Website speed matters. Websites are designed to provide tremendous value to a consumer. These digital platforms engage your target audience, feeding them information about your products and services.
If you’re conducting business online, your website can also convert new leads. Ultimately, the design of your website matters in the grand scheme of things. If you currently possess a low-quality website, you’re going to have difficulty getting your audience to take your business seriously.
Website speed, in particular, is an essential component of your site and a core principle in website performance. There are a variety of reasons why, which you can find below.
Website Speed Influences Bounce Rate
Bounce rate is defined as a percentage that indicates the rate at which a person visits and leaves your website without doing anything. Clearly, you want website visitors to interact with your site, contact you, buy something, or convert some other way.
If a person visits and leaves your website without doing any of these, then the session is a failure. With that said, the higher your bounce rate, the more your audience isn’t paying attention to your website.
If your website loads too slow, a potential customer will leave without converting, thus increasing your bounce rate.
People Don’t Spend Long on Websites
You wouldn’t believe how much time the average person spends on a website. According to Crazy Egg, people generally only spend 15 seconds on a website. This gives you a short window of time to make a great first impression.
No one is going to wait for your website to load forever continuously. For this reason, use a free website speed check tool to clock your data and make improvements. Website users traditionally aren’t going to stick around long.
It Builds a Lasting Impression
There are trillions of websites on the internet. One of the best things about search engines, like Google and Bing, is that you can find endless websites for local searches. This gives consumers the right to be picky.
If your website doesn’t provide what a potential customer is looking for, they’ll simply leave and go somewhere else. People hate slow websites more than anything else. It doesn’t matter how well your site is designed, how many keywords you’re ranking for, and if you’re churning out great content.
Website speed is the determining factor in building a lasting impression on your target audience.
Your Competitors Can Have a Faster Site
Here is the paradox of the internet. If your website isn’t slow or really fast either, your competitors can take advantage. A website should ideally load between 1 to 2 seconds. 53% of website visits are typically abandoned if they load longer than 3 seconds.
If your website loads in 2.8 seconds and a competitor’s site loads in 1.3 seconds, it’s a no-brainer that your audience could be more attracted to the competitor even if your website ranks higher.
Most websites take more than five seconds to load, which is completely unacceptable. Optimizing your website speed to the fastest level will give you the edge over your competitors online.
Google Penalizes Slow Websites
Per the previous statistic, most websites are pretty slow. Google has made it clear that they will penalize slow websites by significantly decreasing their website rankings. This makes it mandatory for you to take the necessary steps to improve your website speed.
Unfortunately, making this improvement is a highly-technical job. Hiring an experienced website designer can make the difference in having your website load at an optimal speed.
Maintaining Speed Requires Maintenance
To keep website speed performance at its best, the website must be continuously monitored and maintained. A key factor we monitor in websites under our Care Plans is speed. We look at speed performance on two different measurement systems which comprise several factors. We make sure databases are optimized, images are optimized and that the website files are served from a Content Delivery Network (CDN), among other factors.
Feature photo by Myriam Jessier on Unsplash
