Do you remember the days of dial-up internet? We’d sit there and wait for what seemed like an age for websites to load. In actuality, it wasn’t all that long. However, we’ve become used to content being available in an instant. In fact, if we’re waiting longer than a few seconds nowadays, we’ll often give up and click somewhere else.
Now, take that information and think how it could relate to your business website. Are you losing sales because it’s so slow to load? Are lucrative clients clicking away because they can’t get the information they need quickly enough? It’s easy to gloss over, but slow loading websites are a huge hindrance for businesses across the world.
The thing is: a well-optimized site has plenty more benefits than basic satisfaction for the potential customer. By getting the basics right, you’re opening up more possibilities in terms of techniques like SEO. Backlinks, as explained at https://www.gotchseo.com/backlinks/ can be particularly beneficial to boost your SEO strategy. However, if your website takes an age to load, you’ll actually be doing more harm than good. Eventually, that SEO strategy will keel over and die. Then, it’s wasted money down the drain.
There are help sources available to you. Arguably the most well-known of these is Google’s PageSpeed tool. This is a tool that uses insights to measure load times and identify the issues relating to them. If you’re not technically minded, the tool might not make all that much sense to you. However, if you are, you can find it at https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/.
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So, we’ve mentioned the importance of fast load times, but what can you do to ensure you get them? There are a few basic tips that we’re going to mention today to get you started. If you’re still having problems after implementing them, you might need to seek more expert advice. Let’s take a brief look.
- It all starts with your website hosting provider. If you’re using an unreputable host that can’t handle the demands of your site, it won’t load quickly. You might even find that it suffers from downtime on a regular basis, which is damaging. It might be worth considering a new host.
- Another problem you might face is filling your website with an abundance of images. This can be an issue for multiple reasons. First, it means that your website has to work harder to load the images you want to use. Also, you might not be optimizing those images effectively, resulting in a large file size. In programs like Photoshop, as found at adobe.com/Photoshop, web-specific images can be created.
- Finally, think about the content management systems you’re using. In the case of something like WordPress, you might find that a plugin is slowing it all down. To rectify this, you’ll need to carry out some trial and error procedures.
Make no mistake: slow load times will hinder your website’s progress. Make sure you don’t suffer from them.
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