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How much server response time to expect?

by Craigcmatthew
11 replies
  • SEO
    • |
Hi. I use Google
PageSpeed Insights

to check the speed rating of my site. I've fixed all that I could expect the server response time.



I have one small WP site with about 40 posts (100mb) (makes $0) so I don't wanna buy a VPS for it. I usually buy cheap shared hosting.

My previous host's response time was between 2-3 secs which is bad . I moved to ******* today after reading the good reviews here but it's still in the same range.



My bounce rate and pageviews/visit are so bad that I'm sure it's because of the speed. It also hurts the SERPs in so many ways. I will move to a better host in few days so just want to know what's a good server response time target?
#expect #response #server #time
  • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
    I'm sorry, but despite what Google has said, load time is really not a significant ranking factor. You can find plenty of top ranked sites with load times much, much slower than yours.

    I doubt you are losing visitors and getting more bounces with a 2-3 second server response time. That is not all that bad.

    If you are seeing a lot of bounces and not getting many pageviews, it is much more likely because people do not like your site. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

    That or you have a great conversion rate on a landing page (which will often technically count as a bounce, so not a bad thing).
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    • Profile picture of the author paulgl
      Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

      I'm sorry, but despite what Google has said....
      Despite what people think google said...

      Everyone in the world with an internet connection
      will experience a different load time.

      Google has no idea how fast a site loads for everyone.

      Google even claims chrome is the fastest browser....

      Server time is not the same as page load speed.
      Any online checker is purely hypothetical.

      Google does not operate in hypothetical.

      Browser, isp, location, plugins, wires, etc. are just too spotty.

      Google would never make page speed an issue...unless
      they can't get the page after a certain amount of time.

      That's not page speed, that's page not found.
      Eventually they have to give up. Do this long enough,
      you could get deindexed.

      Paul
      Signature

      If you were disappointed in your results today, lower your standards tomorrow.

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    • Profile picture of the author Craigcmatthew
      Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

      I'm sorry, but despite what Google has said, load time is really not a significant ranking factor. You can find plenty of top ranked sites with load times much, much slower than yours.

      I doubt you are losing visitors and getting more bounces with a 2-3 second server response time. That is not all that bad.

      If you are seeing a lot of bounces and not getting many pageviews, it is much more likely because people do not like your site. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news.

      That or you have a great conversion rate on a landing page (which will often technically count as a bounce, so not a bad thing).
      I beg to differ. I feel Google does factor in site speed which depends on numerous things like server response time, page/image optimization, java/css resources etc.
      The big sites are in a league of their own, they can get away with being slow. In any case, I place a lot of value on site speed due to SEO and user experience considerations.

      People not liking the site can certainly be the reason for high bounce rate. The data is like 10 UV's - 10 page views. So 1 page per user. This has been the case for the past few months. Strange right? Exactly 1 page per user, it hardly ever goes higher. The site is 6 months old , all unique content but Google continuously ranks it lower and lower.

      I thought 2-3 secs of server response time was abysmally bad, I assumed that was the reason. That or people being unable to read due to bad font/color combinations.

      I don't what is the norm when it comes to server response time? I'd like fix that and then move on to other things.
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      • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
        Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

        I beg to differ. I feel Google does factor in site speed which depends on numerous things like server response time, page/image optimization, java/css resources etc.
        The big sites are in a league of their own, they can get away with being slow. In any case, I place a lot of value on site speed due to SEO and user experience considerations.

        People not liking the site can certainly be the reason for high bounce rate. The data is like 10 UV's - 10 page views. So 1 page per user. This has been the case for the past few months. Strange right? Exactly 1 page per user, it hardly ever goes higher. The site is 6 months old , all unique content but Google continuously ranks it lower and lower.

        I thought 2-3 secs of server response time was abysmally bad, I assumed that was the reason. That or people being unable to read due to bad font/color combinations.

        I don't what is the norm when it comes to server response time? I'd like fix that and then move on to other things.
        Well, you can beg to differ all you want, but there is literally zero evidence that Google does factor in site speed other than them saying they were going to, which was a lot like the Mobilegeddon update. They said mobile friendly sites would rank better in mobile search and sites not mobile friendly would rank lower. It didn't happen.

