The era we live in is called the digital age as well as the web era. Younger generations, such as the late generation Y and the generation Z, do not consider a business real and worthwhile if it does not have a website. The loading time also grows engagement among the end-users.
So Why is the loading time important?
As the popularity of the websites grew so did the expectations form the end-users, such as the said loading time. Research suggests that even 1 second of delay in the website loading time can reduce conversion by 7% and page visitors by 11%.
Some of the mobile sites can take up to 22 seconds to fully load. 53% of visitors report that if it takes longer than 3 seconds to load, then there is a high possibility for them abandoning the website.
For e-commerce sites, slow websites are one of the main reason’s clients abandon their checkout process and never end up buying the product. It has been reported that a 2-second delay in the transaction process results in abandonment in over 87% of users.
And what are the causes of your website loading longer?
When the internet connection of the user is slow, the website is slowing down. The loading time would be slow if the connection is slow too. To avoid such connection issues, we must make sure that our server performance is strong and fast. The server is essential as when someone clicks on your website link, the website is loading from the ground up (just like starting your car engine). The owner also needs to assume that all their customers/audience have a slow connection, therefore need to optimise their website to the best performance.
Linking back to the server, if your website experiences a lot of traffic and you have a poor server for it. Your clients can experience the website slowing down.
The next of the top reasons why the website is taking ages to load is the extra-large media files, such as images, videos, vectors, or graphics. This influences the website, especially for e-commerce with many products and galleries of products. If the files will be big the loading time will lengthen as well. Even if the internet connections with the light stream are much faster, the general rules for media optimisation still apply.
A large file is going to take longer to load, especially on mobiles. The file format is also crucial as the browsers can load some of them faster than the others. The fastest forms are JPG, PNG and GIF; some plugins can help the image optimisation; you can find the related article here.
Plugins can be one of the issues of your website, especially if you have too many of them installed and working at the same time. Each of them has a particular CSS file and javascript to add to the loading of your website. Look through the list of your plugins often, especially if you are adding new ones and decide which ones are helping your website and which are just unnecessary.
Remember, if you hire a professional, you do not have to worry about the processes and speed optimising your website. We can give you some advice about why your website is slow and how we can optimise it for future customers/viewers. Don’t hesitate. Contact us today!
Social media apps are a great way to send more traffic to your online store and boost sales. What better platform to do it on than Facebook and Instagram?
