Google recently added the ability to track site speed loading time in Google Analytics. If you are not tracking this yet, you will want to read the following.

Installation:

The first thing you will need to do is figure out if you already have this option installed in your current analytics tracking code or not. If you recently installed Google Analytics and opted for asynchronous tracking, you will already have your page speed data available.

If not, then you will need to update your JavaScript tracking code to include the new page speed function. You can turn on this amazing new function by simply adding _trackPageLoadTime();to your analytics code. If you keep the tradition code (I recommend updating to asynchronous), it will read such as the following:

Traditional Code:

<script type=”text/javascript”>
var gaJsHost = ((“https:” == document.location.protocol) ? “https://ssl.” : “http://www.”);
document.write(unescape(“%3Cscript src=’” + gaJsHost + “google-analytics.com/ga.js’ type=’text/javascript’%3E%3C/script%3E”));
</script>

<script type=”text/javascript”>
try{
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker(“UA-xxxxxx-x”);
pageTracker._trackPageview();
pageTracker._trackPageLoadTime();
} catch(err) {}
</script>

How To Use Google Site Speed

Once you have your page load time function in place, you will want to dig into this precious data. You might have realized that there is an optional new Google Analytics web interface that is available. You will need to switch over to this beta version before you have access to the page speed reports.

Simply click the New Version link and select correct web profile.

Go to content drop down and then to site speed.

What Do I Do With This Data?

Here you can view page by page load times in conjunction with bounce rates, exits and total page views. This is great data to have, and can identify or at least weed out reasons behind poor conversion rates or excessively high bounce rates. We also know that Google is placing greater emphasis on page loading times, and such will affect rankings.

The following issues are the most common reasons for pages loading slower than average.

• Excessive Inline CSS and Javascript – These should be externalized when appropriate (not all CSS and Script needs to be externalized)
• Large images resized with styling – The full file size still loads upon request
• Not Leveraging Caching– All static pages should set aggressive cache expiration dates
• Poor Hosting – Maybe is time to move from shared hosting to dedicated

If anything, this data will give you additional insight into your business to determine actionable items to increase page load speed.