In the last few years, the internet has become a place where consumers make their buying decisions and purchase products. It is taking over the role of "friend's recommendation" in many industries. You can turn people who had previously never heard of your company into customers just by getting recognized.
Many companies have realized the value that a website brings to their business - now it's one of their most important resources! Today, if you want to get the most out of your website, it needs to be fast. Most visitors take only a few seconds to decide whether they like what you're presenting or if they should go someplace else.
In simple words, website optimization can be defined as the process of using tools, strategies, and experiments to improve the performance of a website, drive more traffic, increase conversions, and grow revenue. It's a lengthy process, but it provides many benefits. Some of them can be seen right away, some take time to manifest.
Speed matters for SEO
A very important aspect of website optimization is Search engine optimization (SEO). This powerful marketing strategy not only focuses on getting various pages of the website to rank higher, but also enables visitors to find a brand in the easiest possible way. People trust organic results more than advertisements. Ranking high means you get recommended by Google for having relevant content and a user-friendly interface.
Search engines use a lot of variables when deciding which pages to place on top. Speed and performance are one of the important ones. If the website's metrics (sometimes called Core web vitals) are not good enough, it will automatically be placed lower in the result list.
Conversion rate improvement
A Think with Google report shows that performance has a strong correlation to conversion rates and sales. If a website loads fast, visitors are more likely to stay committed to the task they set out to do. For new visitors, that means educating themselves on the products and services they initially searched for. If they aren’t distracted or put off by slow-loading web pages and intrusive content, they’re more likely to convert.
Better user experience
A positive user experience can help gain loyal customers. If pages aren't optimized, the user's focus moves from products, services, content, etc. to how slowly pages load.
Optimization is even more important on mobile devices. According to the latest data (broadbandsearch.net), more than 55% of all web traffic is coming from mobile devices. Because of this, Google has already switched to mobile-first indexing, where they primarily index and rank mobile pages. Any issues that appear can cost you not just potential conversions, but also the opportunity to rank high for relevant search terms. It is expected that mobile usage will keep increasing in the future. Mobile optimization certainly requires extra work, but it's well worth the effort.