A slow site loses visitors before they see anything. The good news is that most small business sites are slow for the same few reasons, and most of them are easy to fix.
What fast means
Aim for the main content to appear within about two and a half seconds on a phone. Google's Core Web Vitals use that figure for Largest Contentful Paint, and it is a useful target for anyone.
How to check yours
Run your homepage and your busiest service page through Google's free PageSpeed Insights. Look at the mobile result first; that is how most of your visitors arrive.
The usual culprits
Oversized photos are the most common cause by far, followed by too many apps or scripts, auto-playing video, and heavy fonts. Each one is fixable without a redesign.
- Resize photos to the size they display
- Remove apps and scripts you no longer use
- Replace auto-play video with a still image
- Limit fonts to two families
When to get help
If the easy fixes do not move the score, the problem is usually the theme or platform setup. That is the point to bring in a developer for a few hours rather than starting over.
Check your speed after any big change to the site. It is much easier to catch a slow page the week it appears.