How to Speed Up Your WordPress Website

How to Speed Up Your WordPress
Website

Download slides at https://pamannmarketing.com/slides 2
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https://pamannmarketing.com/slides

Why Speed Up
Your Website?
• Google has been using site speed as a
ranking factor for desktop searches
for several years.
• Google started rolling out a “Speed
Update” algorithm change on 7/9/18.
• This means that site speed is now a
ranking factor on mobile search.
• Over 50% of Google searches occur
on mobile, so this is likely to be very
impactful.

Why Speed Up Your Website?
Even before this algorithm update, we noticed correlations between
site speed and rankings

Having a fast-loading website also helps insure that users won’t bounce
away from your website because it took too long to load.

How Do I Test My Site’s Speed?
Tool Tests for Benchmarks to aim for Settings to use
Google PageSpeed
Insights
The presence of page speed
optimization best practices
Minimum:
80 Mobile / 80 Desktop
n/a
WebPageTest.org Total page load time Minimum: “First Interactive” less
than 3 seconds
Ideal: “Fully Loaded” less than 3
seconds
Dulles, VA, USA (Desktop, Android, iOS)
Cable (5/1 Mbps 28ms RTT)
3 Test Runs
First View Only
GTMetrix.com Total page load time Minimum: “Onload” less than 3
seconds
Ideal: “Fully Loaded” less than 3
seconds
Dallas, USA
Chrome (Desktop)
(Sign up for a free account to be able to
specify settings and view onload timings)
Lighthouse Mobile page speed (3G
connection), presence of
page speed optimization best
practices
Minimum Performance Score:
60
Ideal Performance Score: 75
Use this URL to run the test:
https://www.webpagetest.org/lighthouse
(Don’t run in dev tools in Chrome as that’s
too dependent on your own computer’s
hardware speed)
Google Analytics Average page load time and
server response time over
time
Ideal: Monthly average page
load time of 3 seconds or less
Ideal: Monthly average server
response time of 200ms or less
Set date range to Last 30 Days.
Behavior -> Site Speed -> Overview
(use dropdown at top to switch between
Avg. Page Load Time and Server Response
Time)
(use a custom segments to view mobile and
desktop traffic separately, as well as US
traffic only if it’s a US client)
Note: Watch for single-day spikes that skew
the monthly average.

How Does Site Speed Work?
There are two categories of things that can impact site speed:
Hardware Factors Site Assets
The speed of the physical
server that the website is
hosted on
Code, imagery, scripts,
database, etc.
StickerMule.com
< >

Hardware: Hosting
Your hosting plan might be the culprit of a slow-loading site.
Good Bad
• FAST Managed WordPress
Hosting, like LiquidWeb* or
Flywheel*
• VPS (Virtual Private Server)
• Dedicated Server
• Cheap Shared Hosting
Plans
*Affiliate links

Hardware: Server Response Time
Ensure that your “server response time” a.k.a. “time to first byte” is around 200ms or
less on desktop and 600ms or less on mobile.
TTFB is typically dependent upon hosting resources, but it can be affected by on-site
resources as well (plugins, scripts, database, number of http requests, etc.).

Site Assets: Themes & Page Builders
The use of WordPress themes and page builders has an impact on speed as
well. A poorly-coded theme or a page builder that generates bloated code can
cause page load time.
We recommend that whenever possible, sites are built with speed-conscious
theme and page builder providers like Astra, GeneratePress, and lean page
builders like Beaver Builder or Elementor.
Good Bad
• Astra Theme
• GeneratePress Theme
• Avada Theme / Fusion
Builder
• Beaver Builder Page Builder
• Elementor Page Builder
• Site Origin Page Builder
• WPBakery (formerly
known as Visual
Composer)
• Multi-purpose themes
(themes with more
features than you need)
• Poorly-coded or bloated
themes

Site Assets: Plugins
Plugins, while useful and convenient, can slow site speed significantly by loading
unnecessary files and scripts on every page of your site.
Plugins that are activated but not in use should be deactivated and removed.
Poorly coded, slow loading, or no-longer-supported plugins should be replaced with
newer, better alternatives.
Plugin Advice
Deactivate all unnecessary plugins
Ensure that there isn’t more than one plugin for a single function (e.g.
two SEO plugins)
Only use plugins that are actively supported (updated within the last
year)
Only use plugins that are verified to be compatible with the current/latest
version of WordPress core

Site Assets: Caching
Caching pre-processes the code needed to create website content and stores
the already-processed version in memory to be served up to a user faster than
if the server had to execute the code manually every time a request comes in.
Image source: https://www.liquidweb.com/blog/caching-options-for-optimizing-your-vps/

Site Assets: Caching
Caching Advice
Properly implement and test a well-supported caching plugin
(i.e. WP Rocket, W3 Total Cache, WP Super Cache, or Swift)
Utilize server-level caching if possible (e.g. Varnish Cache) if
available through the hosting company

