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A while ago I wrote an article about a method to track page load times in Google Analytics. Short after this article Google came with their own technique to track page load times, but both methods have some disadvantages.
To give a clear understanding about the differences I want to show you this image:
Read more: Simulate Googles trackPageLoadTime without sampling »
Today I read a great presentation from Joshua Bixby (Strangeloop). He showed a nice way to create a business case for Web Performance Optimization (#wpo). The case is that a slower user experience leads to less revenue, but it's not easy to prove that. What you could do is set up an A/B test with a slower page as B variant. The upside is that you can make a business case, the downside is that you will lose revenue. Joshua came up with another option: we already have the connection speed and browser version in Google Analytics!
The older browsers and slower connection types have a negative impact on page load times. So they should show us numbers for people with a slower user experience.
Read more: And that is why you need to speed up your site! »
A small blogpost about a new version of the ga.js file that was launched a week ago. As you can see they changed the way customvars are being reported:
"Fixed a bug in Custom Variables that caused some values to be encoded in reports."
Spaces (and other characters) were reported as "%20". So if my name was in a customvar it would look like this:
Read more: Google Analytics cleaned up Customvars but broke reports »
Adobe is rolling out a new version of their Flash player (10.3) that makes it easy to remove and block your Flash cookies. In the old days (yesterday before my update) we had this menu (right-click on a Flash object):
But as of the new update we have an extra option. If you right-click on a Flash object you see this new option called "Global Settings" that brings you to this menu:
Read more: Adobe makes it easy to remove and block Flash cookies »
In the rebound an article about the tracking of your site's performance with Google Analytics. Almost a year ago I wrote this article in Dutch, but there are some improvements that made life easier. Google Analytics released the 'set events as goals' functionality that is really helpful here.
The script I'm going to explain will track page load time and page render time per individual URL. I know some other articles that describe a comparing technique but I really think the way I use it gives you more insights (at least for smaller sites).
I don't have to tell you how important it is to know how visitors experience your site. Sluggish sites will cost you money in the end. Site speed is a minor SEO ranking factor and fast sites tend to have more pageviews per visit and a higher conversion rate.
Read more: Track site speed / load time with Google Analytics events »