Experimentation, Site Performance, and SEO
We’re often asked how website experimentation affects site performance (page speed load times) and, because site performance is closely coupled, how it may impact SEO.
This guide was written to inform our clients on site performance best practices and how we work with clients on this topic to ensure experimentation has a minimal impact on page load speed, and in many cases, may actually improve SEO, leading to benefits that far outweigh any performance concerns.
The Web-based Experimentation Platform's Site Snippet
Regardless of the experimentation platform used, each requires a snippet of Javascript be placed on the site(s) pages/templates where tests will be run. The snippets can be implemented in various ways, but each provider has painstakingly ensured their snippet is minimal in size. The overall size of the snippet (about 80kb to 120kb) is typically not going to cause load issues.
Rendering Experiments
There are, however, some best practices for both installing the snippet and configuring your site and the platform to render experiments efficiently. In collaboration with our clients, we closely follow the recommendations of each platform we work with. Not all platforms have best practice documents available, but here’s a few that do:
Performance Concerns
Any performance concerns can be addressed by requesting a Site Speed Audit. This includes:
Running a Pagespeed Audit to surface any performance issues and our recommendations to reduce page loading times.
Working with our client’s engineering and web teams to implement best practices on loading the experimentation snippet.
Configuring experiments to follow optimization techniques such as excluding low-traffic audience segments, being judicious about metrics, and creatively rendering page elements without compromising the user experience.
Performing an experimentation platform audit and completing any necessary hygiene clean ups to reduce snippet bloat, optimize experiment rendering, and improve overall account organization.
Impact on Page Performance
Adding a testing snippet will come with some page speed performance cost. Our program will ensure these costs remain acceptable by evaluating performance configurations for CRO/CX needs. Page speed performance costs should be considered and minimized, but the learnings derived through testing often outweigh the costs.
Page speed performance improvement is a combination of many factors throughout the site. Maintaining lean Javascript, minimizing 3rd party software, and optimized images all contribute to improving overall performance and customer experience.
Impact on SEO Strategies
SEO success is driven by a comprehensive strategy that usually includes creating quality content, building domain authority (backlinks), and having optimal website load time. Google itself views A/B testing as a good thing for site visitors. It’s unlikely they would promote their own experimentation tool if a user’s experience on a site wasn’t important. Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO), when facilitated by website experimentation, can support your SEO efforts, because experimentation is typically focused on determining what your users care about and providing a positive user experience that lowers friction.
Additionally, we often collaborate with teams on SEO strategies that include testing around elements such as copy (keywords), sitewide navigation, breadcrumbs, and links.
We will guide you on how to follow best practices during the course of our client engagements, such as properly setting up redirect tests, how long experiments should run for, and how search engine bots should be treated.
One of our partners, Convert.com, has written some great articles on this topic, including covering Google’s Core Web Vitals initiative – a focus on the quality of the user experience on any given website.
If you’re interested in learning more, we highly recommend giving the following articles a look (about 12 minutes of combined reading):
Conclusion
We’re always happy to discuss our process, philosophy, and methodology when it comes to experimentation, site performance, and SEO. Fortunately, our clients have a plethora of experts at their disposal, including Growth Strategists, Program Managers and Experimentation Engineers. Please feel free to reach out to us anytime!
