte, so caching and server response come before anything else.
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Clear the render path
Remove or defer render-blocking resources and inline what is genuinely critical.
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Audit third parties
Every tag has a cost. Quantify it and remove the ones nobody can justify, which is usually more of them than anyone expects.
Site Speed Optimisation: common questions
What is a good page load time?
Aim for Largest Contentful Paint under 2.5 seconds on mobile field data. Time to first byte should be under 800ms and ideally under 200ms. Absolute fully-loaded time matters less than how quickly the main content becomes visible and usable.
Do I need a CDN?
If your audience is spread geographically, or you serve significant static assets, yes. For a UK-only business on a well-configured UK server the gains are smaller, though a CDN still helps with caching, image optimisation and absorbing traffic spikes.
Will a caching plugin fix my speed problem?
It helps with server response time and often produces a quick visible win, but it cannot fix an oversized theme, unoptimised images or twenty third-party scripts. Caching hides some symptoms rather than removing the cause.
Related services
Find out what is actually holding you back
A short conversation and a look at your site is usually enough to tell you where the real problem is. No obligation, and no pressure to sign anything.