How Website Loading Speed Affects Your E-Com Store’s Conversion Rate

The ever-increasing trend of eCommerce is encouraging small to large scale business entrepreneurs to set up their businesses even with limited capital. The number of online buyers is increasing rapidly with each passing day. When it comes to market brainpower, an eCommerce website’s conversion rate is considered one of the most desirable (and carefully safeguarded), secrets out there. Attaining a realistic conversion rate necessitates optimizing your website or landing page in different ways for cost-effectiveness and ultimately reaching the goal of profitability. For every digital marketer, entrepreneur, data analyst, conversion rate optimization manager, or web developer, understanding different tactics into driving more visitors to the website is imperative for every entrepreneur.

Acknowledgment modeling helps businesses analyze the value of different platforms they use for marketing purposes of understanding and evaluating which channel is the most beneficial for marketing. By using the channels that make the most profit, e-commerce entrepreneurs can grow and prosper. For this, you will need to blend different platforms to bring in a more extensive audience base. An excellent tool to use that can help you determine all this is Google Analytics.

In this guide, we will delve deeper into how website loading speed affects e-commerce conversion rates. You will learn about eCommerce topics in detail:

• What is eCommerce?
• Global statistics of eCommerce
• Ecommerce trends 2020
• What is the conversion rate?
• Why is the conversion rate significant in eCommerce?
• What is the website page load time?
• Role of page load time in conversion rates
• Future of eCommerce
• Conclusion

Ecommerce, which is also famous as electronic commerce, refers to the buying and selling of products and services online, and the transfer of money and data to accomplish these transactions. The term ecommerce usually accounts for the sale of physical products online, but it also depicts any kind of money-making purchase facilitated via the internet. Unlike physical stores, e-business sites are not limited by specific geographical areas. With the advent of technology, the trend of m-commerce (mobile commerce) is also on a notable rise.

As per the latest statistics, tech experts project that the trend of mobile commerce will surpass $2.90 trillion in 2020.

The graph of online buying via mobile commerce has increased by more than 33.8 percent since 2016. The experts are also predicting that the spike in e-commerce will continue until 2021. The numbers are startling enough to say that this increase will not witness a halt anytime soon. It is also notable to say that the current number of mobile users globally is over 5.1 billion and still counting. Some of the prominent and significant benefits are:

1. Bringing new customers 

Physical retail is determined by branding and customer-retailer relationships. Apart from this, online sales are also determined by traffic from search engines. It is not extraordinary for customers to follow a particular link in search engine results and reach an e-commerce website that they have never heard. This added source of traffic can be the spotlight for some e-commerce entrepreneurs.

2. Cost-effectiveness 

One of the most concrete benefits of e-commerce is affordability. A part of this affordability could be transferred to consumers via discounts and offers. Some of the ways that are helpful in cost reduction in e-commerce are:

• Marketing: Organic search engine traffic, social media traffic, pay-per-click advertising are some of the popular marketing channels that are affordable.
• Personnel: The automation services of checkout, billing, convenient payments, catalog management, and other operational processes reduces the number of staff needed to run an e-commerce setup.
• Real estate: Well, it is a no-brainer. An e-commerce mercantile does not require an outstanding physical location.

3. Intuitive interface and navigation 

The classy and elite décor of the shops have taken a back seat with the introduction of the intuitive interface of online payment methods. Customers can easily browse their favorite products through an intuitive interface and easy navigation immediately. Some ecommerce platforms remember customer preferences and create wish lists to assist them in making a repeat purchase.

Also, read – What Major Digital Marketing Trends To Anticipate And Plan For In 2020?

4. Exclusive discounts, offers, and Coupons

The appealing and jaw-dropping deals, exclusive offers, coupons, and group buying of online shopping are other captivating parts of ecommerce. Few clicks here and few clicks there can quickly get their favorite products and services at their doorstep.

Global statistics of ecommerce

The number of online buyers globally is expected to surpass 2.05 billion in 2020, accounting for a section of the world population. The name was more than 1.30 billion in 2014 and is projected to reach 2.14 billion by 2021. Some of the reasons why the number of digital buyers is increasing is convenience and cost-effectiveness.

• Shopify’s research study says that by 2021, global retail ecommerce retail will reach $4.9 trillion.
• Digital Commerce 360 has recently shared a report saying that online consumers spend $601.75 billion with U.S. retailers in 2019. The number has been increased by nearly 15 percent as compared to 2018.
• As per the Frost and Suvllian report in 2017, the Global B2B ecommerce retailers predict that B2B will surpass B2C ecommerce and will $6.6 trillion by 2020.
• By 2040, over 95 percent of shopping will be offered by eCommerce, a report presented by Nasdaq in 2017 says.
• Going by Statista, 2017, the total online shopping per consumer annually, on average, is projected to be $1,800 in the USA and $1,600 in the U.K.

