Lots of people overload their WordPress websites with plugins — from a backup plugin in WordPress to security plugins to SEO plugins to general theme and “cutesy” plugins that tweak your layout. But these plugins, particularly the superfluous ones, can actually slow down your performance.
The New Year is on the way, so there is no better time to get a fresh start on your WordPress website by taking some time to sit down and optimize your site. If you do this now, you have a better chance of having fewer site issues in 2020.
Take a Look at Your Hosting Provider
The first thing you need to look at seriously is your web hosting provider. If you are on a shared server, you may want to consider moving up to a virtual private server that can offer you more customization and faster speeds or a managed web-hosting option that will provide you with better support if something goes wrong. This latter option is really good if you want to treat yourself in the New Year to fewer headaches; you can leave all the nitty-gritty to the technical experts who are managing your website.
Backup Regularly
Another way to optimize your website’s performance is to make sure that you have a backup handy if something should happen and your site crashes. WordPress allows manual updates, but these take time and you have to remember to run them. Instead, get a backup plugin in WordPress and you can make sure that your backups are scheduled regularly. You will rest easier knowing that restoration is ultra-simple.
Caching Helps As Well
Another good plugin to add is one that will cache your website. This helps repeat customers view the website faster as the site has the previously viewed pages pre-loaded and ready to roll out. There is a variety of caching plugins, so find the one that works best for you.
Go Mobile
If you really want to bring in the younger crowd, you are going to have to go mobile with your design. Just because your website looks good and works well on a computer screen doesn’t mean it will work the same way on a mobile device like a smartphone or a tablet.
Seek out design templates that are mobile friendly and optimize your site for this important demographic. This is a really important consideration because mobile-enabled websites are ranked higher on search engines like Google. If you want to improve your website optimization AND your search engine optimization, then you need this tweak to your site.
Clean Out Your Other Plugins
Many people will bounce from a website if it’s slow to load. To fix this, you need to make sure that all of your plugins are working properly and that none of them are conflicting with each other.
Although WordPress has many great plugins, not all of them are designed to work together and some can be incredibly clunky and eat up lots of memory.
To fix this, go through each plugin individually. Turn the plugin off and then reload your website. If the site loads faster, you may want to look at permanently disabling that plugin or finding an alternative that isn’t going to hinder your performance.
A backup plugin in WordPress, a new hosting provider, a spring cleaning of your plugins — examining all of these will help to tweak and tune your website. There are lots of factors that cause less than optimal performance on a WordPress website. But by taking the time to work on these issues now, you can ensure that 2020 is a great year for you and your business.
