Proof that Website Performance Can Cost You Customers and Money

In the past, we here at Alertra have warned our readers that slow website performance can lead to lost customers and profit. That is why we notify our clients when their sites are suffering performance issues or outages. Now there is proof that we were right. Slow website performance can indeed result in lost customers. In a recent report issued by the National Retail Federation, it was stated that 67 percent of consumers will abandon a website if the site is too slow.

How Slow is Too Slow?

So just how slow is too slow? According to KISSMetrics, nearly half of all online consumers will abandon their shopping cart if there is even just a three-second delay on the website they are visiting. A mere three seconds can cost you a sale. When you take this into consideration, it becomes very apparent that website performance can be just as crucial as website uptime.

How Much is Your Site’s Performance Costing You?

If you’re receiving notifications from Alertra regarding outages and performance issues, you need to take measures to correct the problem. If your website is tied directly to your company’s revenue, those measures need to be taken immediately. How much money downtime and performance issues actually cost you will depend on the revenue of your site. For example, the 2-hour outage that Amazon.com experienced in 2008 cost the company a whopping $31,000 per minute. However, each dollar of revenue lost is a dollar too much. Especially when measures can be taken to prevent performance issues and downtime and address downtime when it does occur.

Don’t Let Your Site’s Performance Affect Your Company’s Profits

There is a valuable lesson to be learned here. A mere three second delay can cost you thousands of dollars in lost sales. As a website operator, not only do you need to make sure your site is up and running, you need to make sure it’s up and running properly. Delays are just as unacceptable as downtime itself. If your site is experiencing delays, you are losing customers. There is no question about it. Lost customers equate to lost sales which equate to lost revenue. Your goal is to maximize your revenue. To do this, you have to make sure your site is running and that it is running like a well-oiled machine.

In the past weeks we’ve made numerous posts about how you can optimize your site for better performance. These latest reports are proof that it’s time to start taking this advice seriously. If you have yet to follow the advice we have given regarding the optimization of your site for performance and maintaining maximum uptime, now is the time to implement the tools and strategies that are at your disposal. Your bottom line will thank you for it.