Do you know more than 50% of people leave a website that takes 3 or more seconds to load? In fact, a site that takes more than 5 seconds to load loses almost 80-90% of visitors. Now that’s a worrying percentage. So, what is making your site load so slow? Well, there can be numerous reasons for that from an unoptimized site to a poor hosting provider.
But you must find the reason that’s making you slow because your competitors will not wait for you and you will surely lose the race. So to win the race, we must prepare well and the first step of preparation is to fix our weaknesses. So here we have listed a few popular reasons that might be responsible for the slow loading of your website in this article. Read till the end to get a better understanding.
How a slow website affects your business?
In the year 2006, Amazon conducted a test on its site and found that with just a 100ms delay in their site’s loading speed, they will lose 1% of sales. Comparing it to the Annual Revenue of Amazon in 2006, 1% is around 107 million dollars. According to 2021 revenue, it would be more than 3.5 billion dollars.
So, now you know how big a loss you can face in your business if your website takes just 100ms more to load. Even research shows that a 1-second delay can result in a 7% reduction in conversions.
Also Read: Website Optimization Tips To Increase Website Performance
Top Reasons For a Slow Website
The following can be one of the reasons behind your slow-loading website. So, just read them well…
1. Media Files
It’s good to have great, HD-quality images but they should not be too large in size. As they consume lots of bandwidth and the loading speed gets slower. So you can optimize your images through the following ways –
- You can compress the file size through any image/video compressor available online.
- Also for images, you can use JPEG format as they are much smaller in size than PNG or GIF.
- For video, you can externally host a video on youtube or any other platform while providing the link on your website.
- If you wish to play videos on your site, you should lose quality video recording software for lossless or Zip compression for the video.
2. Javascript
Javascript helps your website to be interactive with users. But if you haven’t optimized it well, it might result in a delayed loading time of your website. Experienced JavaScript developers can play a crucial role in optimizing a website’s performance, ensuring that scripts are efficiently loaded and executed. When a browser loads a webpage, it has to first load any Javascript file it encounters.
This is called ‘render-blocking Javascript. Google developers recommend these three solutions for this –
- Remove external JavaScript files, and use inline JavaScript.
- Use asynchronous loading so JavaScript can load separately from the rest of the page.
- Defer JavaScript loading until the rest of the page is visible to the user.
Also Read: Website Development Checklist To Help Create Your First Website
3. HTTP Requests
The more the number of elements or Javascript, CSS files on the site, the more HTTP requests will be and the slower will be the website loading speed. So, optimize your HTTP requests through the following ways –
- Reduce the number of elements including Javascript and CSS files on your site as much as possible.
- CSS sprites is a technique to combine several images into a single image so the browser won’t be sending different requests to the server for each image but rather will send a single request. You can use an online tool like Toptal’s CSS Sprites Generator & CSS Sprites to do this.
- Basically, reduce the total no. of files a user will have to download to access a webpage.
4. Caching
Browser stores frequently used data in cached memory so that the next you visit the site, it doesn’t have to load all the data and thus reducing your website’s loading speed. So, enable caching for your site. So, doing a Brave vs DuckDuckGo comparison, you can assess how each browser handles caching mechanisms and apply the most suitable caching settings to optimize your website’s performance across various platforms.
You can use a caching plugin for this such as WP Super Cache.
Also Read: 22 Best Plugins For WordPress Website
5. Flash Content
Flash can help you make your website more interactive but at the same time, due to its bulky file size, it can make your website load slower. So, one of the best ways is to replace the flash content with HTML5 alternatives. You can also try reducing your flash content’s size or eliminate them if possible.
6. Too many ads
Though ads can make you a lot of money, too many ads might result in a reduced number of visitors and that will eventually reduce your revenue from ads too. Too many ads mean too many HTTP requests and that means slow loading time. So keep a limited number of ads on your site and make sure you are not overloading your site with ads.
Also Read: 10 Common Reasons For A Website Crash
7. Content Delivery Network (CDN)
A CDN comprises several servers placed in different geographical locations, where you can store copies of your website. So suppose when a user from India will try to access your site, it will get a response from the Indian server and a UK visitor will get it from the UK server. This will save loading time for your site.
Consider using CDN service if you have visitors from the whole world, it’s not that important if your visitors are from a specific location or country.
Also Read: How Does Server Location Have An Impact On Your Website SEO?
8. Update CMS
CMS is basically used to create, manage, and modify digital content. Using an outdated CMS is a compromise with your website’s security and its optimization. Keep your software and CMS always updated for better results.
Also Read: Complete Guide To The Content Management System
9. Missing Files and Plugins:
Sometimes it might happen that your website is missing a few files. To find those files several requests are made by the browser and that delays loading time. Ultimately it ends in ‘file not found page.’ In case it happens, you can restore your site’s backup to avoid it. Also using too many plugins can delay loading time so delete the ones you are not using.
Also Read: Best WordPress Security Plugins (Paid+Free)
10. Poor Hosting Provider
Your website host can increase or decrease your website’s performance to a great extent as they provide main features like bandwidth, uptime, SSD storage, security, etc. So while choosing a web hosting, do your research properly. Check user reviews and view their plans in detail.
How Fast Website Benefits Your Business?
We have discussed how a 100ms delay can cost Amazon 1% sales. Now, what if we speed up the loading time? Well, then that will result in a better User experience, and also according to Google Ranking Index, sites that load faster are ranked better by Google. Hence, the visibility increases. So it’s a win-win situation when you improve your website’s loading speed.
Also Read: Ways To Optimize Your WordPress Website For Speed
Conclusion
Arriving at the conclusion, We can just say that a slow loading site can affect your growth to a great extent, as mentioned above. So, check what’s making your site load slow and work on it. You can check your site’s speed with various tools available online such as Think with Google.
Fix your weaknesses, lace up your shoes, and go, Win the Race!
