We make a selection of the main tools to measure the speed of your online store. What do you do if the page takes too long to load? And when I say ‘too long’ I mean three or four seconds. Are you going to another?
One of the effects that the internet has on people is to increase impatience. We are all a little impatient depending on the situation we find ourselves in, but on the internet, impatience is a virus.
Try searching for information on the net. What do you do if the page takes too long to load? And when I say ‘too long’ I mean three or four seconds. Are you going to another? Or do you wait patiently for the web to be structured, step by step?
According to various studies, 40% of Internet users abandon a web page that takes more than 3 seconds to load. 3 seconds! In 3 seconds, Usain Bolt still hasn’t had time to start a 100-meter dash!
Why so much rush? If we are not interested in that specific website and what we are looking for is information, we know that we will be able to find that data elsewhere. “If this page doesn’t load, I’ll go to another one.”
If we are owners of e-commerce we cannot be naive that Internet users will wait for us even if our website takes time to load. They’ll go somewhere else and maybe never come back. It is as if we put up a “we’ll be back in 5 minutes” sign. The client can say: “Well, I don’t wait for you”.
Why should an e-commerce store load quickly?
- In the first place, because our clients will value it. A fast website makes a good first impression. And the first impression, they say, is the one that counts
- If our e-commerce is slow, sales will notice. A high percentage of new customers will never know our products because after 3 seconds they will have already said: au revoir.
- Because Google also pays attention to the loading speed. The positioning of our website can be affected by a load that is too slow. Google values more those pages that load faster, proof of this is that they have released AMP, a new language for websites to load faster.
Conclusion? We have to do everything on our part so that our e-commerce website loads as fast as possible. All are benefits if our website is fast, you can read our article on how to maximize the speed of our Prestashop.
Tools To Measure The Speed Of Our e-commerce
Very good. We have it clear. Now it’s time to analyze the behavior of our website. And as always, the internet offers us different tools to do it. Here is a selection of the most important, remember that sometimes we will have to choose between functionality or speed, it is useless to have a 100 in Page Speed if the store is crap, you have to find a balance, I think that with an 80 of valuation is very good.
- Google Page Speed Insights. It is the tool of the Google empire and, therefore, one of the ones that we must try to analyze the loading speed of our page. It gives a rating from 0 to 100. The higher the value, the better the loading performance of our website.
- Pingdom Website Speed Test. It is one of the most popular tools among webmasters. One of its most interesting aspects is that its ‘guts’ webs offer data on each of its parts. In this way, we will know which aspects to improve. It also saves the measurement history so we can compare.
- YSlow. Another of the instruments that we can use to test our website. YSlow analyzes web pages and suggests ways to improve performance based on a set of rules. The objective is to make our eCommerce fly.
- GtMetrix. More complete than the previous ones, it takes into account both Google Page Speed Insights and YSlow to prepare its reports.
- Web Page Test. And we end with one of the simplest, suitable for the uninitiated. It allows a quick analysis of the speed of our website, in addition to other aspects that can be used to optimize it.
Why is my store running so slow?
If we use any of these tools, they will shed light on the problems of our e-commerce. In any case, the most common errors that slow down web pages have to do with:
- Bad choice of hosting. The hosting of our online store is essential for the loading speed. Cheap is expensive with hosting. It is a fact. With prestigious hosting, we will have the most basic covered, for example, we have fully optimized hosting for Prestashop.
- Bad choice of the content manager. If we are serious about our business, we must use a professional content manager or a powerful framework.
- Themes for Prestashop without optimization and inadequate choice of add-ons. If we fill our website with addons and we do not choose an optimized template, loading times skyrocket.
- Don’t trust professionals. If we are not experts in web design and optimization, our obligation is to consult with professionals, at least if things do not work as they should, contact 4webs web design and development to review your store and see how to get the most out of it.
In short, for our website to go smoothly, it is necessary to spend money. But let’s not forget that it is an investment. Sales will grow if our e-commerce page is optimized.
Editorial Team
