The real cost of a slow website (with the math to prove it)

There's a well-known statistic that a one-second delay in load time can cost a meaningful percentage of conversions. What's less discussed is how to actually calculate that cost for your own site, rather than quoting an average from someone else's traffic.

Start with your current conversion rate and average order or deal value, then benchmark your load time against the 2–3 second range where drop-off accelerates sharply. The gap between your current time and that threshold, multiplied against your traffic volume, gives a rough monthly cost estimate that's usually uncomfortable to look at.

The fix is rarely one big rewrite — it's usually death by a thousand unoptimized images and unnecessary third-party scripts. Audit those two things first before assuming you need a full platform migration.