IISpeed accelerates visitnapavalley.com, with PageSpeed optimization by Google

MAR 03, 2014
Author PhotoThis guest post was written by Otto van der Schaaf, Founder and Software Engineer, We-Amp

Google has been working on making the web faster for years now. Recently, We-Amp collaborated with Google and SunStar Media to conduct a test to measure the real-world effects of PageSpeed optimization with IISpeed on conversion rates and overall site speed. We used IISpeed to optimize the Visit Napa Valley site.

Our test found that IISpeed reduced page load time on average by 12.36% for mobile, and increased conversions by 1%. (In this case, a conversion is a visit to a booking page on an external site.) In the mobile and tablet segments, we saw 7x and 9x improvements in the 0-1 second page load time bucket.

We got these results after spending just 20 minutes to configure IISpeed.

What did IISpeed optimize?

James Moberg, CTO of SunStar Media, said this about the project: “This website displays a large number of unique images. IISpeed automatically controls caching for updated files and performs lazy loading. We were using some server-side logic and jQuery libraries to do this, but it required more code, required caching file dates and it appeared to display slower during page load. We use Adobe ColdFusion and there are some libraries that concat and minify both JavaScript and CSS, but none are as easy or robust as IISpeed. Adding a custom header allows us to enable or disable any IISpeed features on page requests based on any criteria like authenticated user, browser, cookie, IP address, internal application toggle, and so on. Overall we are extremely pleased with IISpeed and are proactively removing all optimization hacks from past projects and allowing IISpeed to manage it.”

Some third-party content isn't optimized by PageSpeed in this test. These are areas for future enhancement.

Findings

Changes measured: IISpeed versus no IISpeed. We set up a classic A/B test on Google Analytics to facilitate our test strategy.
table of findings
The average timings are sensitive to outliers, so for correct interpretation it is good to have a look at the timing distribution as well.

Mobile

Tablet

Desktop

IISpeed by We-Amp

IISpeed brings the full power of PageSpeed optimization to Microsoft’s IIS web server, which powers millions of websites. PageSpeed optimization via IISpeed improves site speed by automating best practices as outlined by Steve Souders, Head Performance Engineer at Google. In addition to these optimizations, Google’s “Make the web faster” team has added above-the-fold content prioritization and a lot more.

IISpeed is an initiative by We-Amp, a web performance optimization company located in the Netherlands.


Otto van der Schaaf is one of the founders of We-Amp,and spends his time coding on web acceleration technologies and accelerating web sites. When he is not working he loves to play soccer with his two sons.

Posted by Scott Knaster, Editor