AWS, E-Commerce, WordPress for the NY Startups

Category: Performance

  • WordPress Performance Tweaks for Entrepreneurs

    WordPress Performance Tweaks for Entrepreneurs

    Entrepreneurs and startup CEOs need an edge. Any advantage you have over the competition can make a huge difference to your business. And WordPress performance tweaks can be the edge you need to succeed.

     

    What Is WordPress?

    WordPress is a popular free and open-source content management system (CMS) based on PHP and MySQL. With this powerful tool, you can create a unique connection with your customers via an online site that can be interactive or static, and always fresh and new.

     

    Why Is It so Popular?

    From lightweight frameworks to elegant powerhouses, WordPress has something for everyone. The extensive selection of free and paid themes is just one of the reasons it is so popular. Other reasons include:

    Ease of use for administrators, editors and system administrators. WordPress uses a standard PHP and MySQL database configuration, along with dozens of graphical actions and plugins for just about every possible administrative need. A reasonably skilled user can build a site with SEO, social sharing, maps, e-commerce, new post types and custom site structures in just a few hours.

    Great Price and License. It is free and open-sourced for all projects, including commercial uses.

    Flexibility. Everyone makes mistakes. This application is very forgiving–you can easily fix or undo any errors made. Whether you are a “power user” or someone who is not particularly tech savvy, you will find WordPress to be a real game changer for your business.

    Plugin stability and autonomy. This great plugin system allows for thousands of mature plugins. Most of these plugins don’t need other plugins that require constant updates. This alone can save you hours of monitoring and maintenance time. Today’s businesses don’t have time to waste on downtime or costly maintenance.

    Multi-site option. This recently introduced option created quite the buzz among entrepreneurs. You can now host multiple WordPress sites on the same installation. This means you are allowed a site for each member of your team (sales agents, reps, etc.) without the need for additional websites or hosting packages.

     

    What Components Affect WordPress Performance?

    Components that affect WordPress performance include:

    The Theme. The theme is the look and feel of the site, and it determines the structure and layout of your pages. Themes can be updated to meet your requirements.

    Plugins are great. They help to extend the power of WordPress through third-parties apps. Plugins are essential to the success of your site. Not all plugins are compatible with all themes, so choose your theme carefully.

    WordPress Core. The core is the heart or engine of WordPress. It contains the complicated stuff (code) administrators need to manage the system.

    Server Software. This is the “behind-the-scenes” software that hosts your site. It can be managed by your own IT contractors or a hosting company of your choice. How you choose to host your WordPress site can have a huge effect on performance.

    Database. WordPress supports the MySQL database for data storage. Like all databases, the speed at which it runs can be optimized for particular workloads, when needed.

    External Security and Performance Services. WordPress is an example of a Content Management System, which means it is capable of supporting multiple users in a collaborative environment.

     

    Improvements to Components

    Tweak each component to perform better. Here’s how:

    Theme

    Theme files should be “minified,” which means that they should be as small as possible. This allows files to be sent from your website to the end user much faster.

    Choose a theme that uses as few images as possible. Downsize or optimize available images for faster load times.

    Your theme should have as few files as possible. The fewer needed connections, the better your website will perform.

    Plugins

    Don’t use more WordPress plugins than you absolutely need. Plugins are like wildcards–they are developed by third parties of varying skills and QA processes. If you are having performance issues with your site, definitely consider removing (not just disabling) your plugins.

    Use a Performance Optimization plugin such as W3 Total Cache or WP Super Cache. These offer a large variety of performance-tuning features for optimal speed and performance.

    WordPress Core

    Do not leave your WordPress site in DEBUG mode. This is important, yet often forgotten.

    Cache servers such as Redis and Memcache. This speeds up the loading time of your site by keeping bits and pieces of previous loads close at hand.

    Keep your site updated. This will improve performance as well as make your website a tougher target for hackers.

    Database

    Make sure your database is sized correctly. Improper sizing is often the leading cause of slow loads, especially on larger sites.

    Enable object or database caching to minimize extra trips to the database. Fewer trips means faster loads.

    Try to add a few indexes. This will speed up your most common MySQL queries because much of the requested info will be cached.

    Server Software

    Use high-performance server software such as Nginx and turn on Webserver caching to keep files in memory. Also, size your application server properly and make sure your PHP processor caches compiled PHP code.

    External Security and Cache

    Varnish is a good choice. It can sit in front your WordPress PHP Application servers and be configured to respond to 90% or more of your traffic.