Ecommerce trends 2020

Advanced ecommerce trends are coming forward at a crushing pace. Here is a comprehensive list of all the directions to match your counterparts in 2020. The ecommerce market is gradually growing each year. In 2019 the global ecommerce market surpassed US$2 trillion porches. With US$634 billion in revenue generation in 2018, China is standing at number one position in ecommerce, and the numbers clearly show it will stay in the limelight through 2023. Explore the ecommerce trends for 2020.

Mobile commerce is significantly increasing since the advent of the technology of smartphones and gadgets. It’s projected that six out of seven Americans buy online, and more than 50 percent of them shop by using a mobile device (m-commerce). In Europe alone, the startling numbers are even higher – 64 percent of Europeans buy products online, and 55 percent prefer m-commerce, and the trend will increase in 2020 for different reasons.

2. Personalized customer experience 

Customers are usually unaware of the technical arena of their favorite ecommerce products and services, but it doesn’t mean the new trends don’t follow it. On the other hand, the direction of headless ecommerce is selling like a hot cake as it enables the presentation layer of a web page to be decoupled from the ecommerce website working. Thanks to technology, products, and services can offer more customized customer experience and be better-off in content. In 2020, the competition is undoubtedly going to rise, at least for smaller retailers. Headless ecommerce means the use of ecommerce platforms (such as Shopify or Magento). These platforms are prominent because they don’t require a pre-requisite storefront.

3. Voice assistants 

Voice assistants such as Apple’s Siri, Amazon’s Alexa, and Google’s Assistant are expanding more and more among users. It’s estimated that 8 billion devices with in-built voice assistants in them (including smartphones) by 2023. Voice shopping is projected to witness an increase to 40 billion by 2022.

4. Chatbots

By 2025, the global chatbot market is projected to generate revenues in a surfeit of one thousand million dollars. And ecommerce demonstrates a big slice of it. Chatbots will continue to be one of the hottest selling ecommerce trends in 2020. The global chatbot market has gained a vast 24.3% Compound Annual Growth Rate. As per the reports, over 45% of end-users deem chatbots their primary choice for customer support services.

What is the conversion rate?

Conversion rate is a primary element in the paid search strategy of any marketer. A marketer or even an entrepreneur looks for turning the website visitors into potential customers at a high rate. Conversion rate optimization allows marketers to exploit every cent of the PPC advertisement spend by searching that engaging speck that induces the maximum percentage of the viewpoint to take action. It is different from click-through rate and cost-per-click because it depicts how good a marketing strategy is at getting the maximum number of consumers (we call this “converting” in the marketing world). A conversion is a bit different from purchase. While conversion rate is a versatile metric, most digital marketers’ goal isn’t to fabricate conversions—it’s to enhance sales. To put in simple words, the higher the conversion rate, the better marketing is! Some of the available conversion types are:

• A consumer who made a purchase
• Forms submission by users
• Consumers calling businesses
• Customers contacting on chatbots
• Subscription sign-ups
• Consumers registering on websites

Also, Read – 12 Ways to Promote a Local Business Online

Why is the conversion rate significant in ecommerce?

In the above scenarios, marketers need conversion rate optimization more than other entrepreneurs for various reasons. A website that is hard to steer does not look dependable or immediately proves its value to the consumer. The significance of conversion rate optimization for online retailers is that it enables them to make the most of the site traffic and efficiently. It helps generate more revenue without having to invest much more for optimization or customer attainment.

What is the website page load time?

Page load time is the time to download and show the entire content and infographics of a web page in the browsing window. Page load time is a web presentation metric that directly results in user engagement and defines a business’s bottom line. It is also known as “page speed” (speed of the page load). It specifies how long it takes for a web page to load in the browser when a user clicks a link or makes a request on the site entirely. Various factors affect a site’s page load time. The speed at which a page loads relies on the hosting server, amount of bandwidth in the passage, and web page interface – including the number, type, and weight of elements on the page. Other factors are user location, device, and browser type. Page load time is measured from the beginning; when a user clicks on a link or types a web address until the completion when the page is fully loaded. A web page or site is generally measured in seconds, and two components produce it:

• Network and Server Time: It depends on the internet connection speed and how quickly static elements on the site like photos and other graphics are displayed.
• Browser time: It refers to the duration of how long does it take to evaluate and perform the entire document and make the page available for the communication with potential users.

The same web page can have different page load times depending on the type of browser used, the platform (e.g., Android, iOS), and the user’s geographical location. For instance, if a website uses a data center in Switzerland, but the brand also has customers in Italy and Asia, they may experience a slower page load time. With the help of Content Delivery Network solutions (CDN), one can deliver the contents all across the globe keeping high performance, and the issue is easily solved. Similarly, web pages of the same business could have thoroughly different page load times due to the developer’s decision on the contents affluence, page structure, functionalities, and amount of elements on the page.

