Embedded JS Marketo Forms are slow to render?

[Anonymous]

When embedding the JavaScript for a Marketo form on our test server, there is a noticeable delay when rednering the form - at least 3-4 seconds.  Is this expected?

We are following these instructions:
Embed Form on your Website - Marketo Docs - Product Docs

[SanfordWhiteman]

Certainly not expected.  A half-second to download the form description, maybe.  Although it does depend on how far (geographically) the user is from your Marketo instance.  What's a sample URL I can test?  Have you checked the network waterfall when loading your page to see how it's taking to load the form on the wire?

[Casey_Grimes]

Sanford's correct that it's not expected—but given that the JavaScript that powers the form needs to load in the body, it may be an issue with other assets on your page (other pieces of JavaScript, a large image file, what have you.) Since you're on a local test server, try opening the page in Chrome, then use Chrome's Inspector (Ctrl + Shift + I / Apple + Option + I) and look under the "Network" tab to see a waterfall test of your assets. Does it look like anything in particular is causing a slow load?

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the suggestion! Very helpful to use the inspector to see what is going on....

I found that the two largest sources of latency were - by far - calls made by the Marketo form2.min.js library
1) marketo getForm?munchkinId=xxx    TTFB 940ms2) marketo XDFrame   TTFB 920ms

These happen serially, so altogether that is almost 2 seconds of latency!

For comparison, Google Analytics plugin latency TTFB 24ms

Is this expected?

Also, when embedding a Marketo form on a page, should I also have the normal munchkin code on the page as well?  I do have the standard munckin script ...and It looks like the munchkin.js gets dowloaded twice?

[SanfordWhiteman]

Comparing to GA isn't really fair because it's loaded from a CDN, not from the origin server.

What is a sample URL?

And yes, Munchkin and Forms offer complementary features and should both be loaded. What you see as two munchkin.js is actually the bootstrap and the main file.

[David_Hyde2]

I'll pose the question - I get anecdotal feedback that our embedded Marketo forms that pop up are slow to render sometimes for global users. I've never experienced this and we have thousands of conversions every month from around the world. But I'm trying to formulate an answer. An example is https://www.acronis.com/en-us/cloud/service-provider/platform/?trial= 

Marketo Support said that "that there are many outside resources being loaded. This would affect the form, in that dependent on the placement of the form within the HTML, the form will need to wait for other resources to load before it is able to. You may want to speak to your web developers who maintain your website if all of the outside resources being loaded on this page is necessary, as the more resources that are needing to load, the slower your overall time of your webpage will be and this will in turn affect how the Marketo form loads (as it is being designated as one of the last resources to load). Let me know if you have any questions." 

Does that mean that if we put the forms.js file on line 41 instead of 314 that the pop up would load faster? Our Marketo data center is San Jose. Does geography really matter? Thank you.