    Use a content delivery network (CDN) and a Web Application Firewall service, such as Incapsula or CloudFlare. These applications can also help with performance caching to help with the performance of your website.

  • Introduction to Website Performance and Speed for Entrepreneurs

    Introduction to Website Performance and Speed for Entrepreneurs

    Did you know more than 200 factors determine your overall website ranking — both on- and off-site? Business owners can only control the on-site factors, which is why many entrepreneurs focus on fresh content and SEO. However, website performance is also a controlled factor, so don’t ignore it. Front-end optimization improves user experience and increases your site’s speed, which in turn increases your overall rankings, conversions, and profit.

     

    Website Speed Affects Your Rankings

    Since 2010, Google has factored website speed into its search rankings. While the company notes that site performance isn’t as important as page relevance, it is still a factor. Because of this, every online entrepreneur should be concerned with their website’s overall speed and performance. A study from Backlinko determined that domains ranked in the first position of the search results were approximately 13 percent faster than those ranking in 10th position. So if you want to improve your site’s search engine page results (SERP) ranking, you need to increase your site speed.

     

    Website Speed Affects Your Bounce Rates, Conversions, and Revenue

    According to surveys completed by Akamai and Gomez.com, almost half of all internet users expect a website’s load time to be faster than two seconds, and many completely abandon a website that takes longer than three seconds to load. This results in higher bounce rates, as well as lower conversion rates and revenue. Statistics from Hubpages show just how important website speed is to your bottom line. According to them, a one-second delay results in a 7 percent reduction in conversions. So if your website makes $100,000 per day, increasing your website’s speed by one second could increase your revenue by $7,000 per day. This is because your website’s speed and performance has an effect on your customer’s happiness.

     

    Testing Your Website Speed

    Before you can improve your website’s speed and performance, you need to pinpoint areas that need improvement. Running a simple website speed test helps you:

    • Find fonts, scripts, and plug-ins causing delays in load times
    • Pinpoint large images on your site that are causing bottlenecks
    • Determine if you have any render-blocking CSS or JavaScript
    • Check your site’s rendering speed in different browsers
    • Analyze your site’s total load times, number of requests, and page sizes
    • Measure your content delivery network
    • Verify that all of your website’s assets are loading properly

     

    Testing your website’s speed is simple. Just use one of these speed tests:

    • Google
    • KeyCDN
    • Pingdom
    • Google

    Tips to Improve Your Website’s Speed Front-end optimization or website optimization is the process of tweaking your website to decrease load time and improve speed. To do this, you’ll need to make some simple changes and monitor your process going forward.

     

    Minimize your HTTP requests

    According to Yahoo, 80 percent of a web page’s loading time involves downloading the various pieces of the page itself. HTTP requests are made for each element individually, so reducing your on-page components reduces your HTTP requests, speeding up your load time. To minimize your HTTP requests:

    • Limit the number of elements used on your web pages
    • When possible, use CSS instead of uploading images
    • Combine numerous style sheets into one
    • Reduce the number of scripts your site is running, and put those scripts at the bottom of the page

     

    Reduce server response time

    Ideally, your server response time should be 200 milliseconds. However, server response times vary depending on how many websites share the server. To lower your server response time, start by reviewing your hosting package. Free and shared hosting packages typically have longer server response times because other websites are sharing server space. To reduce your server response time, consider upgrading to virtual private server hosting or dedicated hosting.

     

    Optimize images

    Optimizing images typically yields big results because images often account for the most downloaded bytes on a page, according to Google. Before using an image, consider its type, size, number of pixels, and resolution. If you want to use an image that doesn’t meet your requirements, use a convert tool, such as ImageMagick, to optimize your image.

     

    Optimize CSS delivery

    When CSS is poorly delivered, it drastically slows down your website. To optimize your CSS delivery:

    • Combine any CSS scripts you’re able to combine • Use a CSS compressor to reduce the amount of data downloaded by each user
    • Use a critical CSS generator to extract all necessary pieces of your CSS script
    • Place the extracted snippets of script in-line within your site’s HTML
    • Set the rest of your compressed script to defer load

     

    Move to a Cloud Provider

    If you’re like most online entrepreneurs, you aren’t an information technology expert. Consider cloud computing for your business to optimize your website’s performance. When you use cloud computing, the software company you choose manages the technical aspects of your website, including its speed and performance. Both Google Compute and Amazon AWS offer 12-month free trials to get you started, and Microsoft Azure offers a 30-day free trial that includes a sizable credit to let you explore the more customizable options.