        I have been running a test where I slowed down a site as much as I could. Guess what happened? Rankings have gone up.

        There is nothing strange about your stats if people don't like the site or don't find it useful.

        I think you are looking for excuses (site speed) when you should be evaluating your content.
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      • Profile picture of the author paulgl
        Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

        I beg to differ. I feel Google does factor in site speed which depends on numerous things like server response time....

        I thought 2-3 secs of server response time was abysmally bad, I assumed that was the reason. That or people being unable to read due to bad font/color combinations.
        You have no idea how the internet works.

        Server time has zip to do with page load speed....

        Did you read any of my post above? Obviously not.

        If your server is unresponsive, you have problems with your host.

        That has NOTHING to do with serps and google rankings.

        Since everyone gets a different page load speed....

        No way would google ever make that anything that counts, except in the rarest of rarest conditions.

        I pity the people in India. 85% of anyone online, has a truly nasty experience.

        But hey! Gives them more time on the bicycle.

        Every name brand host will have normal servers and speed.

        But people don't. And google is a people company.

        Paul
        Signature

        If you were disappointed in your results today, lower your standards tomorrow.

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  • Profile picture of the author rMike
    Try using CloudFlare.

    I promise you'll be pretty amazed with the results. No VPS needed either!
    Signature
    BuildMyTraffic WSO - The Ultimate SEO - PBN Backlinking Software
    Rank #1 for ANY Keyword!
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    • Profile picture of the author nettiapina
      Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

      I thought 2-3 secs of server response time was abysmally bad, I assumed that was the reason. That or people being unable to read due to bad font/color combinations.

      I don't what is the norm when it comes to server response time? I'd like fix that and then move on to other things.
      As MikeF pointed out your content is the most likely culprit. Even fonts, colors or site design are more likely to drive people away if your site is loading this fast.

      Just a random comparison: WF loading times are 8+ seconds today, and it yesterday it was way worse. And here I am. Yes, it's apples to oranges.

      Pingdom's tool gives you some rough comparisons to other sites they've tested.

      Originally Posted by paulgl View Post

      Every name brand host will have normal servers and speed.
      Some of the biggest names are in the number games, and oversell like crazy. I'm not opposing overselling, but if it goes too far the servers are crowded and slow. Of course you usually get what you pay for.

      Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

      Well, you can beg to differ all you want, but there is literally zero evidence that Google does factor in site speed other than them saying they were going to, which was a lot like the Mobilegeddon update. They said mobile friendly sites would rank better in mobile search and sites not mobile friendly would rank lower. It didn't happen.
      I believe that Google might take site speed in account if the site is not loading properly. But that's not what we're talking about here. It should be easy enough to see if a site is too slow or not. Just try to use the damn thing.

      I've seen mobile sites rank higher in mobile search. However, if you track 20+ keywords the difference may be something like 2-3 positions on average. Not for every keyword, but all of them combined.
      Signature
      Links in signature will not help your SEO. Not on this site, and not on any other forum.
      Who told me this? An ex Google web spam engineer.

      What's your excuse?
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  • Profile picture of the author Craigcmatthew
    All of you seem to suggest that site speed is not important. But think of it this way, if Goggle has to choose between two sites with similar content, one of which is mobile friendly and has great page load times and the other not so much, which do you think it will rank higher?

    If two sites are similar in everything except the page load time, then page load time and mobile friendliness becomes an important factor. How is this logic fallible!

    As for people from different parts of the world experiencing a different load time, Google has multiple servers in multiple countries so it can easily measure the site speed from different locations and rank accordingly. There's a whole section dedicated to site speed in Google Analytics and also in webmaster tools not to mention the page speed insights page with a large knowledge base, so don't tell me site speed is irrelevant.

    Apart from SEO, site speed is also great from a user experience perspective and we should try and get it as high as possible!

    In other words, I'm not asking if speed is important, I'm convinced that it is and my mind is made up, what I want to know is the benchmark.

    Just like a bounce rate of 60-70% is considered good, what sort of page speed score on Google Insights is considered workable, right now I have is 60/100 for mobile and 70/100 for desktop.


