PLANIT PRESENTS

6 INGREDIENTS FOR

A SUCCESSFUL
WEBSITE OR APP
Containing 20 Digital Stats You Need to Know
 KNOW YOUR USERS
Your customers are always connected. Their lives are filled with devices designed to help
them access the digital world around them, whether at home, in the office, shopping,
commuting, relaxing or exercising.

As a digital product owner, it’s important to understand your customers’ demands, and the
implications on your brand and bottom-line if you fail to meet these demands. In a nutshell:

Expectations are high. Your web and mobile apps are expected to provide an
excellent user experience.

They must effectively deliver the information and functionality your customers need
regardless of the device, all wrapped in package that is fast, secure and user-friendly
for all customer groups.

These recent stats shed more light on the immense demands placed upon today’s
digital products.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 SECTION 1
COMPATIBILITY
Today’s connected users are a great source of opportunity for
businesses. However, the proliferation and diversification of
devices that they choose to use brings substantial challenges.
This means websites and apps must work well across a massive
range of operating systems, browsers, and screen sizes to deliver
a consistent experience that users have grown accustomed to.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
Mobile and desktop tie
for popularity
While the breakdown of users will
vary based on industry, there is no
doubt that most organisations should
pay equal attention to the experience
provided on both desktop and mobile.
Across global web traffic, desktop
sits in the top spot at 49% with mobile
close behind at 48%.
Closely mirroring the market split
above, the most popular OS is
Windows on desktop at 38% and
Android on mobile at 37%. Over a
decade after creating the smartphone
category, iOS on Apple mobile
devices holds a respectable 14%.
PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
Extreme diversity in
screen resolutions
One may assume that the most
common screen resolution would be
Standard HD (1366x768) or 1080p/
full HD (1920x1080), however these
devices only represent 10% and 8%
of web traffic respectively. Ahead
of them, the most popular screen
resolution is 360 x 640 pixels (17%),
typical among mobile devices.
The device landscape now is more
diverse now than it was five or more
years ago. Supporting the then
leading screen resolutions may have
been enough to cover the majority of
users, but nowadays the distinction
isn’t as clear and requires a more
platform agnostic approach.
Chrome is the most
popular web browser
As the clear market leader at 63%,
organisations would be wise to focus
the majority of their website testing on
Google’s Chrome browser.
Still, it is critical to ensure that
compatibility extends to the other
popular browsers. That includes
Apple’s Safari, in second spot at 16%,
which is the default browser on iOS
and OS X devices. Mozilla’s Firefox
comes third at 5%, which indicates
its popularity as a desktop browser
rather than a mobile one. And, despite
its declining market share, Internet
Explorer and Microsoft Edge should
be considered, especially given their
history of quirks in resolving websites.
 SECTION 2
USABILITY + UX
A good user experience can mean the difference in a user
regularly using your site or app, or moving on to the competition.
With the proliferation of user review sites and social media, a
bad experience or unfulfilled expectation can lead to reputational
damage.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 You have around 10 seconds to impress a user

First impressions last. You only have ten seconds to convince users to keep browsing
your site and potentially convert into a customer.

75% of people base a company’s credibility by how their website looks, feels, and
responds. When on the site, 86% of users want clear and immediate information about
products and services. The content needs to be up-to-date, otherwise 94% won’t trust
you and will look for a more trustworthy alternative.

Easy navigation is the most useful website feature

If your visitors are faced with a complex layout with multiple ads, excessive scrolling,
or unintuitive menus, it’s likely they won’t stay for long. Conversely, a streamlined,
user-friendly design has the potential to raise user conversion rates up to 400%.

One increasingly common tactic for engaging users is by delivering a personalised

experience that takes into account the preference of users, and what they find
most useful.

88% are less likely to return after a bad experience

With so much choice available to today’s consumers, they have a low threshold for
bad online interactions. If a site has poor design or runs slow, the impression will last
and lead them to look for an alternative.

Site visitors also don’t have patience for delays during peak traffic times. The same
study found that more than 75% would leave for a competitor’s site rather than persist
with their existing session.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 SECTION 3
ACCESSIBILITY
15% of the world’s population, or 1 billion people, experience
some form of disability, whether visual, hearing, physical or
cognitive. By embracing accessible design, you can deliver a
highly engaging and inclusive experience to all users, thereby
increasing your potential reach, establishing new brand
advocates and preventing risk of legal action.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
Only 0.02% pages are
accessibility error-free
Many digital platforms still do not
conform with the Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
According to research conducted by
Tenon, on average 279 A level and
106 AA level accessibility errors can
be found on a page.
Tenon also found that only
0.02% of pages are free from
WCAG conformance errors when
parsed through an automated
accessibility testing tool. This figure
is compounded when you consider
that automated accessibility tools
fail to discover all issues, some of
which can only be identified by expert
accessibility testers and users with
accessibility requirements.
PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
88% of screen reader
usage is now on mobile
The uptake in mobile device usage
amongst users with accessibility
requirements has exploded over the
past decade. This is particularly with
the introduction of native accessibility
tools in iOS, Android and Windows over
a decade ago. Today, 88% of screen
reader usage is now on mobile devices.
This highlights the importance of
not only considering accessibility
for desktop users, but mobile users
as well. What may be accessible
in a desktop environment does
not guarantee it will be on mobile
devices, thus it is important to test
the accessibility of sites and apps in a
variety of configurations to ensure all
users are catered for.
Lawsuits grew by 181%
from 2017 to 2018
Organisations that fail to meet
accessibility guidelines are at risk of
lawsuits and litigation. The sharp rise
in lawsuits highlights the growing
importance of technology and the
Internet for disabled users.
Although the majority of the lawsuits
were for US-based companies,
other countries are not exempt
from accessibility requirements.
Governments in Canada and Europe,
including the UK, are currently
updating their digital accessibility
laws, which means organisations and
businesses will need to do further
work on their digital products and
services to make them accessible.
 SECTION 4
FUNCTIONALITY
Your users have high standards for the digital platforms with
which they interact. If they encounter features that aren’t user-
friendly or are broken, they will quickly jump ship and look
elsewhere.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 Failures cause US$1.7 trillion in lost revenue annually

The most common culprits behind these costly failures were software bugs (55%),
followed by security vulnerabilities (22%) and usability glitches (9%), impacting
businesses, users, time and assets.

