The Need for Speed

The web has been littered with “get fast quick” articles following Google’s recent announcement that site speed can affect page ranking. Web site performance is suddenly a KPI for many businesses.

What’s disappointing about this sudden need for speed is that it’s not driven by businesses looking to please their customers, or improve the web, it’s driven entirely by businesses hoping to rank high in Google. The thing is that Google care about speed because Google care about users. It’s right in their 10 principles.

I’d love to see what would happen if Google explicitly added metrics like customer happiness, or website usability to their page rank algorithm. “Quick Johnny, Ring Jakob Nielsen, we’re in all kinds of trouble.”

Speeding up your site specifically for Google bots is short-sighted; it’s missing the point. Principle #1: Focus on the user and all else will follow.