How to Optimize your Website in the Age of Instant Gratification
July 02, 2018
As people involve more and more websites in their everyday lives, the time they spend on each one begins to decrease more and more. Researches recently found that adults’ attention spans have dropped to eight seconds on average, which means they will spend less time on a website before moving to the next one. This can be a problem for business owners, many of whom rely on promoting their business through their website. Website designers must adapt to this new era of instant gratification, and these tips will help you make a website that will grab users immediately.
1. Bite-sized content
There are many elements that make up an effective website, but one of the most important one is using ‘snackable’ content. Snackable content means bite-sized chunks of information that gives a user everything they need to know about a website immediately. Don’t fill your website with walls of text, especially on the homepage. A successful piece of snackable content will make a visitor decide that a website is worth their time, and will begin to explore other content. One example of this is Microsoft’s homepage, which offers many of their services on the very first page, sharing one concise line of text explaining what each is and using larger pictures that catches one’s attention. An added bonus of concise content is that it’s easier to share on SOCial media to increase brand awareness.
2. Loading time
When designing a website made to grab visitor’s attentions, the internal parts of the website is just as important as the external. It is essential that a website is designed so it can load as quickly as possible. The same research from before found a user will likely click away from a website if it takes more than three seconds to load. To decrease loading times, it helps to decrease the number of high-resolution photos and videos, at least on the homepage. Also implement mobile-friendly image formats for users that use mobile devices and networks. Another popular solution for website creators is Google Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP). AMP will create a mobile-optimized version of a website so images and videos render quickly.
3. Personalization
A huge factor in someone’s likelihood of using a website is if the user feels that the website is to some degree tailored just for them. People appreciate when a website provides the content they desire upfront, to avoid having to dig through the site. An example of this is Netflix, which uses analytics to recommend movies and TV shows based on a user’s viewing history. Anyone can utilize Google Analytics to better understand the people visiting their website, and use this information to alter their website accordingly.
If you want to increase customer engagement and page visits, make sure you’re doing all these things with your website. Web trends can also change at any moment, so stay tuned to our blog to know about the latest developments.
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