Site Assets: Compression & Minification
Compression and minification decrease file sizes by removing unnecessary
spaces, line breaks, and comments from JS and CSS files.
Removing unnecessary data and compressing the result reduces the
overall file size, thus allowing the data to load faster in the browser.
Image source: https://www.keycdn.com/support/how-to-minify-css-js-and-html/

Site Assets: Compression & Minification
Compression & Minification Advice
 Properly implement and test a well-supported compression
and minification plugin (e.g. Autoptimize), or use a caching
plugin that supports this functionality (e.g. WP Rocket),
resulting in no on-domain minification or compression errors
displayed on Google PageSpeed Insights

Site Assets: Reduce HTTP Requests
Every time a user visits your website, HTTP requests are made to the
server. Reducing the number of HTTP requests made to your server allows
the page to load faster.
Image source: https://blog.cloudflare.com/http-2-for-web-developers/

Site Assets: Reduce HTTP Requests
Reducing HTTP Requests
Implement compression and minification plugins (or use those features in a
caching plugin like WP Rocket), resulting in no on-domain minification or
compression errors displayed on Google PageSpeed Insights
Minimize the number of third party scripts on the site as much as possible (e.g.
social sharing buttons.) These scripts call upon outside resources, adding to the
number of http requests
Serve as many third party tags, scripts, and pixels as possible through Google Tag
Manager, instead of embedding them directly on the site. Only fire tags when they
are absolutely needed.
Serve static thumbnail previews for YouTube videos instead of the full embed.
Some caching plugins like WP Rocket support this, and plugins like WP YouTube
Lyte can also provide this functionality.

Site Assets: Image Optimization
Utilizing appropriate image file dimensions can significantly reduce page
load time, which contributes to overall site speed.
Don’t upload a 4,000px
wide image…
…to fill a
40px
spot

Compressing images removes unnecessary metadata (information on date
taken, camera used, etc.) and makes the file size smaller, while the image
looks the same to the user.
Don’t upload a 4MB
uncompressed image…
…when you can
upload a 40kb image
that looks exactly the
same.

Image Optimization Advice
 Properly size image file dimensions for the size that they are actually displayed
on the site, resulting in no “Serve Scaled Images” errors on GTMetrix. (For
example, don’t upload a 4,000px wide image for an image element that will only
be displayed as 400px.)
 Reduce image file size by compressing the image before or upon upload,
resulting in no “Optimize image” errors on PageSpeed Insights.
 Have a plugin in place to automatically compress future images upon upload (e.g.
EWWW Image Optimizer.)
 Lazyload images so that below-the-fold images don’t load until they are needed.
Some caching plugins support this, and separate plugins like BJ Lazy Load exist
for this purpose as well.

Site Assets: Database Optimization
A site that has been around for awhile will naturally have old post revisions,
shortcodes, and other files that prevent the database from functioning
quickly.
Database Optimization Advice
Periodically run (can be scheduled) database cleanups with a
plugin such as WP-Optimize.

Site Assets: Defer Loading of Render-Blocking Code
Websites often include CSS or JavaScript files that are required to load before the
rest of the page loads. Scripts that are not necessary to load above-the-fold
content should be deferred or asynchronously loaded.
Render-Blocking Code Advice
 Properly implement and test a well-supported CSS/JS optimization plugin
(i.e. Autoptimize or Async JavaScript by Frank Goossens), or use a caching
plugin that supports this functionality, resulting in no “Eliminate render-
blocking JavaScript and CSS in above-the-fold content” errors displayed on
Google PageSpeed Insights. This may require configuring non-essential
CSS to be deferred, while having critical path (above the fold) CSS load
inline.
 Load external fonts with Web Font Loader, or optimize the loading of Google
fonts with a caching or minification plugin (e.g. Autoptimize.)

Site Assets: CDN
A content delivery network (CDN) improves site speed by serving content to users
from stored files on a server that is closest to them geographically.

Site Assets: CDN
CDN Advice
Implement a CDN solution (e.g. CloudFlare, which is free.) Allow
the CDN provider to manage DNS, as opposed to using CNAME
records for implementation.

Recap
How to Speed Up Your WordPress Website
Simple/Easy  Ensure fast hosting plan
 Select Lean Themes & Page Builders
 Minimize Use of Plugins & Choose Well-
Supported Plugins
 Install an Image Optimization Plugin
 Don’t Upload Oversized Images
Intermediate/Advanced  Install and Configure Caching &
Minification Plugins
 Defer Loading of Render-Blocking Code
 Periodically Run Database Optimization
 Implement a CDN
Download Slides: https://pamannmarketing.com/slides

How to Speed Up Your WordPress Website

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