Page Speed
How fast your website loads. Speed matters for rankings AND conversions.
The Tradie Take
Page speed is how fast the apprentice answers the workshop phone. If it rings 8 times before someone picks up, the customer hangs up and calls the next tradie. Your website is the same. If it takes too long to load, customers leave before they even see your content. Speed is a competitive advantage.
Definition
Page speed is how quickly your website loads and becomes interactive. It matters for two reasons: Google uses it as a ranking factor (fast sites rank higher), and visitors leave if your site takes more than 3 seconds to load. For tradies, a slow site means losing emergency jobs - someone with a burst pipe won't wait 5 seconds for your site to load, they'll call the next tradie.
How It Works
- 1 Google measures page speed through Core Web Vitals (specific performance metrics)
- 2 Slow sites are penalised in mobile search rankings
- 3 Every second of delay reduces conversions by roughly 7%
- 4 Common causes: large images, too many plugins, slow hosting, unoptimised code
Tips for Tradies
- Compress images before uploading - huge photos are the #1 cause of slow sites
- Test your site speed with Google's PageSpeed Insights (free)
- Good hosting matters - cheap $5/month hosting = slow site