    All critiques welcome.
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    • Profile picture of the author MikeFriedman
      Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

      All of you seem to suggest that site speed is not important. But think of it this way, if Goggle has to choose between two sites with similar content, one of which is mobile friendly and has great page load times and the other not so much, which do you think it will rank higher?

      If two sites are similar in everything except the page load time, then page load time and mobile friendliness becomes an important factor. How is this logic fallible!
      The argument has nothing to do with logic. Sure, that all makes sense. What I'm telling you is that if you study a lot of SERPs, you will quickly see that site speed and mobile friendliness are just not ranking factors, or if they are, they are so insignificant it is not worth spending time on.

      As an example, I specifically have been tracking a lot of sites that are not mobile friendly to the extreme and are in competitive SERPs. The kind of SERPs where little things like that should make a difference. In zero of the cases have the sites gone down in rankings. In most of the cases, they sites have actually gone up in their mobile rankings since Google's Mobilegeddon.

      Do what you want though.

      Your site likely has crappy bounce rates because there is no call to action anywhere on your pages. You are also in the type of market where people are going to visit more than one site before making a purchasing decision. There is just nothing that pulls me in to your webpages or catches my attention at all.

      The site is very plain and very vanilla.
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      • Profile picture of the author Craigcmatthew
        Originally Posted by MikeFriedman View Post

        The argument has nothing to do with logic. Sure, that all makes sense. What I'm telling you is that if you study a lot of SERPs, you will quickly see that site speed and mobile friendliness are just not ranking factors, or if they are, they are so insignificant it is not worth spending time on.

        As an example, I specifically have been tracking a lot of sites that are not mobile friendly to the extreme and are in competitive SERPs. The kind of SERPs where little things like that should make a difference. In zero of the cases have the sites gone down in rankings. In most of the cases, they sites have actually gone up in their mobile rankings since Google's Mobilegeddon.

        Do what you want though.

        Your site likely has crappy bounce rates because there is no call to action anywhere on your pages. You are also in the type of market where people are going to visit more than one site before making a purchasing decision. There is just nothing that pulls me in to your webpages or catches my attention at all.

        The site is very plain and very vanilla.
        I agree with what you said. The site is very generic and uninspired. It's really nothing special. At this point I'm sure it's going to be a loss making venture.

        Anyways, I've managed to improve the page speed rank to 80-90 which is better than before. I'll know if I'm right if I see an improvement in bounce rate/pageviews etc.

        Thanks for the replies.
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        • Profile picture of the author nettiapina
          Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

          All of you seem to suggest that site speed is not important.
          That's not what I've said, but I'm sure you can see where you went wrong with this simplification.

          Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

          But think of it this way, if Goggle has to choose between two sites with similar content, one of which is mobile friendly and has great page load times and the other not so much, which do you think it will rank higher?
          That kind of thought experiment is something you often see on a forum such as WF SEO, but I find it very unimpressive and even misleading. Sure, you can imagine a set of constraints and make a logical conclusion based on those. Doesn't do much good, though. In real world there's never two sites that are the same, and there's hundreds of factors that Google considers.

          As Mike F. pointed out site speed just doesn't seem to be an important factor even with all the talk and tools from Google.

          Originally Posted by Craigcmatthew View Post

          Anyways, I've managed to improve the page speed rank to 80-90 which is better than before. I'll know if I'm right if I see an improvement in bounce rate/pageviews etc.
          Unfortunately, you don't. If you're working actively on SEO the improvement might be due to something you did last week or last month. Also, it's not like you can say that someone who watches trends on multiple websites is wrong because of your anecdotal evidence.

          I've been meaning to post about WordPress WP_Rewrite class. Had some listings behind URL parameters, took those away, and the site shot up in SERPs. However, the team had been working on the same pages during the previous couple of weeks too, they wrote some new content, and they got some fairly good backlinks as well during the same period. We even managed to increase the site speed quite significantly. Can you say that one of these things were the main driver behind the better rankings? I'd like to attribute a lot of it to the cool technical stuff I did, but I recognize my bias.
          Signature
          Links in signature will not help your SEO. Not on this site, and not on any other forum.
          Who told me this? An ex Google web spam engineer.

          What's your excuse?
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