Comment posted on Need For Site Speed: Practical Guide For The Average Blogger by Ana Hoffman
Ahh, you are into “shiny things” too, Andrew?
I used to get every plugin I thought sounded cool, until I knew what I was doing to my blog. 
I love W3 Super Cache; my site performance jumped up as well since I started using it.
I was planning on talking about it in my next blog post, but since you brought it up…
Thanks for stopping by.
Ana
Ana Hoffman also commented
- You said it, John Paul - better search ranking is just a bonus.
User experience is the biggest consideration in improving your site speed; nobody wants to loose readers due to a slow-loading page.
I am glad to hear that you used some of the same methods I talk about in the post to speed up your blog; that’ the difference between theory and practice!
Ana
- Hello Udegbunam,
Yes it can happen sometimes but 4 sec is quite ok, not bad at all.
Glad you came by,
Ana
- Hello Dennis,
Thanks for the additional input about this topic. It’s really amazing how this thing work, right? About the picture in your post, I hope you can figure that out. Keep me posted.
All the Best,
Ana
- Anything external can slow down your blog; it’s hard enough to control your own server.
Glad you got some good tips out of the post, Richard; let me know how your speed improves.
Ana
- No, that slash doesn’t make a difference to your links.
Recent comments by Ana Hoffman
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Of course, Jackie.Have a great Tuesday!
- Content Recycling: How to Turn Articles into Videos in 5 Minutes
Very good point, Rick; never thought about it.This IS great for camera-phobics!
Thanks for the comment and have a great Tuesday.
Ana
- Promote Yourself: More About You & Your Business
Sure thing, Steve.I checked the local listings for chiropractors in your area - looks like you need to do some work to get your site on the first page of Google; that’s the best way to get traffic for a local business!
Ana
- Content Recycling: How to Turn Articles into Videos in 5 Minutes
Absolutely, Lori!Isn’t blogging amazing? On the surface, our niches have nothing in common, yet we can learn so much from each other. Love it!
Ana
- Promote Yourself: More About You & Your Business
Recovering attorney… gotta love it!Sounds like a great niche market; all those professionals who don’t have the time for, yet can greatly benefit from social media.
All the best!
Ana
PS My husband, by the way, is also a recovering attorney and loving it.
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Ana,,Nice walk thru. I’m like you ” stubborn and OCD” haha
I was all about getting my blog to load faster.. I tried Super Cache.. it sucked.. then I added W3 Cache, and it dropped my load time from 14 sec to about 9 sec… then I did some of what you shared here and basically dropped any button that was draggin.
I am now at about a 6sec load, which is good enough for me, till the cost for CDN makes sense for me.
But what I will say,, is I have NOT noticed any difference in rankings since I went from a load of 14 to about 6.. and it has been at 6 over a month.
So I would say if your dropping load time for search luv.. dont bother.. but if your dropping load time for your readers, and to better the chance visitors will make it thru your blog,, then do it.. the search luv is a bonus if it happens or not.,
John Paul@Make A Blog´s last blog ..OptimizePress Review
You said it, John Paul - better search ranking is just a bonus.
User experience is the biggest consideration in improving your site speed; nobody wants to loose readers due to a slow-loading page.
I am glad to hear that you used some of the same methods I talk about in the post to speed up your blog; that’ the difference between theory and practice!
Ana
I’m really bothered by the stats shown by Google Webmasters Tool as it can also be affected by the speed of the visitors internet connection. So far so good, I’ve managed to stay @ 4 secs according to gtmetrix.com and that’s fine by me
Udegbunam Chukwudi@Wordpress Blog Setup´s last blog ..How to Rank 1 For Highly Competitive Keywords on Google SERPs
Hello Udegbunam,
Yes it can happen sometimes but 4 sec is quite ok, not bad at all.
