Why speed matters
People do not wait for websites. A page that takes several seconds to show anything loses a share of its visitors before it loads, and on a mobile connection outside a city that share grows. Speed is also part of how Google evaluates page experience, which means a slow site can be held back in search even when its content is good.
The frustrating part for business owners is that slow sites often look fine on the office Wi-Fi. The problem shows up on a customer's phone in a parking lot.
What slows websites down
- Oversized images. The most common culprit: a photo from a camera, several megabytes, delivered to a phone that displays it at 400 pixels wide.
- Unnecessary scripts. Chat widgets, trackers, embedded feeds and plugins that each add weight and delay.
- Poor loading behavior. Everything loading at once instead of the visible part first.
- Performance bottlenecks in fonts, third-party embeds or heavy page templates.
- Mobile responsiveness problems that force phones to lay the page out several times.
- Core page experience issues: content that jumps as it loads, or a page that cannot be interacted with for seconds.
What Secret Systems does
Under Growth Starter we keep an eye on how the site performs, particularly on phones, and improve what is within our control: image optimization and modern formats, removing or deferring unnecessary scripts, loading the visible part of the page first, fixing bottlenecks, keeping the mobile layout stable, and addressing the page experience issues Google measures. Performance work also supports technical SEO and conversion, because a fast page is both easier to index and easier to act on.
Example. A page loads slowly because full-size images are being delivered to phones. We generate properly sized, compressed versions and serve the right one to each screen. The page looks identical and loads in a fraction of the time. We did exactly this on our own site, cutting a 204 MB homepage to under 10 MB; the case study walks through it.
Performance and third-party tools
Some slowness comes from tools you have chosen to embed: a booking widget, a review feed, a chat bubble. We can often load them more intelligently, but we cannot make a third-party script lighter than its maker built it. When a tool is costing more in speed than it is worth, we will say so and let you decide.
How it fits into Growth Starter
What we do not promise
- We do not promise perfect performance scores; scores fluctuate with third-party tools, network conditions and the testing method itself.
- We cannot make a third-party embed faster than its provider built it, though we can often load it more intelligently or advise removing it.
- We do not invent results. If a month's work was small, the report says so.
Frequently asked questions
We do not chase scores for their own sake. We make the site fast for real visitors on real phones and address the issues that matter. Scores usually improve as a result, but a specific number is not something anyone should promise.
Try it on a phone, on cellular, away from Wi-Fi. That is your customer's experience. Performance work is also ongoing: every new image, embed or tool can slow a site down again, which is why it belongs in a monthly plan.
Page experience, including speed and stability, is one of the things Google considers. It is not the biggest factor, but a slow site can hold back otherwise good content, and a fast one removes an obstacle.
Growth Starter is designed for sites we host and manage. Contact us about other sites; sometimes a one-time performance project makes sense.
Speed and performance optimization is included in Growth Starter.
One monthly plan covers ongoing SEO, technical SEO, content, local SEO, hosting, maintenance, monitoring, issue fixes and a monthly report. You run your business. We handle the website.
See Growth Starter pricing →