How Long Does It Take Your Site To Load on Dial Up?
1809
Internet > Ecommerce
Mar 1, 2007
Halstatt Pires
How Long Does It Take Your Site To Load on Dial Up?
Your site is getting traffic, but conversion rates are horrible. Everything seems to be working, so what?s wrong? Your site may simply be to slow.
Load Times ? Are You Driving A Ferrari or Moped?
Give some thought to the sites you have visited of the past few weeks. Were you willing to wait 20 seconds for a site to load or did you hit the back button? Why would visitors to your site behave any differently? They won?t.
Webmasters, designers and site owners universally access the web through high-speed connections. Because of this, it is easy to forget roughly 40 percent of surfers use dial-up connections. While your site may appear to load quickly on your high-speed connection, have you tried loading it on a 56k connection? The results can be shocking.
Sites that appear to load quickly on a high-speed connection can take forever on 56k. It is not unheard of to find a ?fast site? actually takes 30, 50 or 80 seconds to load on a 56k. Sometimes, the load time is so slow the browser will actually ?time out? and fail to show anything. If your site has this problem, 40 percent of the hits are worthless. Worse, those frustrated surfers are unlikely to try to access your site in the future even if you fix the speed problems.
How fast should a page load on a 56k connection? As fast as possible, but no slower then 25 seconds. If you can get 56k load times below 10 seconds, you can turn a negative into a competitive advantage. Surfers come back to fast sites.
Determining Load Times
The best way to determine the load time for your site is to actually use a 56k connection. While this solution isn?t particularly technical, it will let you see exactly what your prospects are seeing when they visit the site. You will be able to see what loads quickly and what appears slowly. This should let you isolate particular elements in need of optimizing.
Server statistics can also provide you with evidence of slow load times. Are users spending a lot of time on entry pages, but not visiting internal pages? Either you have poor content or a loading problem.
Finally, you can also use diagnostic programs to test load times. Typically, the programs will kick out estimated load times for dial-up, DSL and T1 connections. Make sure you test your home page and internal pages. Diagnostic programs are excellent tools, but don?t get lazy. Make sure you physically watch your site load on a dial-up connection. The experience will prove invaluable to improving your site and conversion rates.
Improving Performance
The steps needed to improve the performance of your site often depend on the nature of the site. A database driven site will have different issue than a graphic intense site. There are, however, universal factors that can be checked:
1. Graphics: Typically, browsers have to make a connection for each image on a page. The more you have, the longer the load time. Limiting the number and size of graphics can help.
2. Tables: If you use tables, try to break them up into smaller modules. Large tables can negatively impact load times.
3. Multimedia: If it flashes, explodes, spins or blinks, consider ditching it. Yes, it looks great, but is it worth 40% of your audience?
4. Size: Scrutinize the size of your pages. The bigger the page, the slower the load times. It shouldn?t be a problem if the page is comprised of text, but large pages with lots of code will load slowly.
Cheer up if you have a speed problem! Yes, you?ve lost a lot of business, but now you can fix it. Most of your competitors will never figure it out. That puts you ahead of the game. Halstatt Pires is with MarketingTitan.com - providing internet marketing services.
Load Times ? Are You Driving A Ferrari or Moped?
Give some thought to the sites you have visited of the past few weeks. Were you willing to wait 20 seconds for a site to load or did you hit the back button? Why would visitors to your site behave any differently? They won?t.
Webmasters, designers and site owners universally access the web through high-speed connections. Because of this, it is easy to forget roughly 40 percent of surfers use dial-up connections. While your site may appear to load quickly on your high-speed connection, have you tried loading it on a 56k connection? The results can be shocking.
Sites that appear to load quickly on a high-speed connection can take forever on 56k. It is not unheard of to find a ?fast site? actually takes 30, 50 or 80 seconds to load on a 56k. Sometimes, the load time is so slow the browser will actually ?time out? and fail to show anything. If your site has this problem, 40 percent of the hits are worthless. Worse, those frustrated surfers are unlikely to try to access your site in the future even if you fix the speed problems.
How fast should a page load on a 56k connection? As fast as possible, but no slower then 25 seconds. If you can get 56k load times below 10 seconds, you can turn a negative into a competitive advantage. Surfers come back to fast sites.
