The Benefits of a Fast Loading Website for Your Business – Web Host Pro

Competition for your customers’ attention is cutthroat in this age of content. If your website loading time is slow, your website visitors may leave your site and transfer to your competitors instead.

Impact of a Website’s Loading Speed

“Website speed” is the time in which your webpage is downloaded from its hosting server until it gets displayed on your users’ web browser. Meanwhile, “page load time” refers to the time when all elements of your webpage are finally loaded into users’ browsers upon clicking on your site.

Your website’s loading speed can either make or break your business. If it loads slow, your customers might leave instead of waiting for it to load completely. Moreover, loading speed can affect your ranking in search engine results. In fact, Google algorithm considers your website loading speed. The faster it is, the more chances that you rank higher.

Mobile vs. desktop loading speeds

So, how fast should your website load? According to Google, website load times on the desktop should be at 3 seconds maximum. For mobile websites, it should be around 15 seconds. If load times exceed these numbers, your website’s bounce rate can increase. This can leave your customers frustrated, forcing them to give up on your website and look elsewhere.

Website performance can vary between desktop and mobile devices. Since mobile devices use weaker processors compared to desktops, it might be harder and slower for them to load the content of your website. 

Hence, it is important to optimize your website to load faster on mobile devices. In fact, 92% of internet users prefer surfing the web with their mobile devices over their desktops. 

5 Benefits of Having a Fast-Loading Website

Fast-loading pages can improve your website’s functionality and usability. It loads your themes, images, and videos faster so that visitors can instantly see them upon clicking on your site. Ultimately, it makes your website a lot more responsive and navigable for users. This allows your customers to successfully navigate your site – whether it’s to buy a product, look for information, or send you a message.

Google penalizes slow loading websites by lowering their rankings in search engine results. This can leave you at a disadvantage to your competitors and reduce your internet searchability. One of the benefits of a fast website is to improve SEO (search engine optimization).

Loading time is also a major factor in your site’s ranking. Even with an optimized content, your pages can still rank lower if it is slower than other websites. In fact, Google confirmed that 2 seconds is the acceptable threshold for business website load speed.  So instead of focusing on just your content, you should also consider the overall performance of your website.

A responsive website builds your customers’ trust and makes a good impression. Customers see your website as an extension of your services. For first-time visitors, a fast-loading website sends out the message that your business is just as responsive, reliable, and professional.

Attracting new visitors doesn’t always equal new customers. For example, cart abandonment demonstrates the page speed impact on conversion. In fact, Statista reported that 18% of cart abandonment is due to too long checkout processing, while 12% is due to slow loading and unstable websites.

A study by Deloitte shows that fast-loading sites can also boost your conversion rates. In fact, 8%-10% of businesses who improved their website’s responsiveness have also increased their conversion rates in the process.

Another benefit to having better page load speed and bounce rate is a boost to customer engagement. As mentioned earlier, responsive websites can make your customers want to stay and interact with your webpages longer compared to slow-loading sites.

When a customer can instantly access your content, customer service and products, they are more likely to visit your website again. It also encourages them to explore your website and learn more about your business.

How to Improve Your Website’s Speed

Businesses of all sizes need fast-loading websites to remain competitive in the market. Whether it’s startups or large corporations, having an accessible, quick-to-load website is crucial.

Take for example the difference between college and university websites. Universities are usually much larger and have more diverse programs to offer. Hence, their websites are often bombarded with more content than college websites. Nonetheless, they need to ensure their website is just as fast and responsive as other college websites to accommodate their students’ browsing needs.

Thankfully, speeding up your website’s loading time often involves simple processes. This includes: 

• cutting down on the number of ads, widgets, and plugins from your pages 
• lower your photos’ resolution
• use a responsive website layout
• avoid URL redirects

With these tips, your website becomes more stable and less likely to fall into unexpected downtimes.

Finally, a crucial piece to having a responsive website is your web host. Despite using the best optimization techniques, your website can only go so fast without a good hosting service.

Choose a web host with high performance servers and uptime guarantee. For example, Web Host Pro has a nearly pure HP G9 SSD RAID 10 cluster, indicating their hardware is lightning fast, reliable and easy to upgrade. The hosting provider also regularly upgrades their connection to ensure a 99.99% network uptime guarantee. To know more, you may check out Web Host Pro’s web hosting plans here.