The Need for Speed: Why website page speed matters more than ever
In today’s fast-paced digital world, website page speed is no longer a luxury—it’s a necessity. With users expecting instant access to information, a slow-loading website can be the difference between a visitor staying to explore or bouncing away to a competitor. Whether you run a business website, an e-commerce store, or a blog, the speed of your site has a direct impact on user experience, search rankings, and even your bottom line. I recently carried out this exercise with the company that hosts my website.
Many of the suggestion below will need to be implemented by your web developer. Somerset Web Services host mine and I was concerned that as I added pages I wasn’t doing some of it in the way that would best benefit my website, as my site was not loading as fast as I needed it to. After they had completed the work listed below I put the site through Page Speed Insights and this is what they managed to pull out of the bag …
First impressions matter
Your website is often the first interaction potential customers have with your brand. Research shows that it takes just 50 milliseconds for users to form an opinion about a website. If your pages take too long to load, visitors may perceive your site as unprofessional or unreliable, leading them to leave before engaging with your content.
User experience and engagement
A slow website frustrates users. Studies indicate that a delay of even one second can reduce page views, decrease customer satisfaction and lower conversion rates. In contrast, a fast-loading website keeps visitors engaged, encourages them to explore more pages and ultimately increases the likelihood of conversions—whether that means making a purchase, signing up for a newsletter, or filling out a contact form.
Search engine rankings and SEO
Search engines, particularly Google, prioritise website page speed as a ranking factor. A slow website can negatively affect your SEO, pushing your site lower in search results and making it harder for potential customers to find you. Google’s Core Web Vitals emphasise performance metrics like loading speed, interactivity and visual stability, reinforcing the importance of optimising website speed for better search rankings.
Mobile-first performance
With more than half of web traffic coming from mobile devices, mobile optimisation is crucial. Mobile users are often on the go and have even less patience for slow-loading pages. A site that is sluggish on mobile can lead to high bounce rates and lost business opportunities. Ensuring your website is mobile-friendly and loads quickly across all devices is essential for maintaining a competitive edge.
Conversions and revenue impact
A faster website directly influences your conversion rates. Amazon, for instance, found that a one-second delay in page load time could cost them billions in lost sales. While smaller businesses may not operate on Amazon’s scale, the principle remains the same—a slow website results in lost revenue. Faster websites not only enhance user trust but also encourage visitors to complete desired actions, whether that’s making a purchase, booking a service, or submitting an inquiry.
How to improve website speed
If your website isn’t performing at optimal speed, here are a few steps to improve it:
- Optimise Images – Compress images without sacrificing quality to reduce load times. Consider using WebP images. WebP is a modern image format developed by Google that offers superior lossless and lossy compression, resulting in smaller, faster-loading images on the web compared to traditional formats like JPEG and PNG
- Use a content delivery network (CDN) – Distribute your website’s content across multiple servers to enhance load speed. A CDN is a system of distributed servers that work together to deliver digital content (such as websites, images, videos, and scripts) to users more quickly and efficiently.
Key Benefits of a CDN
- Faster Load Times – Content is served from the nearest location to the user, reducing delays.
- Reduced Server Load – CDNs distribute traffic across multiple servers, preventing overloading.
- Improved Security – Many CDNs offer DDoS protection and encryption to prevent cyberattacks.
- Better Availability – If one server goes down, others can take over, ensuring uptime.
- SEO Benefits – Faster websites perform better in search rankings.
Examples of CDN Providers
- Cloudflare
- Akamai
- Amazon CloudFront
- Google Cloud CDN
Why Minimise HTTP Requests?
Each HTTP request requires:
- A connection to the server
- Data transfer
- Processing time
The more requests a webpage has, the longer it takes to load. By reducing these requests, websites become faster, improving user experience, SEO rankings, and server efficiency.
How to Minimise HTTP Requests
- Combine CSS and JavaScript Files
- Instead of loading multiple small CSS or JavaScript files, merge them into one file where possible.
- Use CSS sprites for images
- Combine multiple images into a single file and use CSS to display the correct part. This reduces image requests.
- Use Inline Small CSS and JavaScript
- For very small scripts or styles, include them directly in the HTML instead of linking to external files.
- Lazy Load images and videos
- Load images and videos only when they are needed (eg when they appear on screen).
- Use browser caching
- Cache static resources so they don’t need to be downloaded again on repeat visits.
- Minimise external resources
- Avoid too many third-party scripts (e.g. social media widgets, analytics tools).
- Enable HTTP/2 or HTTP/3
- These protocols allow multiple files to be downloaded in one connection, reducing the impact of multiple requests.
The Impact of Fewer HTTP Requests
✅ Faster page loads
✅ Better SEO rankings
✅ Lower bandwidth usage
✅ Improved user experience and conversions
Reduce the number of elements (such as images, scripts, and stylesheets) that need to load on a page.
- Enable browser caching – Allow visitors’ browsers to store certain elements of your site to speed up repeat visits.
- Upgrade hosting – A reliable, high-performance hosting provider can significantly impact website speed.
- Reduce unnecessary plugins – Too many plugins can slow down your website, so only keep what’s essential.