Optimised, valuable content that doesn’t overwhelm a website setup, choosing the best plugins for the user experience, hosting on a green provider utilising renewable energy and organisations that walk the talk on sustainability – even online!
Everything we use on the internet has an environmental footprint. Like in other industries, carbon emissions are a key consideration for an increasing number of organisations looking at their ESG targets.
Luckily for those organisations, a website’s footprint can be reduced!
In this blog post, we’re highlighting our energy-saving tips that all website owners should be implementing if they want to improve their online emissions.
Sustainable website design is something Beech take pride in, as we strive to improve our impact on the climate. Read more about our sustainability mission here.
Prioritise the most valuable content
Is there content on your website that’s not relevant anymore?
It could be that some services are no longer applicable, or there are products hidden you just don’t sell anymore. There’s also the possibility that a business’s mission has changed over time and the text content could do with a refresh.
With any website, updating our content regularly is key. It’s what our target audience sees when they visit us online, and it’s how search engines learn more about us.
What you may not know, is that it can also benefit the planet.
Without optimising our content, we risk overflowing pages with outdated information that overwhelms our visitors and uses valuable server space. The more content a website must load, the harder the server must work. This requires vast amounts of energy, which contributes to the overall emissions of a website.
By removing outdated, irrelevant content, we can improve website search engine optimisation (SEO), enhance user experience (UX), and reduce server load. A smaller website with less content will load faster for our visitors and in turn, be more sustainable.
To find out more about how your website experience feels to users, request a free website healthcheck from our team today.
Remove unnecessary plugins
Do you really need that plugin slowing down each page?
Plugins are a handy component to add to any website. They’re designed to extend the capabilities of a website, influencing design and adding features and functionality that may not have been possible before.
They’re used commonly on WordPress websites and are popular with many website developers. But here’s our top tip…
Don’t use too many!
Plugins can affect a website’s carbon emissions by adding unnecessary weight to each page. Like our content, increased weight caused by plugins then leads to further energy consumption, which has a negative impact on our website emissions.
When adding plugins to a website, look for the following:
- How reliable is the source or developer of the plugin?
- Does it work with the latest version of WordPress?
- Is there a good support team to help in the event of a problem?
- Is it well-coded and efficient?
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All these considerations will help to determine the quality of the plugins we include on a website. By reducing the number of unnecessary plugins that could be doing more harm than good, we can rely on trusted, well-produced plugins that have a much more minimal impact.
Choose the best website host
Where your website lives on the internet has a huge impact on how sustainable it is.
Hint – it’s not actually stored in a cloud!
Choosing the right place to host your website is one of the simplest ways to make it more sustainable. Many providers are already switching their energy and server providers, to help contribute to a more sustainable future online. Some of the most well-known providers, including Amazon and Google, are confirmed as green providers, according to the Green Web Foundation directory.
If you’re thinking of switching to a greener host, here’s what to look out for:
- Are they energy efficient?
- Is the server using renewable energy resources?
- Do they implement eco-friendly practices within their organisation?
- Is their sustainability policy accessible to website visitors?
Opting for a green host not only reduces your website’s environmental impact but also aligns with responsible business practices, appealing to a climate-conscious audience. If your website walks the talk on sustainability, from the hosting down to the content, visitors will be more confident in your ability to support your business values, adding trust and credibility to your brand as well as increasing conversions.
If you’re unsure if your hosting provider is running on green energy, check out the Green Web Foundation and test your website through their online checker.
For more information on choosing the right hosting provider, check out this previous blog on our website.
Optimise for fast performance
The average attention span of website visitors is 8 seconds, according to research by Reboot Online So a fast website is always a high priority!
But high performance doesn’t just benefit the user experience, it also plays a role in how sustainable a website can be.
A slower website takes more time to load all of the elements on each page, which requires more energy from the host and more resources from a server. When we optimise a website for speed, we also help to reduce our carbon footprint from the website and its emissions.
So, what can we do to make our website perform better?
- Image Optimisation: Images are often the biggest causes of slower loading speeds. To optimise images, choose a file format that is more efficient such as .webp or .avif
- Use efficient coding: Clean and efficient code is essential for a fast website. Take a look at the website code (or ask a developer) and remove any unnecessary elements, redundancies, or outdated programming techniques
- Use lazy loading: This technique ensures that images and videos on your website only load when they become visible to the user. This reduces the initial load time of your website and saves energy
- Caching: This allows a website to store frequently accessed information for faster retrieval, which can significantly speed up page load times and reduce server load.
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With a fast, high-performance website, using techniques like those listed above, we can optimise our website for our audience, as well as for the Planet.
Greener websites benefit sales!
Being sustainable is great for the Planet, but it’s also great for business!
Improving a website’s performance, removing unnecessary content and choosing a host with sustainable values not only reduces a website’s carbon emissions, but they also increase the possibility of conversions.
Google ranks websites highly based on their performance, meaning a faster, well-optimised website is more likely to rank in search engine results. Google is also continuing to prioritise sustainability in their efforts to reach Net Zero by 2030. This suggests that the more websites focus on being sustainable, Google will further promote them to search engine users.
A sustainable website can improve your brand reputation and attract customers who share your climate-friendly values. By prioritising sustainability, you can create a positive impact on the environment and encourage growth for your business.
It’s a continuous process. By staying informed, adopting sustainable practices, and making small changes, we can reduce our impact on the environment, creating websites that are efficient, user-friendly, and reflect our brand values.
If you’d like a sustainable website for your business, we’re the developer for you! Get in touch with our team of experts today.
