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Web 2.0 - Slow and Steady Doesn't Win the Race
11/9/06
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Thursday, November 9, 2006
6:53:00 PM EST
Marissa Mayer, Google Vice President for Search Products & User Experience, has quite possibly become the most public face of Google these days, but she really isn't all that public. If it's not Valleywag asking if she is a robot or not, it's Vogue (or was it Seventeen) talking about her "most loved gadgets," and article after article after article speaking about her in Business Week, Fast Company...you name it, she's probably been in it.
Today, Marissa gave a presentation on "What Google Knows," going back to some research Google had done a few years back. In short? Pages that load faster get more usage. We knew that, that's not only the theory that Google is built on, but it's been Marissa's mantra. The longer story follows:
Google users had told the folks at the company that they wanted to see more search results per page. So, Google tested this theory, giving some users 10 results, some 30, and so on. The test results didn't show that users were happier with more results, though. In fact, people were using the search up to 20% less when they got more results. Why? Because the page loads slower when you see more results. It took .5 seconds for a page to load with 10 results, but .9 with 30. Yes, that silly .9 seconds mattered. A lot.
Another example Marissa gave was about the feature-creep that Google Maps suffered from after initial launch. Google had a cool maps product, so they kept adding feature after feature after feature...until the page load suffered. But, once Google went back, took some things off, and sped up the page, Google maps usage increased by 25%.
None of this is mindblowingly insightful - we all know that when people want to see something they want to see it NOW, and a perception of something loading slowly is much more important than the actual speed at which it loads (that's why the .5 seconds matters so much). But it all was interesting, and it never hurts to have hard facts to back up the information that we "believe" to be true. "Believe" and "prove" are two very different things.
Oh, and Valleywag? Marissa sure looked real, but as someone pointed out to me just before we went in to watch her speak - robots can be awfully realistic. But..I believe she's real. Can I prove it? Naw. Maybe someone else can.
Technorati tags: StephanieBamBam, BamBam, google, Marissa Mayer, Valleywag, Web 2.0, Web2.0 Summit
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6:53:00 PM EST
Web 2.0 - Slow and Steady Doesn't Win the Race
Today, Marissa gave a presentation on "What Google Knows," going back to some research Google had done a few years back. In short? Pages that load faster get more usage. We knew that, that's not only the theory that Google is built on, but it's been Marissa's mantra. The longer story follows:
Google users had told the folks at the company that they wanted to see more search results per page. So, Google tested this theory, giving some users 10 results, some 30, and so on. The test results didn't show that users were happier with more results, though. In fact, people were using the search up to 20% less when they got more results. Why? Because the page loads slower when you see more results. It took .5 seconds for a page to load with 10 results, but .9 with 30. Yes, that silly .9 seconds mattered. A lot.
Another example Marissa gave was about the feature-creep that Google Maps suffered from after initial launch. Google had a cool maps product, so they kept adding feature after feature after feature...until the page load suffered. But, once Google went back, took some things off, and sped up the page, Google maps usage increased by 25%.
None of this is mindblowingly insightful - we all know that when people want to see something they want to see it NOW, and a perception of something loading slowly is much more important than the actual speed at which it loads (that's why the .5 seconds matters so much). But it all was interesting, and it never hurts to have hard facts to back up the information that we "believe" to be true. "Believe" and "prove" are two very different things.
Oh, and Valleywag? Marissa sure looked real, but as someone pointed out to me just before we went in to watch her speak - robots can be awfully realistic. But..I believe she's real. Can I prove it? Naw. Maybe someone else can.
Technorati tags: StephanieBamBam, BamBam, google, Marissa Mayer, Valleywag, Web 2.0, Web2.0 Summit
Written by stephaniebambam Blog about this entry |
Add to del.icio.us | digg this
