The importance of page speed and why you, the developer, are now part of the UX team.

The internet is growing exponentially, and thousands of sites are built and published every day. This means that your client’s competition for visibility online grows with every hour of the day. As a developer, you’re not responsible for your client’s business model or marketing strategy. But they ordered this brand-new site from you with the aim of improving their online presence. This means you have the responsibility of giving your client the best possible chance of reaching their market online. Page speed or “site speed” is one of the most crucial things to think about when you are developing a new website today. Who doesn’t love a fast website? In the past, page speed was less relevant, a “nice to have” but not “need to have”. This is because the number of devices with internet access has increased so quickly in the last 5-8 years. At the same time, the number of new websites published has also been increasing quickly. Unfortunately, our industry hasn’t caught up quite yet.

 http://www.internetlivestats.com/total-number-of-websites/

That’s why everyone, including Google, talks so much about speed and has made it a big ranking factor, even for mobile pages. The real contest today is to get your visitor to load the site, not having the coolest or most creative site. That’s not to say the design is not important. It’s as essential as it’s always been. A/B testing is also still important. You need to collect data to find out whether, for example, a button should be green, red, or blue to get the optimal conversion rate. People are faster and pickier today when browsing online. When they click something, they want it instantly. That’s why you, as the developer, are now part of the UX team. The first thing a visitor (ourselves included) will complain about in a website is slow loading speed. Fast loading speed is not a luxury anymore. Today, it’s expected.

It’s not mobile first, it’s speed first!