Best Website Speed Optimization Tips and Tricks

6 Undisputable Website Optimization Tips

Now that we’ve discussed why website speed optimization is so important, let’s talk about six things you, as a non-technical site owner, can do to make sure you are running at optimal speed.

Achieve lightning-fast loading times by choosing the right host

Choosing the right web host is one of the most important factors in website speed optimization. It is also the first decision you need to make. Honestly, if your host is slow, none of the rest of these optimization tips are going to make much difference.

Choose a website theme that won’t weigh you down

If your site uses WordPress, the theme you choose for your WordPress website will have a significant impact on its speed. A well-designed and optimized theme can help improve website speed and performance, while a poorly designed theme can have the opposite effect.

All themes can stand to lose a little weight, even the best ones. So to help your site reach its maximum speed, make sure that you have SiteGround Optimizer installed and configured. As discussed above, it can really make a difference in your site’s overall speed.

When choosing a theme for your website, it’s important to consider things like code quality, graphic sizes, and support.

Code quality

A well-coded theme will be lightweight, use minimal resources, and be optimized for speed. It is important to choose a theme that is coded to the latest web standards, WordPress standards, and has been reviewed by other users. 

Graphics Sizes

All themes will let you use your graphics, however, some work with plugins to optimize graphic size, while others do not. If you choose a theme for your website that does not automatically optimize the graphic sizes for speed, all is not lost, you can install the SiteGround Optimizer plugin. It will not only optimize all of your existing images, but will automatically optimize any new graphic as you upload it.

Support and updates

A theme that is regularly updated and supported by the developer can help ensure that your website stays optimized. As technologies change, you want to make sure your theme changes with them to ensure it is always the fastest that it can be.

If you have a WordPress website, hosted with SiteGround, you benefit from their in-house WordPress Autoupdate feature, which automatically backups and upgrades your site each time there is a new WordPress version, along with all of your plugins, if you wish so. That helps you avoid vulnerabilities related to the old application, and you’re up to date with the latest security fixes.

Choosing the right theme is just one part of website optimization. You’ll still need to do things like minify code, and use caching to help improve website speed.

The theme you choose for your WordPress website can have a significant impact on website optimization. By considering the factors mentioned above, you can choose a theme that is well-designed, optimized for speed, and will provide a better user experience for your visitors.

Trim down unnecessary plugins

In the past, I’ve written about removing unused or deactivated plugins. One of the main reasons to do this is speed. The less code there is, the faster your site will run. Even disabled plugins force WordPress to decide between them at each page load. If you delete them, WordPress doesn’t need to worry about them.

Once a year – or more frequently, if possible – you should do a complete audit of the plugins installed on your site. Deactivate and delete any that are not actively being used. If you need them again later, then reinstall them later.

Remove unnecessary redirects

Redirects will affect website speed optimization.

They add an additional step to the page load process, which can increase the amount of time it takes for a page to load. This will negatively impact the user experience and website speed.

Search engines follow redirects to find the final URL of a page. When search engines crawl your website, they follow each redirect, which can slow down the crawling process and affect your website’s SEO. Additionally, redirects can cause the search engines to see the redirecting page and the final page as two different pages, which can lead to duplicate content issues and affect the website’s SEO.

Redirects can be confusing for users and will lead to a poor user experience. If a user clicks on a link that redirects them to a different page than they expected, they may become frustrated and leave the website.

Redirects can be useful in certain situations, such as when a web page has moved or is no longer available, or when you want to redirect traffic from a non-preferred domain to a preferred domain. In these cases, it’s important to use the correct type of redirects and to minimize the number of redirects used to maintain website speed and SEO.

To avoid the negative impact of redirects on website optimization, it’s important to use them sparingly and to use the correct type of redirect. Additionally, implementing a proper redirect strategy and keeping track of the redirects that are in place can help to minimize the negative impact on website optimization.

Cache your way to faster load times

Caching can have a positive impact on website optimization by improving your website’s speed and performance. Caching is the process of storing a copy of a web page or its resources, such as images or scripts. When a user visits a website, their browser can load the cached version of the page, which can reduce the amount of time it takes for the page to load.

Caching can be implemented at different levels, such as browser caching and server-side caching. Each type of caching can have a positive impact on website optimization.

Browser caching

When a user visits a website, their browser stores a copy of the web page and its resources on their device. When the user visits the website again, their browser can load the cached version of the page, which will dramatically reduce the page’s load time.

If you’re using the SiteGround Optimizer plugin for WordPress, available for free download on any hosting platform, you can use the browser caching option it provides. This feature stores the static content of your website in the users’ browsers and cache longer. If you’re a SiteGround client, this option in the plugin will be enabled by default for you.

Server-side caching

Server-side caching can reduce the amount of time it takes for a page to load by storing a copy of the page on the server. When a user visits the website, the server can deliver the cached version instead of having to regenerate it each time. This will reduce page load time.

If you’re hosted with SiteGround, you already take advantage of their powerful caching technology – SuperCacher that includes three levels of server-side caching: 

• NGINX Direct Delivery
  Caches static content like images, CSS files, JavaScript
• Dynamic Cache
  Dynamic cache caches your dynamic content and stores it in the server RAM
• Memcached
  An object caching mechanism designed to improve the connection between your application and its database

When all these three are in action, they improve your website performance up to 5 times!

Speed up your site with CDN

A good CDN, or Content Delivery Network, is a critical next step for optimizing your website’s speed. A CDN is a group of servers in different locations around the world that work together to deliver your website to users faster by delivering large files from servers near your users.

When a user visits your website, the CDN will direct them to the server that is closest to them. This can help reduce the distance between the user and the server, which will improve website speed.

CDNs also help to reduce the number of requests made to your server, which can help to improve website speed. This is because CDNs can store a copy of your website’s files, such as images and videos, and deliver them to users without having to request them from your server.

The less work your server has to do, the faster it will do the work only it can do.

Using a CDN will help to improve the website’s speed and that will create a better user experience for your visitors. It’s a great option to consider if you want to optimize your website and reach a global audience.

You can use a third-party CDN, which will take some time and extra knowledge to configure. Alternatively, you can ask your host to help you select one and then pay them to configure it. A better option is to use SiteGround’s native CDN. SiteGround has a one-click CDN that is already integrated and configured for your site. They offer the essential features free for all customers hosting websites on their platform. For those needing more, they offer a premium version for heavy international traffic websites.

Conclusion

Entire books have been written on the topic of optimizing a website’s speed. In this article, we’ve taken a look at why it’s important, discussed some tools you can use to see how fast your site is now, and then six things you can do without the help of a programmer to speed things up.

It is important that before you start tinkering with your website to optimize it, you check its speed first. Then, do one thing at a time and after each change you make, re-test. This is the only way to tell for sure that you are making things better and not worse.