There are 3 metrics to pay attention when measuring your website’s performance are the Core Web Vitals:
Largest Contentful Paint (LCP): how long it takes for the largest image & text to load on the site. This is the most common way of measuring how long it takes for a site to be fully loaded for a visitor.
Interaction to Next Paint (INP): how quickly a web page responds to any action performs on the website (i.e. clicking a button or typing).
Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS): this is a measure of how “stable” the website is when loading (i.e. do images load in and stay in place or do they shift up/down when loading in the website)
Together, these 3 Core Web Vitals measure the speed, interactivity, and stability of your website. They play a critical role in Google’s ranking algorithm and have strong relationship with your website’s conversion rate and overall customer experience.
In short, websites with better Core Web Vitals have better search rankings, better conversion rates, and an provide a better user experience.
Here are the benchmark to aim for with LCP, INP, and CLS:
LCP — 2.5 seconds or less
INP — 200 milliseconds or less
CLS — 0.1 or less
Audit Results
LCP
Mobile: 4.5 seconds
Desktop: 4.3 seconds
INP
Mobile: 605 ms
Desktop: 479 ms
CLS
Mobile: 0
Desktop: 0.32
What the results mean
Poor LCP time:
The JesseKae website is taking too long to load on both mobile devices and desktop computers
Poor INP time:
The JesseKae website might feel slightly unresponsive for users on both mobile devices and desktop computers
Poor CLS score:
The JesseKae website is unexpectedly shifting around while loading on both mobile devices and desktop computers
How this is effecting the site’s performance
Poor LCP time (i.e. slow loading website):
Research shows that ecommerce sites that take too long to load will have much higher bounce rates and much lower conversion rates.
40-50% of online shoppers will leave a website that takes longer than 3 seconds to load (
In other words, online shoppers are impatient. Shoppers who visit the site will leave before it has he chance to load.
Google mapped out the relationship between conversion rate and loading time after analyzing over 1000 websites. Notice the steep drop off in conversion rate after 3 seconds in loading time? 👇
Poor INP time (i.e. unresponsive website):
Users can become frustrated when your site feel unresponsive. Think about how you feel when you click on a button and it feels like the page takes forever to load? Or when you type a word and it takes second to appear on the screen.
In fact, mobile conversion rates can drop by 50%+ when a your site’s INP time is too high.
Notice the steep drop off in conversion rates after 3 as the INP time increases from 100ms to 200ms+? 👇
Poor CLS score (i.e. unstable website):
Websites that randomly shift around offer a worse user experience.
Ecommerce is all about providing the best experience possible for customers.
Worse UX = lower chance of a site visitor making a purchase = lower conversion rate
Notice how conversion rates decrease by ~50% as the CLS score goes from 0 → 0.2? 👇
How to improve your website’s performance
Based on the audit results, here are my top 3 recommended fixes for the JesseKae website:
Optimize the site’s codebase
Shopify site’s hardly function “out of the box.” You have to install dozens of app plugins to get them to do anything.
Every time you install and app, it injects some unoptimized code into the site. Over time this code accumulates, slowing down the site. Even if you delete or uninstall the app, the code stays behind.
The only way to remove the code is through a full codebase optimization. This is where a developer dives in the site’s code and removed unused JavaScript and CSS code. Then the developer compresses and streamlines the essential JavaScript and CSS code.
Delay the firing of third-party code
Whenever someone visits the JesseKae website, a number of 3rd party tracking software and analytics software fires all at once. This sudden firing of code bogs down the web browser and makes the site take longer to load.
I would delay the firing of this 3rd party code slightly to ease the burden on the browser. This would have zero effect on the 3rd party software’s effectiveness.
Lazy load non-essential code and images
By delaying non-critical code and images from loading immediately, you can reduce the strain on the browser and speed up the overall user experience.
Benefits from improving your site’s performance
Increase in conversion rates
Small improvements in your site’s loading time can have massive affects on conversion rates.
1 second improvement in page load time will increase mobile CVR by up to 27% (
At Roadrunner, we’ve seen ecommerce brands improve conversion rates by 50%+ by making their website load faster.
Improvements in search ranking
Google prioritizes websites that offer a good user experience.
That’s why the Core Web Vitals play a significant role in Google’s search ranking algorithm
Better Core Web Vitals = better search rankings
Better ad performance
The major advertising platforms (Google Ads, Facebook, TikTok, Snap, etc.) prioritize a good user experience, too. They want to send traffic to sites that offer a good user experience.
Websites with good Core Web Vitals will have lower CPMs and CPCs.
Since conversion rates are higher and bounce rates are lower, overall CPAs and CAC from ads is lower.
Increased customer loyalty
Selling products on the internet is all about building trust with customers. Nothing erodes trust more that a poor performing website.
79% of customers are less likely to repurchase from an online store if they were “dissatisfied” with the site's speed (