The Importance of Optimizing Website Images

<p>The speed that your radio station website loads matters – maybe more than you realize. &nbsp;Overall, we have grown increasingly impatient with the amount of time we’re willing to wait for things to load. In fact, many studies show that about forty percent of people will click off a website if it takes longer than three seconds to load. This can have real, tangible impacts on any business whose website is underperforming in the speed department.</p> <p>There are many different factors that can affect your site speed like your hosting plan and the code that makes up your website. Optimizing these factors is often too technical and daunting for the average person. However, image size can play a major role in website speed, and just about anyone can quickly learn how to optimize images for their website.</p> <p><strong>What Image Size and Dimensions Are Best?</strong></p> <p>The first step in optimization is bringing the image down to the proper dimensions. Some cropping may be required to get the image to the proper size that your website requires.</p> <p>It’s likely that your content manager knows the proper sizes that all images should be. This should be passed down and followed by everyone who creates content for the website.</p> <p><strong>Which Image Format is Best?</strong></p> <p>Choosing the best image file format depends on the type of image and your end goal.</p> <p>Here is the best application for each image format:</p> <p><strong>JPG: </strong>Best overall use and widely accepted but optimize them to their smallest file size without sacrificing quality. Does NOT support transparency.</p> <p><strong>PNG: </strong>Typically, file sizes are 2-3 times larger than JPG files. A major plus is that they support transparency, so they should be reserved for that use.</p> <p><strong>GIF: </strong>Small file size due to limited color palate. GIF file support animation. However, animation of GIF files has been disabled in some modern browsers and shown with a play button.</p> <p><strong>SVG:</strong> SVG is a vec