SEO Wash-up Monday 15th January

Google page speed Insights has been updated to use data from Chrome users

Google has updated its page speed Insights tool, it now uses data from the Chrome user experience report. This means that the tool is using the metrics from real world Chrome users who have visited sites in question.

With the new page speed insights tool, you can now see how fast your pages are loading based on real world data. When it comes to page speed, as we know, how fast a page loads is an important metric for user satisfaction.

The Speed score is categorized as being fast, average, or slow. Below is how the pages are graded on page speed:

• Fast – The median value of the metric is in the fastest of all page loads
• Average – The median value of the metric is in the middle of all page loads
• Slow – The median value of the metric is in the slowest of all page loads

This is determined by looking at the median value of two metrics which are the First Contentful Paint and DOM Content Loaded. So if both metrics are in the top of their category, then the page is considered to be fast.

The page speed insight tool also provides the following features:

In the Page Stats section, it outlines the round trips required to load the page’s render-blocking resources, it shows the total bytes that is used by the page and how it compares to the median number of round trips used in the dataset. This can then indicate whether the page will be faster or slower if the developer modifies the appearance and functionality of the page.

In the Page Load Distributions section, it shows how the page’s first contentful paint and DOM content loaded events are distributed in the data set.

There is a list of best practices that could be applied to this page, which is called optimization suggestions. So, if the page is loading fast, these suggestions will already be hidden because the page is already in the top third of all pages in the data set.

However, not all sites are graded as they need sufficient traffic and data from the Chrome user experience report to be graded.

Business owners on Google My Business can now view videos added by customers and upload videos about their business

News from the Google My Business team, they have announced the video upload feature that was being tested is in fact available for business owners in the Google My Business dashboard.

This means that all business owners can view videos, which has been added by customers and upload any videos about their business for their customers. The video has a maximum length of 30 seconds and once it has been uploaded, it can take up to 24 hours for it to appear on the business listing in Google Maps or search results.

So in order for you to add a video to your business, you can simply go to the Google My Business dashboard and click on the photos, then select the video link at the top. Lastly select the option to post videos.

In the near future, sellers will have the ability to flag inappropriate videos through their dashboards. They also promise that it will be mobile friendly in the coming months.