As web developers, we have to deal with non-technical people, or people that just don’t have the same knowledge-set we have. They see a score in the Orange or Red and freak-out. And we have to deal with that freak-out. After Five years, I have a strategy to handle a stakeholder that cares about the number above anything else: I run multiple tests.
Multiple Tests
When you run multiple tests on Pagespeed insights, you will see a variance in scores. On some sites, I see a variance as high as 20 points! If I have a manager or a stakeholder that as adamant about the pagespeed insights score of their site, I have them set next to me, and I then run the site through Pagespeed Insights 10 times in 10 minutes. They will see a variance in the score, like I said, of up to 20 points.
Their reaction is always the same: “This thing is a piece of junk and the number is arbitrary”. Not exactly what I want their reaction to be, but if it gets them to drop the argument about Pagespeed Insights, all the better for me.
Click on the Throttling Tooltip
Show then the download speed being used to calculate these wacky speeds. Then show them the mobile speed statistics for North America. The reaction is always the same. “Why is Google measuring pagespeed for a phone that doesn’t exist anymore?”
Why indeed.
Threaten to take away functionality
If your site has videos, javascript animations, functionality, API calls, your site will not score well on Pagespeed Insights. There is no way around it. If your stakeholder cares so much about score, make it clear: I can make a page that scores in the 90’s, but you won’t have all that nice functionality anymore. It’s one or the other.
Show them Google can’t even Pass!
Put YouTube.com into Pagespeed Insights. It says ‘FAILED’. Really, just do that. This ends the arguments the best way.