Role of page load time in conversion rates

If a website takes longer than three seconds to load, a marketer or entrepreneur could lose nearly half of the visitors, as per the data from Akamai. A faster speed of any website results in increased customer visits on the site. Optimizing page load time leads to perceptible enhancements in user experience, conversion rates, and, ultimately, the improved sales revenue. Decreasing the website’s page load time can also have a positive impact on the entire marketing and sales strategies. Over 79% of unhappy users with a website’s performance say they’re less likely to buy from the same site again.

What is the need to increase conversion rates?

A marketer or data analyst is always keen to track the complete number of whatever user actions a web page has. But to manage the user-interface design and monitor the efficacy of the UX efforts over time, the conversion rate is usually more vital than the conversion count. While keeping the design on point, the conversion count could burst out if a marketer decides to run a robust advertising campaign that makes a lot of people fascinated by the product. But since any design attributes didn’t cause the improved site activity, a marketer can’t quite offer the same kudos to the design team. The conversion rate counts on the activities and actions that take place when people are on your website. Thus, it’s deeply impacted by design, and it’s a pivotal constraint to track for assessing whether the UX strategy is working.

• Reasons for lower and lower conversion rates: It happens when something is wrong with the design and navigation, even if great advertising campaigns keep bringing lots of traffic to the website.
• Reasons for higher conversion rates: Apart from the content, the designers can be praised for this.

Some of the other prominent reasons conversion rate optimization is crucial for any small to large scale business are:

1. Increasing pay-per-click costs

It’s absolutely an undeniable fact that pay-per-clicks (mainly Google Adwords) cost is being seriously on the increase. Higher and higher demand for the platform is a prominent reason—that’s just easy economics, but it doesn’t make throwing out more money any more comfortable. Pay-per-click used to be the ultimate way for startups or small businesses to get some attention when search engine optimization kicked in. Still, it’s getting less and less of an option, especially when not all user clicks convert into sales.

2. An increasing number of competitors 

All over the board, the number of more and more retailers online is increasing, making it hard to compete for your entrepreneurs. Some of them (ex: Amazon) are merely moving ahead of other smaller retailers, thereby leaving no scope for them to make money. It means that for the conversion of the page visitors into customers, one needs to have a website that is easily accessible by the users and automatically channels the visitors towards responding to CTAs (Call-to-action). It merely means making purchases or buying products and services related to your brand. The more counterparts are there, the more pro-active one needs to be. Conversion rate optimization has the benefit of enabling a marketer to compete with colleagues.

3. Rising digital marketing cost

It is just not about the pay per click that is witnessing a spike. The trends of all digital marketing are changing their demographics with each passing day. To experience growth and success, you cannot rely on the tactics or cost of digital marketing that prevailed a few months back. The entire point of marketing is to bring users towards your online business. It can be done by improving the number of page visitors who make purchases-increasing the conversion rate; you can fight the rising cost of digital marketing.

4. Influence of social media marketing 

Social media such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest are commendable spots for marketing, connecting with startups and existing customers, and rising authority and building brand loyalty among the target audiences. Social media has improved the number of page views, but it has also brought about the environment of a shorter customer attention span. That means that an entrepreneur needs to be efficient enough to capture and influence customer interest once he has it. Having a product or service listed on the site isn’t enough anymore. One needs to distinguish yourself from the counterparts that will require you to have your unique strategy tied to your offerings.

5. Getting user engagement is a challenge. 

There are plenty of psychological studies that have proven that the rising generation of customers has short attention spans than their forerunners. It means that if the average consumer cannot quickly find out about his needs or requirements, they do not have the attention span of working around and giving the website more of their effort. Instead, they will go with a site that more readily offers them what they want, even if it is at a higher cost. Conversion rate optimization fights this mentality. Online retailers will enhance the chances of getting the shopper’s attention with CRO.

Future of Ecommerce

By 2023, tech experts project that online purchases will increase from 14.1% to 22% in total. These projections are highly optimistic, and they depict that ecommerce, as a business, is yet to reach its prospective statistics. Mobile ecommerce sales are also projected to rise, estimated to reach almost 2.91 trillion in 2020. And in 20 years from now, the statistics depict that by 2040, more than 95 percent of all online purchases will be through ecommerce that is good for thought for all business entrepreneurs. To make sure the online business dreams and goals come true.

Conclusion 

The speed of an eCommerce web page plays a crucial role in its conversion rate. Making an attractive website or offering deals work if the web page is fast enough to show them. As per the data, there are more than $18 billion worth shopping carts abandoned annually for eCommerce websites, 18 percent of those abandoned carts are due to the slow page-load time. An eCommerce web page with a speed of 3 seconds or more has 22% fewer conversions than an eCommerce web page that loads in one second. An entrepreneur needs or an expert marketer needs to understand that users don’t like to wait these days. The average online consumer is tremendously impatient and that they prefer real-time experience. An ecommerce website that shows up in less than 3 seconds attracts not only the visitor but also encourages his or her purchasing actions and decision-making process.