The Marlborough Regional Chamber of Commerce held its Distinguished Speakers Breakfast this morning. Presenter was Steve Vinter, Director at Google.
Mr. Vinter is a relaxed presenter with a sense of humor. He kept the crowd’s attention using his humor and switching topics fairly frequently. He spoke about AdWords, Analytics, Google+, Speed, Ripples, Android, the Google Body Project, Non-Profits, Page Speed, Sharing, and more.
He demonstrated
- How he used a form in a Google Docs spreadsheet to get votes from a group of employees about where to have a celebration.
- How to find ‘gas stations’ within X miles radius of a location on Google Maps.
- How website developers like myself can improve page delivery speed using Google’s Page Speed tool to measure speed and suggest improvements
I learned new things about Google and some of its products.
The highlight for me was when Mr. Vinter demonstrated the use of Page Speed. He first tested CNN.com and the tool gave that website a rating of 81%. Then he tested the Marlborough Regional Chamber of Commerce‘s website and that received a rating of 89%. Higher than CNN – and by 8%! That made my day, since CNN has so many more employees… and here I am, plugging away, able to get one of my clients such a fabulous rating! Very gratifying and a good way to start the day!
There were “oohs” and “ahhs” in the audience. Many people know that I maintain the Chamber’s website. I, of course, was more than happy to stand and take a bow. It was a moment to remember.