These failures are very much avoidable. Through proper testing, you can mitigate the
risk of losing revenue and focus on delivering features that delight, setting you apart
from your competition.

78% of mobile purchases are incomplete

Cart abandonment is a challenge for any ecommerce site. On mobile, there is a

greater propensity for a cart to be abandoned, due to a lack of optimisation for the
platform’s unique characteristics and users’ growing expectations.

22% of abandoned mobile purchases are due to technical issues. That means that
almost a quarter of sales could have transacted successfully if the technical side of
the online shopping experience was trouble-free.

15% of pages have broken links or missing images

If your website contains broken links or missing images, you may be turning away
users and causing them to question their trust in your brand. This may mean loss of
sales both now and in the future.

The impact can reach beyond just those users directly impacted by these defects.
Search engines check if a site has fully working links, and penalises the rank of those
that don’t, meaning competing sites with working links get ranked higher and are
seen by more visitors.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 SECTION 5
PERFORMANCE
Users want their digital experience to be fast, reliable, and
responsive. With so many alternatives just a click away, failing to
deliver on this promise means potentially losing your audience to
the competition.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
53% leave if it takes
3+ seconds to load
Mobile users want their online
experience to be fast and responsive.
However, with a typical mobile site
taking 8 or more seconds to load, it
is clear that many organisations are
limiting the potential of their websites
and losing opportunities.
Ideally, mobile sites should aim to
load in 2 seconds. By uncovering
optimisations in both the hardware
and code powering the website, it’s
entirely possible to reduce load times
and bring the mobile experience
closer to the speed users are
expecting.
PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
90% stop using an app
due to performance
People expect their apps to be simple
and fast to use. They don’t want to
encounter any obstacles whenever
they perform a simple task.
Slow and awkward app interactions
only lead to user frustration. When
that happens, they will stop using
the app and look for a more reliable
alternative.
100 millisecond delay =
7% reduced conversion
Not only is page speed linked to lost
visitors, but potentially also revenue.
The same research found that one
whole second decreases conversion
rates by as much as 70%.
The websites that are fast and
responsive are the ones that have
recognised this. If they were able to
uncover performance improvements
to deliver a quicker experience, then
others can do the same to realise the
same or better conversion rates.
 SECTION 6
SECURITY
The risks associated with vulnerabilities in today’s systems are
substantial. As more company apps and data move to the Cloud,
adequate security measures are critical for protecting these
valuable assets. With the average cost of a breach coming in
at US$3.92 million, security is an attribute few businesses can
afford to overlook.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 92% of web applications have security flaws

At that rate, the chances are that you’re at risk. Many of these vulnerabilities have
been around for a long time, including form inputs that do not validate or sanitise, web
server misconfiguration, and general design flaws.

The same research has found that 16% of US companies have two or more outdated
or vulnerable versions of external web applications. If unaddressed, these web
applications can easily become targets for exploitation by hackers.

A typical web app contains 33 vulnerabilities

Six of these issues are classified as high severity. Concerningly, the average number
of critical vulnerabilities per web application is growing, increasing by 3 times
compared to 2017.

In 19% of cases, a hacker is able to exploit the vulnerability to take control of the web
app. With sufficient access, the hacker is able to penetrate further into the corporate
network to access and steal more sensitive information. With severe penalties in place
and strong risks of lawsuits, it makes strong financial sense to prevent these types of
intrusions rather than to deal with the aftermath.

81% will uninstall an app because of security issues

Mobile users are becoming more careful about the security of online shopping and
social networking apps, as well as payment portals. Accidental in-app purchases are
also a growing concern, such as apps aimed for kids.

The days of users trading their privacy concerns in order to download an app for free
are gone. If your app doesn’t meet modern privacy and security expectations, users
will likely elect for another option.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 STAY AHEAD IN
THE DIGITAL AGE
It’s clear that the challenges faced as an owner or manager of a digital product are
significant. To succeed in today’s competitive landscape, your web and mobile apps must
meet business goals and demands around speed to market. At the same time, they need
to deliver a great experience that keeps users coming back.

QUALITY BEGINS EARLY

Fixing a faulty site or app after the fact is time consuming and costly. We’ve seen cases
where it has cost 100 times more to rectify the issue than it would have taken to avoid it in
the first place.

By “shifting left” to build quality in and test earlier, you can resolve problems before users
are exposed to them. Doing so can help reduce time spent in development and customer
support. You can also improve your conversion rates, avoid potential damage to your
brand, and safeguard against expensive security breaches.

Talk to us for more advice on how to navigate these digital challenges and deliver quality
apps that your customers will love.

PLANIT PRESENTS | Top and trending digital stats you must know
 Compatibility
Accessibilit y Performance

Usability FORM Y Security

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Automation Virtualization

Intelligenc e DevOps

Agility

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