Is our website running slow?

pir

Just cleared my firefox cache and tried again. Still initial 15-20 load time but the internal links are working much better with a 1-3 second load time.

On another note the design is very good but the actual navigation could be better and with respect to search engine optimisation, you need to consider doing some work on that (some very basic SEO things which all sites should do are missing). But first sort out the speed issue as there is no point getting lots of relevant traffic from the search engines if people don't want to stay around for long.

Actually now that I think of it, I see you are running google analytics. Log in and check your bounce rate. Bounce rate is the percentage of people who come to your site and bounce right out again without clicking any more links. If your site is really slow you would expect a high bouncerate. Anything over 35% I would consider too high though depends on a few factors.

Check your bouncerate overall, over different weeks, months. Even check today's bouncerate though I suspect today's will be low because most people have been deliberately poking about your site.

Post back with September's bounce rate. Or bounce rate before you noticed the site was slow and after (if it has been an ongoing issue post the stats but if it's recent you won't have enough data to make an meaningful assessment).

isofa

Might be worth noting that I run with NoScript and have Google Analytics disabled, so maybe that makes a difference...

pir

isofa wrote: »

As with Lee, I'm on a fast high quality connection from Zen (best ISP, can't fault them!), and it continues to load instantly

(PS I couldn't recommend 1&1 less, appalling company. Search the forum.)

I find that weird. I'm on a 20Mb line and my current connection is quick, no throttling going on and yet each time I check after cleaning cache in safari, chrome and ff I still get load times of 15-20 seconds. When I don't clear the cache and come back to it, I'm getting 10 second load times. Just checked my connection with sites that I know load quickly, and a few slower (5 second ones) and I'm getting load times I would expect.

I'm actually trying IE now. I hate IE but thought worth a shot. More than 20 seconds, was just about to close the browser when it popped up. I'll check again when I'm in my other office (different network) and let you know.

I think there is a issue. It would be easier to say for sure if everyone was experiencing a slowdown.

What kind of bandwidth do you use a month? Do you have a bandwidth limit with your host?

pir

isofa wrote: »

Might be worth noting that I run with NoScript and have Google Analytics disabled, so maybe that makes a difference...

I run no script but allow google analytics. Maybe it's all the tracking. I'm away to poke at the code.

pir

looks like bog standard analytics code. Just blocked google analytics with no script and tried again and same 20+ load time.

Idiophreak

Pretty much bang-on 5s in both chrome and ie for me.

pir

isofa wrote: »

As with Lee, I'm on a fast high quality connection from Zen (best ISP, can't fault them!), and it continues to load instantly

(PS I couldn't recommend 1&1 less, appalling company. Search the forum.)

Who do you recommend for hosting? UK or German server (non-US).

isofa

pir wrote: »

I find that weird. I'm on a 20Mb line and my current connection is quick, no throttling going on and yet each time I check after cleaning cache in safari, chrome and ff I still get load times of 15-20 seconds. When I don't clear the cache and come back to it, I'm getting 10 second load times. Just checked my connection with sites that I know load quickly, and a few slower (5 second ones) and I'm getting load times I would expect.

I'm actually trying IE now. I hate IE but thought worth a shot. More than 20 seconds, was just about to close the browser when it popped up. I'll check again when I'm in my other office (different network) and let you know.

I think there is a issue. It would be easier to say for sure if everyone was experiencing a slowdown.

What kind of bandwidth do you use a month? Do you have a bandwidth limit with your host?

Just tried on IE (hate IE), empty cache took 25 seconds - first time I've seen a slow response.

Tried the same on FF, approx 3 seconds to load.

Will try on OS X, FF and Safari a bit later.

Looks like it's either taking forever, or it's instant. The OP is getting a good hit rate out of this! Also it always redirects to epages/es119644.sf and the code is a little untidy for such a simple homepage, 709 lines long!

I have decent 6 to 7 Mbps connection with 5 GB bandwidth with Zen on this particular link. Will try on our faster office links tomorrow.

isofa

pir wrote: »

Who do you recommend for hosting? UK or German server (non-US).

I'm using Zen and Kingston at the moment, very happy with these, plus 123-reg for some smaller sites and lots of domains which I manage, all seems fine. But looking for some cheap space to trial a Drupal and Joomla site, so might try a US host.

pir

isofa wrote: »

I'm using Zen and Kingston at the moment, plus 123-reg for some smaller sites, happy with these. But looking for some cheap space to trial a Drupal and Joomla site, so might try a US host.

I would say no to a US site, not good at all if you use a top level domain. Search engines will assume you are in America which in most cases is a bad thing. Even if you want to be international with the TLD, it's still best to be assumed to be in the UK(Europe) where possible.

Haven't tried zen before but reseller account looks like a good deal. Mental note in case I need it.

Only thing I can say about 1and1 is it's hard to end a rolling contract with them but otherwise I think what you get is fine.

I'd like to know where the ecom engine came for the OP's site as I think it's the problem. The urls are horrible and unnecessary.