‘Online grocery sites among worst performing ones’

Online grocery businesses are falling behind in performance, accessibility and the speed of their websites, says a new study, calling for more to be done to provide support to people who need home delivery services.

According to a recent analysis of all FTSE 100 and 250 homepages by an expert team at Contensis, the retail and grocery sector stands at tenth position among 15 other sectors. The findings have been published by web experts Contensis as part of new research “Big Players, Slow Web Pages“.

Media and publishing companies have the best performing websites overall. The study also found that FTSE 250 companies are doing better than their FTSE 100 counterparts, loading a whole second faster and getting better scores for accessibility too.

The full league table highlights the great disparity online, where on average, the homepages of chemicals, mining, oil and gas businesses take six seconds longer than media and publishing to load.

The best performing FTSE 100 business, Kingfisher, which owns B&Q, among other home improvement brands, had an accessibility score into the mid-nineties and a homepage load speed of just over two seconds.

“With the cost of living reaching new heights, businesses must focus on improving and maintaining their website’s performance in order to stay fighting fit,” states the report.

Richard Chivers, co-founder of content management system, Contensis, and chief executive officer of Zengenti, the software company which makes Contensis, commented, “This research shows us just how much the big players value their online presence. Industries that you’d expect to be doing really well, like retail, are not performing as you might think and are in fact in tenth position in our league table, in between telecoms and property and construction.

“I think the biggest eye-opener is that, consistently, we all need to up our game when it comes to accessibility. Retail and grocery businesses, for example, should be mindful that 22 percent of the UK population have a long-term illness, impairment or disability according to latest figures. More can be done to support these users online which would be win-win for retail businesses and their customers.”

The full league table highlights the great disparity online, where on average, the homepages of chemicals, mining, oil and gas businesses take six seconds longer than media and publishing to load.