70% of consumers say that page speed impacts their purchasing decisions.
A one-second delay in page load time leads to 11% fewer page views.
Why speed matters
I don’t think we could stress enough how important website speed and performance is! We bang on about it all the time because it is the main factor that contributes to user experience and ultimately business success!
We have short attention spans. In fact ‘The average adult internet user’s attention span is 8.25 seconds, influenced by the increasing distractions on the internet, social media, and the environment.’
Slow websites frustrate people, causing them to abandon pages and resulting in a high bounce rate: the length of time it takes someone to abandon the page they’re on. Studies show that users expect a site to load in 2-3 seconds, and anything slower increases the likelihood of them leaving and trying a competitor’s website.
Google also plays a large factor in the importance of website performance. Google considers site speed to be a ranking factor. A faster, more optimised site is more likely to appear higher in search results, boosting organic traffic.
With more users browsing on mobile, speed is even more critical. Mobile networks can already be slower, so a lightweight, fast-loading, and mobile-optimised site provides a better user experience.
How to measure your website’s speed
Monitoring your website’s speed isn’t just about guessing whether it feels fast or slow. There are so many factors that influence loading times and speed. It’s about using the right tools to make informed decisions. We use GTmetrix as an independent tool that gives us an in-depth review of a website’s performance.
GTmetrix breaks down everything from page load times to specific recommendations for optimisation.
How to use GTmetrix
- Visit: https://gtmetrix.com/ (no sign-up required for basic tests)
- Enter the website URL you are testing and hit “test your site”
- GTmetrix will run a detailed analysis of your website, generating a report within seconds.
- Your report will show areas such as image optimisation, caching settings, and JavaScript issues.
Understanding the metrics
PageSpeed Score: This reflects how well your site follows Google’s best practices for website performance. A higher score means that your site is better optimised and has faster loading times for users. This also means that Google will favour your site, so this score is important for SEO too. Aim for a score of 85 or above for optimal performance.
YSlow Score: This score is similar to PageSpeed, but it is based on Yahoo’s best practices rather than Google’s. YSlow is a bit older, but still useful for identifying potential issues.
Fully loaded time: This is the metric that shows how long it takes for all elements on your page (including images, script and third-party resources) to fully load. You want this time to be as low as possible, ideally, under 3 seconds.
Total page size: This shows the total size of your webpage, including all assets like images, and CSS files. Larger pages take longer to load, so keeping your page size under 2MB is a good benchmark for fast load times.
Requests: This shows you how many individual elements your page is trying to load. The fewer requests, the faster your page will load.
Once you have your GTmetrix results, you can work on fixing those issues through image optimisation leveraging caching, minifying CSS and JavaScript, or prioritising above-the-fold content.
Factors that affect website speed
Image Optimisation
Large, compressed images are one of the main factors that slow down a website. Large photos have a larger file size which means that the server needs more time to send the files. Uncompressed images also consume more bandwidth. This means that for users with data limits (generally browsing on a mobile), this can lead to longer loading times or even page timeouts if data runs out. Higher bandwidth usage can also lead to additional costs, on the server side, especially if the website has high traffic.
Web Hosting
There are multiple different hosting factors that affect website performance. The processing power, memory, and storage type provided by your hosting plan can influence how quickly your website can handle requests. There are different types of hosting options. Shared hosting divides resources among multiple websites on the same server, this can potentially slow down each site. Different web server technologies can also impact performance. For example, LiteSpeed and NGINX are generally faster than Apache if you get high traffic.
Browser Caching
Caching means storing parts of a website on the user’s device, so returning visitors load the site faster. If caching isn’t set up properly, users will have to load the full website every time they visit.
Third-party scripts and plugins
External scripts such as ads, social media widgets, and tracking codes can slow down a website. Minisming or loading them asynchronously helps maintain speed. Excessive or poorly optimised plugins can slow down a site, so be careful about loading stacks of plugins on. Using efficient frameworks and libraries also impacts performance.
How to optimise your images for web
Choose the right image format
- JPEG: Best for photos and images with gradients. Offers good quality with a smaller file size.
- PNG: Ideal for images with transparency or graphics (e.g., logos). But keep an eye on file size, as PNGs can get heavy.
- SVG: For vector-based images like logos or icons, SVGs are scalable, lightweight, and provide excellent quality across different screen sizes which is a must nowadays.
Resize your images
You don’t need to use larger images than necessary. Resize them to fit the dimensions required on your site. We use Photoshop to resize our images, optimised for the web. To do this open your image in Photoshop and either click File > Save for Web or use, ‘shift + option + command, s’. From here you can optimise file size and file type.
Use a Content Delivery Network
A CDN caches your images and serves them from a location closer to the user, speeding up load times. Providers like Cloudflare, KeyCDN, or Fastly can help distribute images efficiently across the globe.
Conclusion
It’s clear: improving website speed isn’t just about user experience; it directly affects your bottom line. The good news? You don’t need to tear down your site and rebuild it from scratch. With the right tools and strategies, boosting your website’s performance is entirely achievable. So, what are you waiting for? Test your website’s speed and identify where improvements can be made. Speed is one of the most valuable assets you can have.
