When it comes to creating a website, many business owners think about aspects such as aesthetics, content, and features provided. There’s no argument that these are essential for proper website functioning, but there’s one more thing that visitors care for even more: website speed. In fact, around 40% of your visitors will bounce back from your website if the page takes more than three seconds to load. You may have the greatest content, but the slow speed has made you lose almost half of your potential clients.
To prevent these types of frustrations, your website management strategy should involve keeping your loading time at an appropriate level. There are several ways that you can do so, but once you understand the triggers that cause the slow speed, you should be able to prevent them in the future. In this article, you can find out more about the best ways to make your website faster and more efficient!
What Causes a Slow Website?
Slow websites can happen due to various reasons and it is often a combination of elements rather than just one factor. For the most part, it happens because you have a superfluous code that brings no value other than to make it look good. Loads of high-resolution images add more strain to the loading time as well, along with excess plugins that don’t serve a real purpose.
Since fast-loading websites can positively impact your website, it’s best to focus on minimalist necessities. This can reduce bounce rate while leaving a good impression on your audience, especially as 83% of customers now expect businesses to respond faster than before.
How to Speed Up Your Website
Increasing your website’s loading speed involves a series of technical steps that you should regularly go for. You aren’t necessarily cutting from the content itself, but changing the way that information is delivered. Here are a few steps to keep in mind:
Reduce Redirects
Redirects happen when you click on a link only to get automatically sent to a different one. This usually happens when changes are made to a website, and redirects are a quick solution to make your site functional when you go through rebranding.
With that said, these redirects take a longer time to load, as they add extra HTTP requests when a click is made. You might want to go through your website links and fix broken or indirect links. If you posted guest posts, it’s a good idea to track them down and fix the links.
Remove Unnecessary Coding
Usually, when you have a JavaScript file that hasn’t been processed or updated in a while, it can have quite a few dead code sections. You have to be careful when removing these bits of code, though, as incorrect removal could end up breaking your entire site.
If you are a coding expert, you could try your hand at this yourself and remove the unnecessary sections to improve speed. If you aren’t, however, consider calling an expert in, as even a wrongfully removed bracket could cause everything to come crashing.
Minify HTML, JavaScript, and CSS
Once you take out the dead sections of the code, you should put your focus on the ones that aren’t exactly damaging but aren’t very useful either. This could include comments, spaces, and lines that you probably put there to look nice, but do nothing except weigh down your speed.
By minifying, you can reduce the file size along with the bandwidth ultimately improving the loading speed of your website. You can get a coding pro to help with this too, but there are also plenty of minification tools out there. Many of these are equipped with automation features that minifies before deploying.
Reduce the Size of Images
Websites that have images are 94% more likely to get views and conversions compared to those that don’t. The better the quality of the image, the more your audience will likely resonate with your content. The problem is that many don’t realize a high-quality image doesn’t have to be high-resolution. This causes them to clutter their web page with heavy scripts that slow the loading speed.
A good way to prevent that is to compress the image before putting it on your website. Sometimes, all it takes is a format change to make everything fit nicely, without taking too much space. JPG files are great when you want a casual small file that maintains quality, but if you need transparency, PNG might be the better choice.
Enable Browser Caching
Browser caching can be useful as it stores certain bits such as JavaScript, CSS, and images on the file of the user’s computer. It won’t do as much for the first visit, but when they come back on your website or specific pages, it significantly speeds up the website speed.
Make sure to set up effective expiration dates for these caches. For instance, if you update your content often, shorter timeframes are generally a good choice. That said, if you don’t mess with it too often, you can choose longer expiration times instead.
Optimize the Server Performance
The server you keep the website on plays a very important role in its speed. One thing to remember is that the greater the distance between the server location and the requesting device, the more it will take to load.
A good idea would be to choose a server that is suitable for your demographics, but you can take a few more steps to improve its efficiency. You can also use a VPS or dedicated server rather than going for shared hosting.
Reduce Third-Party Scripts
Third-party scripts can be useful to keep your marketing strategy connected, but not all those elements are beneficial. Analytics tools, social media widgets, and ads can potentially draw traffic to your website and improve your sales, but they can also drag your traffic down.
You should regularly check the relevance of your scripts and remove the ones that are not important. If you have any heavy third-party scripts, consider replacing them with faster options for better functionality.
The Bottom Line
A speedy website will likely make your visitors happy, as they won’t have to wait long moments for the websites to load. By compressing where necessary and optimizing your website, you should notice a better SEO ranking and a higher conversion rate.