eCommerce Site Speed...

I have recently launched my social shopping eCommerce store etoot.com. It is very very slow to render. It takes almost 18 to 20 seconds in loading completely. And I am quite sure that this slow loading kills almost 50% of conversions. So how can I improve my site loading speed.

Help will be highly appreciated.

Thanks in an anticipation.

Regards,
Etoot

 

Who is your web host? Are you on one of those "unlimited" plans? Are you on shared hosting? Your IP comes up as "UnifiedLayer", which I can find no real information on other than it may or may not be associated with EIG (it is located in Provo, Utah, so it very well may be EIG). You are the second person I have run across recently complaining of slow load time with an IP address that resolves to UnifiedLayer.

Also, which e-commerce script/software are you running? Any type of e-commerce application is going to be relatively slow as there are many thousands of lines of code to execute and lots of database queries to be performed with each page load. However, 18 to 20 seconds is too long regardless. 7 seconds would be more acceptable, but it would be nice to go lower than that.

I ran a check on tools.pingdom.com and discovered why your site takes so long to load. Your home page has 155 requests for various files. No page is going to load fast with that many requests. The test results showed your home page had a "wait time" (waiting for delivery of content to begin) of 2.05 seconds at almost 3 AM Eastern Standard Time (when internet traffic is low in America). That is a little slow. But it is not too bad. Your real problem is the large number of file requests you have. The total load time at this early morning hour was 6.68 seconds. Not fast, but considering how bulky your page is, not all that bad.

Yes, a slow load time will reduce sales. If possible, try reducing the number of file requests your page make. Also, check tools.pingdom.com and run a test during the daytime hours. It could be a problem with your hosting, too. I can't tell at this time.

 

Hi billzo,

I highly appreciate your answer. It is very insightful regarding my site loading speed. Your "file requests" point really stuck my mind. I might also think now that this is the main cause of my slow site loading.

Keep up the good work.

thanks.

 

I would consider cleaning up the imagery on your site. Its look and feel is very cluttered.

If you ditched some of the superfluous imagery (the "Versus Competition" graphic is a huge problem in that it is a) broken, and b) doesn't make any sense...also, those very overused stock images at the bottom aren't doing you any favors in terms of load time or customer response), you'd probably see your site start to load quite a bit faster right away.

Hope this helps!

 

Hi Solid Commerce,

Appreciate your answer especially the sentence "Its look and feel is very cluttered". I will definitely try it out.

Thanks for your great help!

Regards,
Etoot.com

 

Hey, you know it! I've seen you building this project for the last SEVERAL months, both here and on Warrior Forum.

It's really, really neat to see the progress you're making, and I'm totally honored to get to help you shape this project of yours.

Upwards and onwards! Let me know when you've made changes; I'd love to see what you're working with in your next iteration.

 

Hi Solid Commerce,

Thanks for your enthusiasm and kind words regarding my project. I will definitely let you know when the new changes happen.

Regards,
etoot.com

 

Took 3.3 seconds for me on a 50mbps connection...a little slow still. Does look cluttered and the sign in pop up keeps me from getting a look at the site right away.

 

Your website only took a second to load on mine (Cox cable 25Mphs) so I think your load time isn't an issue. I would install Analytics (if it isn't installed already) and look at the Behavior Flow under Behavior so you can see where people are going to on the website, as well as which pages they are exitting. This will give you some more accurate insight on where to improve.

 

I think your website is running slow due to the source code of your website. In this case, you can only upgrade the host

 

Check your home page size and check your host speed over internet. If your site page has overweight then it takes a time to load, so take care on design home page.