We analysed the portfolios of 16 website designers local to Worcester to see how fast their websites are. We tested using Google Page Speed Insights and GTMetrix.
Based on these results, we found that out of all the web designers we looked at, Black Pear Digital delivers the fastest websites.
A note on the importance of Page Speed
Top search engines use web page speed as a factor when determining position in search results. Additionally, various studies have shown that faster websites are more likely to convert users.
Essentially, having a fast website leads to more visitors and more conversions of those visitors.
The Results
Web designer rankings
We ranked each web designer based on the average results of each test completed against their portfolio. We then took the average rank across all tests.
This was the easiest way to get an overall rank, since the variations in each test meant they couldn’t be directly compared.
Average Page Speeds
Using the overall average speeds for each speed test set, you can quickly see whether a site is below or above average.
| Average Google Page Speed | 40% |
| Average GTMetrix Page Speed | 74% |
| Average GTMetrix YSlow | 78% |
Interestingly the results for Google Page Speed were low (and varied significantly). This is surprising since you would expect web designers to pay more attention to what Google thinks due to the impact on SEO.
Individual Test Results
The graph below shows the average speed test results for each web designer. Note that Black Pear Digital came top in all tests.
How we tested
- Identifying local web designers – A list of local Web Design Businesses was primary obtained primarily from a Google search for “Worcester web design”. The first 2 pages of results were used (data beyond that was harder to collect). Other sources were also used, such as Twitter.
- Collecting portfolio sites – For each web designer, the first 3 portfolio website links were collected as a sample.
- Obtaining speed rating – Each portfolio site was ran through different speed checkers to get speed ratings (expressed as a percentage), these were:
- Analysis – An average was taken for each web designers portfolio results giving their final result, which was used to rank each web designer.
Notes
- There was no verification of:
- Whether the portfolio sites identified were current or accurate
- Whether the business is physically local to the Worcester area
- If no portfolio with links could be easily located then the business was not included
- Sites were given a rating of 0 if they failed the speed test 0. This is because a failure normally meant the site timed out or was unavailable so is penalised as a result
- If a linked website was not available then the web designer was essentially disqualified
- Only the websites index (home) page was tested, acting as a sample of the website as a whole (it was expected that the home page was the fastest, most content-full page)
- We included 5 of our own websites as opposed to the first 3 from other web designers (since we were doing the investigation and it would give a more accurate indication of speed).