Glad you came by,
Ana
With the way we change things around on our blogs and test out suggested plugins it’s no wonder we drag a little at times. Thank goodness for tech heads because W3 Total Cache is awesome. I was 11 seconds loading before I installed it 4 months ago. Averaging just under 3 seconds and I’m bloated so I started another domain to take some load off.
It’s the plugins that do it every time. Recommended number is 10 -12 max but I’m running 15. If your back office is taking ages to switch between sections that’s a good indication your plugins are weighing you down. Which means it’s time to trim but figuring out the bandwidth hogs isn’t easy.
Total Cache makes it dead simple to switch to Amazon S3 and everything went smooth except pictures in my posts dont appear. Now I gotta figure that out. Any help would be well received. Great subject Ana thanks for sharing.
Dennis O’Brien´s last blog ..Add Some Style To Your Posts
Hello Dennis,
Thanks for the additional input about this topic. It’s really amazing how this thing work, right? About the picture in your post, I hope you can figure that out. Keep me posted.
All the Best,
Ana
Average Load Time for Stevescottsite.com
Average (1.349 Seconds), 58% of sites are slower.
-not too bad I guess. I noticed a while back a plugin was slowing it down A lot (like an extra 4 seconds) As much as I liked it I had to dump it for this reason. Sometimes the cuts an hurt and some plugins are worth a little drop in speed, but it can be a tough thing.
Steve@Lifestyle Design´s last blog ..5 Easy Ways to Save Time
Yes Steve, not bad at all. That’s awesome. Thanks for your input.
All the Best,
Ana
Hey Ana
as always - excellent enlightening information. Thank you! You always provoke interesting comments too, so every visit here is always very enriching.
I will tail-slash, super-cache and trim-slim my blog to speed now…without mercy.
As Samuel mentioned in a comment in this thread: choosing the right hosting provider can make a very significant difference in speed. Not too long ago, I moved an install and this alone brought a tremendous increase in loading speed, what no fiddling before achieved (‘smoking hot blondes’ in advertising don’t really make up for slow server speed, nuh?).
laters Ana
Michel
Michel@freedomdaily´s last blog ..The money is in the list – so it’s said…
Thanks for the compliment Michel. I also agree with Samuel, that can really make a difference.
Cheers,
Ana
Hey Ana,
Wow another goodie bag of tips here. I didn’t know about the slash at the end of links although by default my blog posts all have backslash at the back of their links. And also about ads, I agree with you. I’ve recently dump a lot of useless ads that aren’t making me any money. I think its best to use ads sparingly and if it works.
bryan´s last blog ..5 Inspirational Quotes That Will Make Or Break Your Business
Thanks for dropping by Bryan. I’m glad you find the tips I shared here very useful. That’s why I’m always inspired to posts more of it.
Have a nice day,
Ana
Incidentally, before I change my permalink structure to add a / at the end. Do you know if it will break the links to my posts out on the web if I just add a / at the end?
Richard´s last blog ..How Much Cash Am I Going To Generate Through Adsense
No, that slash doesn’t make a difference to your links.
Hi Ana,
Wow, really great post! I used it as a guide to check my site speed on webmaster’s tool. I had previously already tried to speed it up a bit by dumping some plugins. After checking webmaster’s tools, I saw it was still slow. Your tip really nudged me in the right direct to dump some of my low performing external ads. I’m also going to add the slash at the end of my permalinks. Thanks for the tips!
Richard´s last blog ..How Much Cash Am I Going To Generate Through Adsense
Anything external can slow down your blog; it’s hard enough to control your own server.
Glad you got some good tips out of the post, Richard; let me know how your speed improves.
Ana
Hi Ana!
Like Tommy, W3 Total Cache sped up my site a great deal. I love that tool.
I would also suggest that people upload images that they use for advertising or for their posts to their own sites. That little change seems to make a big different in timing as well.
