If you are struggling with a slow WordPress website, you are not alone! WordPress is the most popular CMS and currently powers over 40% of all the websites around the world. However, many Canadian WordPress users notice that their webpages are taking too long to load, or their media does not pop up promptly. Luckily, there are many ways to increase the speed of your site without compromising the quality of the content.
How to Determine Website Speed
There are many free online speed tools available for anyone to use. All you must do is copy your website’s URL and paste it into one of these tools. Another thing you can do is ask your friends and family to test out the site. Listen to their constructive criticism, as they will tell you if they feel that the loading time is too long.
Ideally, you are aiming for the quickest speeds possible. On average, a web page should load within 1-2 seconds. Once you hit 3 seconds, you run the risk of losing about half of your virtual traffic.
Methods of Increasing Speed
Use a Caching Plugin
WordPress offers thousands of different plugins to improve the efficiency of your site. Some of these are necessary for the site to function, while others are simply nice to have. Installing a caching plugin might be the answer to solving your slow loading speeds.
When visitors access your site, WordPress needs to locate all the script and then transfer it to their browser. When visitors are abundant to one website, this process can become very backlogged. Caching involves storing the website files in a temporary location on the visitor’s browser. When they return to the site, WordPress will not need to load the entire script, saving time.
Invest in a Good Web Host Provider
When people first create their website, they may be tempted to purchase a hosting plan that is as cheap as possible. This can be a big mistake, as poor hosting can lead to virtual security breaches and slow, unresponsible websites. Instead, take the time to research reputable web hosting companies that can provide you with the plan you need.
Many companies offer specific plans for people looking for WordPress hosting in Canada. A WordPress hosting plan is completely optimized for your platform. This includes additional tools such as enhanced security features, automatic updates, quick setups, and access to customer support agents who are WordPress experts.
Perform Regular Updates
As a website owner, you will need to keep an eye out for required updates. Since WordPress is open-source, this means that it frequently requires new updates. Elements such as themes and plugins will also need to be kept up to date to ensure that they are fully optimized.
If you allow your website to remain out of date, there is an increased security risk. Partially due to its large scale, WordPress is a popular target for hackers and other people with nefarious intentions. Remaining left behind with older versions of WordPress will leave you exposed to weaknesses that hackers are probably well-aware of.
Implement Excerpts Rather Than Full Text
For many websites, but especially blogs, people will have multiple web pages with different discussion topics. On your homepage, WordPress will automatically showcase full paragraphs from all your different pages. This is detrimental to you because your homepage will load slower, and viewers will not be as tempted to click through your other pages.
To avoid this, you can change the settings so that only short summaries of the articles appear on your homepage. This will encourage viewers to click into the article to get the whole story, and your loading speed will improve. You can change this through “Settings – Reading”, and then choose the option “For each article in a feed, show: Summary.”
Consider Using a Content Delivery Network
A content delivery network, or CDN for short, is when a collection of worldwide servers stores your site’s static files. The purpose of this is to reduce the distance between your virtual visitor and the server. When a visitor accesses your site, they will receive the files from the server in their city or the nearest alternative.
Using a CDN also reduces a website’s downtime, as there will constantly be a redistribution between servers if one goes down.
