Website Performance Audit - Why is it necessary?

With the rapid development in technology, a high-quality website of today has all the bells and whistles that might become outdated or even obsolete in the future. Thus, it is paramount to run regular checkups on the working of your website and keep the system updated - as per the changes in platforms or environments your site runs upon.

Conducting a website performance check is even more important for a company that uses the website to generate business.

Would you like to have SoftNEP which is one of the best software development company in Nepal perform a website performance test for you? Let us know!

With each passing day, we rely more and more on the ubiquitous online means of communication - including but not limited to buying and selling, entertainment, information gathering, gaming, conducting business, etc. Whatever the objective of your website, if you depend on your website for your livelihood or business growth or even brand awareness - you cannot take the risk of running your business on an outdated and vulnerable system.

Now, let's get personal for a while, and talk about what we - as a professional web design and development company - consider important qualities in websites today. In this mobile world, the answer to that question is simple. It is ‘Site Responsiveness’. 5-10 years ago, making a site responsive would not have been a priority for us. However, things have changed, and now making sites responsive is one of our primary focuses. Adapting to the ever-changing industry is necessary for a business to survive. 

‘Nokia’ - a Finnish Company, which pioneered the advancement of mobile phones and dominated the global market during the 1990s - failed to adapt when iPhone and Android phones were launched in late 2000, drastically changing the industry. By 2012, the mobile phone market was dominated by iPhones and Android phones. While new competitors joined the market, Nokia focused more on cutting costs rather than the development of new products and adapting - which eventually crippled the company. Today, the story of Nokia is viewed as a missed opportunity, and how it is important to change with the tides of technological advancement. 

The point behind these anecdotes is simple, businesses have to adapt to progress.  Having a website does not cut it anymore. The site not only has to perform flawlessly across various devices, but it also has to be quick, authentic, and have engaging content.  As the owner of the site, it is your responsibility to keep track of all these various aspects of your page. As this is a very significant matter, it is advised to seek the help of professionals if you are unable to audit the site yourself.

Website Performance Test Metrics

There are several various factors that come into play when maintaining a website’s standards. Some of the website performance metrics, we will be discussing in this article are listed henceforth:

1. Responsiveness

Responsiveness is a primary feature any business website should possess. In a generation where sites are primarily viewed on mobile phones, you can’t expect your unresponsive website to outperform a competitor’s responsive website.

Furthermore, if you are concerned about your SEO (Search Engine Optimization) ranking, Google  - the world’s most widely used search engine - has made it mandatory for sites to be responsive to be considered for a ranking within its system. The bottom line is, a responsive site is a necessity for you to compete in today’s tech-savvy market. 

2. Site Load Speed

According to Neil Patel, a 1-second delay in page response can result in up to a 7% decrease in sales and conversion.

Site Load Speed is another important factor, for your website to be considered successful. A website that loads faster than its competitors has more chance of getting conversions.

What good will have great content on your site to keep your audience engaged to do,  when the load time of your site is higher than your competitors? The audience will lose interest in what you have to offer,  costing you conversion. Google found 53% of mobile visits ended if a page took longer than 3 seconds to load.

3. Robots Filter Check

It is safe to say that competition is thick and growing thicker over the internet. In such high competition, you can expect some hooligan competitors to send a bot attack to overload and crash your server. Bot attacks are of different types and while it may not be possible to stop all of them, you can stop some of them. Applying a bot filter in contact forms is a fine example to stop bots from filling your inbox with spam emails.

4. Backlinks Check

Backlinks or Referrals check is a less popular however an important website performance metric. More backlinks mean more visitors which ultimately leads to more sales.

You could be getting spam traffic via Referrals or being mentioned in toxic sites that can tarnish the reputation of your website or company as a whole. Spam visitors from such sites cause unclear data for you and raise your bounce rates. High bounce rates are certainly not good for the performance of your website.

5. Domain or URL Test (Canonical and SEO-friendly test)

Domain and URL should be on the same page as the company’s objectives. A user might not read the whole URL but Search Engines do. If you are looking to grow your business via search engines, you cannot rule out focusing on URLs.

Even when you’re not focusing on search engines, it is a good practice to maintain neat and to-the-point URLs.