And using tools like the javascript-based Delicious and Facebook sharing buttons with serious consideration. I love them, but boy, the time it takes (especially for Delicious) to load can be a killer. Better to ditch the script they provide and just copy the image to your site and then do manual sharing code. If that makes any sense at all! lol
Cheers,
Tia
Tia´s last blog ..Autumn at BizChickBlogs- Changes are Coming
Hello Tia,
Thanks for sharing additional tips. I really appreciate that. More options, the better.
All the Best,
Ana
Great tips Ana. I subscribed to the “Purge the Plugins” theory several months ago and it has made a huge difference. I need to remind myself sometimes that less is indeed more!
Karen Newman @ Experience Mapping´s last blog ..Susan Boyle Sings Success
I did the same, Karen, and then I noticed I started adding them again.
Always have to watch myself; it’s addictive.
Ana
Hey Ana,
I have the W3 Cache Plugin a few months back and really helped pick up the speed on my blog.
I did notice it was being slowed down by some of the widgets, which was also brought to my attention by someone. I removed some and will definitely look into some of your other ideas especially updating my wordpress to help speed it up.
Thanks Ana!
Tommy D.
TommyDiPietro@MLM Sales´s last blog ..Sunday Funday When There Does Not Have To Be An MLM Sales Strategy Everyday
Yes Tommy, widgets can also slow you down, good thing you removed it.
Thanks for dropping by,
Ana
Hey Ana,
Thank you so much for the valuable information, I will have to check out my speed also, I am wanting to say it is around 5 seconds - but I will find out exactly. I was once like many others and has tons of “cool toys” that were really slowing my site down, I have since deactivated them.
I am always learning from other people and keep taking different ideas and tweaking them and seeing if I can do them also. It is really amazing if we just keep moving forward and learning from each other, the outcome is always a great one.
Looking forward to your next post!
Pleasure is mine Robert. Thanks also for reading my post. It’s nice to know that we can learn from each other. I hope to see you again since I’ve got more tips to share.
All the Best,
Ana
Hi Ana,
I will be tweaking a few things after reading your post, thanks.
For some reason I have never been able to verify my blog on Google Webmaster Tools although I have other sites verified.
I tried to resolve this previously but as per usual everyone just points a finger in someone else’s direction and nothing gets solved.
I will have to add it to my list again for the future. Annoying as much as technical can be.
~Marcus
Marcus Baker@network marketing Internet business´s last blog ..These Questions are the Answers to Your Success
I wish I knew the answer to your Webmaster troubles, Marcus, but at least I can tell you that you are not the only one.
I had a couple of complaints about the same problem recently.
All I can say is definitely try again; they now have 4 options of verifying a website - more than the last time I verified my blog.
Hope you figure it out!
Ana
I think we shouldn’t worry that much to the site speed, it is just one of over 200 ranking factors and I guess that it won’t affect user experience as it differs for a few seconds.
Tek3D´s last blog ..Does Google stop Pagerank Updates
With all due respect, it DOES affect users.
The difference between a 2 sec download and a 10 sec download is huge when you are staring at the screen.
As far as Google ranking is concerned, might not seem like a huge thing, but if 2 websites are equal in any other ranking algorithm and one of them is faster than the other, guess which one will be first?
Everything matter, when put into perspective…
Thanks for sharing your thoughts!
Ana
Living in Namibia where I have a much slower connection that much of the world, page speed has always been really important to me. Bloggers have become so widget mad these days that most blogs I visit I end up hitting the stop button on Firefox just so that the page gets done. On days that the web is really slow, I start using a text only browser.
My site, since you asked, is at the top end of the scale, but it is mainly because I rolled my own blog engine and work hard to keep it fast.
Vernon´s last blog ..Interlude - Merlin Man on Creativity
That’s another good reason to keep it fast, Vernon.
Forget about Google, think of your users - many bloggers simply forget that.
“Widget-mad” - I think you just coined a phrase!
Love it.