Determining Load Times
The best way to determine the load time for your site is to actually use a 56k connection. While this solution isn?t particularly technical, it will let you see exactly what your prospects are seeing when they visit the site. You will be able to see what loads quickly and what appears slowly. This should let you isolate particular elements in need of optimizing.
Server statistics can also provide you with evidence of slow load times. Are users spending a lot of time on entry pages, but not visiting internal pages? Either you have poor content or a loading problem.
Finally, you can also use diagnostic programs to test load times. Typically, the programs will kick out estimated load times for dial-up, DSL and T1 connections. Make sure you test your home page and internal pages. Diagnostic programs are excellent tools, but don?t get lazy. Make sure you physically watch your site load on a dial-up connection. The experience will prove invaluable to improving your site and conversion rates.
Improving Performance
The steps needed to improve the performance of your site often depend on the nature of the site. A database driven site will have different issue than a graphic intense site. There are, however, universal factors that can be checked:
1. Graphics: Typically, browsers have to make a connection for each image on a page. The more you have, the longer the load time. Limiting the number and size of graphics can help.
2. Tables: If you use tables, try to break them up into smaller modules. Large tables can negatively impact load times.
3. Multimedia: If it flashes, explodes, spins or blinks, consider ditching it. Yes, it looks great, but is it worth 40% of your audience?
4. Size: Scrutinize the size of your pages. The bigger the page, the slower the load times. It shouldn?t be a problem if the page is comprised of text, but large pages with lots of code will load slowly.
Cheer up if you have a speed problem! Yes, you?ve lost a lot of business, but now you can fix it. Most of your competitors will never figure it out. That puts you ahead of the game. Halstatt Pires is with MarketingTitan.com - providing internet marketing services.
Write a Review
Add to My Favorite
Refer it to Friend
Report Article
Other links owned by this user
The Internet is great at leveling the field for businesses. Where else can you put up a site and immediately compete with huge companies on an international basis? What It Is E-commerce, clearly termed as web commerce,
Category:
Your site is getting traffic, but conversion rates are horrible. Everything seems to be working, so what?s wrong? Your site may simply be to slow. Load Times ? Are You Driving A Ferrari or Moped? Give some thought to the sites
Category:
Your site is fast and getting traffic, but conversion rates are disappointing. You may have problems with the tone of your content Do You Believe? You must have passion for the product or service you are providing. If you don?t
Category:
Setting up a small business, whether web based or not, can be a very time consuming and difficult task. The increasing popularity of the Internet and the resources available has seen a massive increase in business tools to help you on your
Category:
You have decided to open a site online, but are not sure where to start. This brings us to the subject of the online turnkey sites. Online Turnkey Sites ? Good and Bad An online turnkey site comes in a couple of variations. All
Category:
As you know from the dot.com debacle in the late 1990s, starting an Internet business is no guarantee of success. Internet business failures happen, but often for obvious reasons. Why Internet Businesses Crash and Burn Internet
Category:
If you have a product oriented business, the Internet offers a unique ability to reach a broad audience. With new technology, it is easy to build your own e-commerce store. E-commerce Store Today's world is an E-commerce
Category:
Online or off, a time tested method of succeeding in business is to focus on an unexploited area. You are probably wondering how. Here is your answer. Finding Your Nook and Cranny When we talk about a nook, we are simply
Category:
Other links at Internet > Ecommerce
Your site is getting traffic, but conversion rates are horrible. Everything seems to be working, so what?s wrong? Your site may simply be to slow. Load Times ? Are You Driving A Ferrari or Moped? Give some thought to the sites
Category:
If you hve business nd you wnt to tell more people bout your business nd wht service you offer to the public or wht product you're selling. Putting your business on the Internet tody offers you the chnce to rech millions of people everydy
Category:
So, sell online - congratulations (and welcome to the 21st century ;-) )! But does r online store sell enough? Chances are could do with increasing r sales figures. And this article discusses seven simple strategies to help
Category:
If you've been online for more than a day you've probably heard some "guru" somewhere recommend that you create a Money Magnet Web Site - a site that is highly automated and helps you make money 24 hours a day. While that might *sound* great, what
Category:
When people place orders through your website, it is always a good idea to immediately acknowledge the purchase. One way to do this is with the use of an autoresponder that can be integrated with your shopping cart. In fact, many shopping carts that are
Category:
Site Sponsor
Directory Statistics
Articles: 68214
Categories: 501
Yahoo Entertainment
