Google has a new rating scheme to rate visitor experience on a website. This new scheme is called “Core Web Vitals” (CWV). These are metrics used by Google to assess users experience on a particular website.
CWV are intended to ensure a seamless user experience. Core Web Vitals measure several dimensions on a website such as load time, responsiveness, interactivity and more. Google gives importance to these dimensions on a website when determining the Search Engine Optimization rankings.
Core Web Vitals offer insight on how users are experiencing your website. If visitors have a good experience on a website, they will be likely to return and recommend the website to other people. If a visitor has a poor experience on a website, they will likely not visit the website again.
This article will discuss the composition of Core Web Vitals and how you can improve them to optimize your SEO.
Three Components of Core Web Vitals (CWV):
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): this refers to average loading time of the main content found on a page. It is the time from clicking on a link to seeing the major content on the page. Main content includes both media and text. Google uses LCP to determine how fast the first meaningful piece of content loads. LCP is more than just page load speed. It is also an indicator of perceived load time the LCP is measured for each page. Each page will receive a different LCP score based on what is the most important content on each different page. A good LCP score is important to ensure users are having a seamless experience. If they are waiting a long time for the content to load on a page, they may leave and search elsewhere.
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): this measures website page stability as it loads. When a page is loading, sometimes you may notice the content of the website shifts around. This would indicate a poor CLS score. Having a good CLS score can prevent visitors from clicking on the wrong thing.
First Input Delay (FID): this is used to measure time from when a user inputs an action or command and the page executes it. It measures the time it takes for a user to actually interact with your page. This includes clicking links, buttons, pressing keys, choosing an option from a menu, and more. FID won't be important for every page if it doesn't have a lot of components it measures. For pages with a login page, sign up page, or any other page where immediate clicking something is needed, FID is very important.
Ideal Scores for Core Web Vitals:
LCP: Google standard requires content must load in less than 2.5 seconds. If the LCP score is between 2.5 and four seconds, the score could use improvement. If the score is higher than four seconds, it is considered a poor score.
CLS: CLS score should maintain a score of 0.1 or less for each page.
FID: To get a good score from Google, they like a score of fewer than 100 milliseconds. When the FID scores are higher than 300 milliseconds, that is when it starts to affect the score.
Where to Find Core Web Vitals:
Google provides a few different options to measure the Core Web Vitals' performance.
Google Search Console: To evaluate your Core Web Vitals on Google Search Console, go to the “core web vitals” report under experience. They have reports for both desktop and mobile. You want to make sure that both vitals are good because a visitor may be visiting the website through different devices. In these reports, you are able to find information on the whole website. Looking at all the pages, you can see the pages that need to be improved.
Page Speed Insights: Googles page speed insights gives your information on the elements affecting the Core Web Vitals as well as giving suggestions for improving the vital score. To start visit this website and enter the URL for what you want to evaluate. You will get the vitals for both desktop and mobile, the issues that need to be addressed and different optimization opportunities.
Chrome DevTools: The Chrome dev tools allow you to view the issues directly on each page. To open, on Google Chrome, right-click your mouse and select “more tools” and then click “developer tools”. From there go to the performance tab. Click on the record button and reload the page. Once the page is done loading, stop recording. From there you will see the details of the different metrics.
Core Web Vitals are the measurements Google uses to evaluate different elements such as the seed of the URL. Having better scores for the core components will allow a more seamless user experience and could gain more visitors and customers.
Remember to constantly monitor your Core Web Vitals to see how your website is performing. Over time your scores will change so be sure to keep an eye on it over the long term to deliver the best visitor experience possible.
If you have any questions related to Core Web Vitals or anything else Digital Marketing related, contact us today!