5 quick tips to make your beauty business website more sustainable

When you consider the impact you make as a beauty business, what comes to mind? The waste you create and the way you produce energy may be at the forefront, but have you thought about the effect of your business website?

Internet use accounts for roughly 3.7% of global greenhouse gas emissions – similar to the emissions of the global airline industry, and this figure is predicted to double within the next four years. This is because every time a website is loaded, CO² is produced.

However there are simple changes that can be made to websites to make them more sustainable and energy efficient. Take a look at our five top tips below:

1. Reduce your images and videos

High-resolution images and videos may look great but they can be directly linked to a longer load time and therefore more energy being consumed. Compressing or reducing the resolution and file size of images and videos is quick and easy, and there are tonnes of websites that will do it for you for free.

2. Improve your site navigation

If your business website is confusing, users will either spend more time clicking on different pages, adding to CO² emissions each time they do, or they will get frustrated and leave your website. The best choice for the environment and for you is to make your website easy to navigate. Plus, studies show that people prefer less complicated websites!

3. Improve your SEO

SEO, or search engine optimisation, relates to how findable your website is on a search engine. Improving this will help reduce the number of searches and sites being loaded by users and will save energy. Making your website visually easy on the eye and mobile-friendly (60% of Google searches are carried out on mobile), as well as prioritising key information that users want to see, will all improve your SEO.

4. Carry out a website spring clean

By deleting any parts of your website that are irrelevant or that you and your clients don’t use, less energy will be used. Even removing broken likes and unused media can make a huge difference!

5. Choose a green web host

A website host owns the data centre in which your website is contained. Therefore, how they source their energy directly impacts the energy efficiency of your website. Do your research to find companies that use renewable energy and other environmentally conscious initiatives.