Are you noticing a decrease in your mobile site’s Google score? Don’t panic! Your site isn’t underperforming; Google has changed its PageSpeed Insights tool. Those changes were rather significant as well. Google is now using performance metrics from Lighthouse – which provides a breakdown of scores across several categories – but the “Performance” category is the only one you see displayed in PageSpeed Insights.
To improve performance, recommendations include using new image format files such as WebP, JPG 2000, and JPG XR; however, support for these formats in browsers and photo sources is still limited. As a result, websites will appear to have a much lower score. CPU usage/interactivity relating to javascript execution is another factor affecting performance. Many third party utilities, such as chat, need javascript. While website providers and third party companies are working to update these types of formats and scripts, the process will take time.
In the meantime, it’s important to keep in mind that your site’s scores dropping is not a reflection in poor performance, but as a result of the Google PageSpeed Insight’s change. We at Chumney & Associates will continue to monitor all of Google’s changes and make sure we’re doing our very best to serve your automotive marketing and advertising needs. Feel free to contact us anytime with questions about your dealership site’s performance.