If a page takes longer than three seconds to load, over a quarter of users click away. According to Google, the probability of a bounce rises by 32% at 1–3 seconds, 90% at 1–5 seconds and 123% at 1–10 seconds.
Background
A poorly coded custom PHP website belonging to a renowned member of the Supreme Court Bar Association and author of 12 books on labour law. The site loaded ten times slower than a normal website, hurting conversion, search visibility and usability.
What was done
- Minimised HTML, CSS and JavaScript — removing unwanted code and files.
- Compressed site files with Gzip.
- Enabled browser caching so repeat visits don’t reload everything.
- Reduced the number of redirects.
- Optimised graphics for good quality at a low file size.

Before — grade E, 47% performance

After — grade A, 99% performance, LCP 0.8 s
Outcome
The client found me through a search engine. After an hour-long discussion, the website was loading within three seconds the very next day — with a GTmetrix score of 95+ and a Google PageSpeed score of 85+.