How to Make Sure a Website Is Optimized for Fast Loading Times
When managing a website, one of the most important tasks is speed optimization. When a site takes more than five seconds to load, people start to get antsy. They might even give up and navigate away. Thankfully, there are some well-known tactics to prevent and improve slow loading times.
Thanks to all the amazing developers out there, most of the things on the list can be achieved with plugins. Most of these plugins are created for WordPress but if you are using other website tools, I’m sure there are plenty of solutions for those as well.
Let’s take a look at some of the most important speed optimization tactics.
Rely on your hosting
Nowadays, good quality hosting services include optimization services. For example, the Siteground account for my blog offers lots of options. They cover things like great server response time, browser caching, minimization of HTTP requests, controlled loading for CSS and javascript.
All these things can also be done one by one, so let’s see what each one is about.
Server Response Time
When someone enters the URL of your site into Google, DNS servers will look up the IP address associated with it. It’s like finding your site in a gigantic index and then serving it up to the user. This needs to be done fast! The time it takes for your IP address to be found and your site to load depends on your DNS server. This is such an integral part of hosting that pretty much any hosting service includes it. But, if you have a really inexpensive hosting service, they are for sure using a slower DNS server.
Browser Caching
The first time someone visits your site, a whole bunch of data and information is downloaded onto their computer. That way, the next time they visit, the site loads much faster than before. Enabling browser caching for your site helps both new and repeat visitors see your content quicker. There are some plugins available for this service, like W3 Total Cache and WP Rocket.
Minimization of HTTP requests
HTTP requests control the loading of things like the stylesheets and scripts. When there are too many of these, especially on the header, the rest of the site won’t load until the header does. Minimizing HTTP requests can be managed by shrinking image sizes, and combining requests for the navigation bar. WP Rocket can also help with this part of speed optimization.
Controlled loading of CSS and javascript
CSS and javascript are a big part of the styling of your site. These code snippets can get really busy and crowded, especially if your site is a bit out of the box. If you don’t double check the way all these snippets load, your site will load way too slow. Yes, WP Rocket can also handle this.
Compress images
You can minimize images before uploading them on to your site or optimize them with a plugin afterward. Anything over 1MB is already too big. You can use apps like tinyPNG or tinyJPG to compress your images in a way that won’t lower their visual quality too much. A plugin like Imagify can compress all the images which are already on your site and all the ones you upload after.
Embed videos or optimize them
If you need to include video in your site, don’t just upload a 120MB file. This will destroy your page loading time. If the video is short, as in under 30 seconds, you can optimize it with an app like HandBrake. If it doesn’t need to have audio, you can strip it from the video to make it load faster. For longer videos, it’s best to upload them to YouTube or Vimeo first and then embed onto your site.
Avoid too many redirects
When you change the URL or permalink of any page or blog post on your site, it will need to have a redirect to it. Why? Imagine all the social media posts or shares with the old URL out there! The problem is that when there are too many redirects, it slows your site down. Avoid changing URLs and permalinks. Also, consider adding a branded 404 page for when some broken links escape your eagle eyes.
Don’t make the homepage too big
Most people will arrive at your site through the homepage. If your homepage is way too heavy, with large unoptimized images and videos, it will destroy your user’s patience. Make your main homepage light, optimize everything, embed videos, and combine the CSS snippets for the animations.
Conclusion
Unless you are a master web developer with years of code and tech experience, do yourself a favor and get the better hosting and optimization apps. You want users to be amazed at how fast your site loads, not leave them waiting in their seat.
