Sensitivity to latency of Indian web users and website owners

Abstract

In recent times, there is lot of focus around website speed, especially in the US. In India, because of lower broadband penetration, faster web access still not in talks. The purpose of this project is to find out Indian users sensitivity towards latency in the Indian web ecosystem and the associated business impact. This research is one of the first attempts to study the Indian environment in this aspect. Latency is the most significant factor after bandwidth which impacts page load time. We conducted surveys, interviews and simulation experiments, involving users in different age group and industries to understand their browsing pattern and utility. From the survey and the browsing pattern of the users an interesting insight came out that the users do not care much for website speed while talking about latency. Whereas actually their browsing preferences reveal that they tend to prefer faster websites. A conjoint analysis was conducted to find out relative importance of factors like Website Content, Website load time, Advertisement display in the website, Website Layout and Plug-in requirements. In the analysis it was found that the users have highest importance for speed, closely followed by website layout and content. The simulation experiment reveals that Indian users browsing patterns depends more on type and quality of content if the page load time is within 10 seconds. We have proposed a couple of frameworks which will be useful to have a better understanding of website market space. The understanding will be crucial while taking decisions on website design. With the emergence of interactive web applications like online games and high definition videos which will be bandwidth hogging and latency sensitive, the website owners will have to make sure that the overall page load time and latency is within users acceptable limit. Else they will lose their users to substitutes. However it is also important not to ignore other important factors like content or website layout because users are more and more interested in a package of features than a single attribute.