Ana
And you heard it first right here on trafficgenerationcafe.com
Vernon´s last blog ..Interlude - Merlin Man on Creativity
I recently installed the w3-super-cache plugin and my load speed improved by nearly 40%. Takes a little effort to set it up but worth it.
Andrew
P.S. Must admit, I am a little guilty of having too many plugins!
Andrew @ Blogging Guide´s last blog ..Blog Expert Series- The Surprising Decision 77 Of Bloggers Get Wrong
Ahh, you are into “shiny things” too, Andrew?
I used to get every plugin I thought sounded cool, until I knew what I was doing to my blog.
I love W3 Super Cache; my site performance jumped up as well since I started using it.
I was planning on talking about it in my next blog post, but since you brought it up…
Thanks for stopping by.
Ana
Thing is…I don’t class them as ‘shiny’. I class them as requirements!
Andrew
Andrew @ Blogging Guide´s last blog ..Blog Expert Series- The Surprising Decision 77 Of Bloggers Get Wrong
Hey Ana,
It seems my site is embarrassingly slow to. I’ve taken on board many of your measures here. Especially getting rid of unnecessary plugins. Thanks for the excellent tips. Every little bit counts.
Take care,
Wayne
At least we are all in the same boat, Wayne.
I’ve been able to improve my site speed greatly with these tips; i am sure you wil as well.
Ana
“Thank you Anna”
Those were pretty helpful pointers there.
Moon Hussain´s last blog ..Do People Want to Hear That Making Money Online Can Take Time
You are so welcome, Moon - I haven’t seen you for a while around here; nice to have you back.
Ana
Hi Ana,
.
As always, learning from your blog
I’d add a plugin: W3 total cache, really increases site speed.
Another factor: hosting provider. All the site optimization doesn’t have meaning if you have an slow hosting provider.
Samuel´s last blog ..Finalmente- fuera de Google sites
Nice to hear from you Samuel.
Thanks for dropping by,
Ana
I have actually been working on this, my site loads at a 3.6 in webmaster tools. 2.7 on other speed test sites. Even at 3.6 Google claims mine is slower than 67% of all sites. YIKES… LOL I thought my site was loading pretty fast….
You give some great tips I have not tried, thanks for sharing I will be using your tips I will keep you posted. It’s funny I wrote a similar post just yesterday on my blog.
Rob Franta@How to retire early´s last blog ..How Fast Does Your Website Load
Hello Rob,
I’m glad you came by. Yap, you can surely try it. I will read your blog about this topic, I’m sure I can learn more things as well.
Thanks for the comment,
Ana
Thanks Ana,
AS ever you’ve dug some esoteric tips and tricks out from somewhere to enlighten us. I’m surprised to learn about the ending ‘/’, and very grateful for the tips on optimizing images properly.
Can’t wait for the next round of tips!
All the best,
Jym
Jym´s last blog ..The 7 Simple Steps Of Online MLM Business
You’re welcome Jym. I’m glad you gain some insights from my post. I will be very happy to share more tips in the the future.
Have a great day,
Ana
Nice points, Ana. One more point that I find out when I do speed optimization for my site is place a share box on sidebar and float it can really increase your blog speed.
The reason lies within the HTML structure. With traditional share box, it’s in between the content and footer sections. If one of the share services like Digg, etc, loads slowly, it will drag your site down, too!
Putting a share box float resolves this issue. You can put this box in footer and use CSS to position it in your blog. When your blog loads, all of the content, sidebar and comment will be loaded first so it doesn’t create feeling of content load slowly for users, and your sidebar share box can take time to load while users start to read the content. Very nice, right?
Mike´s last blog ..Supercharge Your Blog Traffic and Income with These 9 Underrated WordPress Plug-ins
Thanks for sharing your own technique Mike. That is very helpful as well. I will also try using that one. Anything, to increase speed.
Thanks Mike. Glad you came by
Ana
I’m glad to know that I’m following good ‘speedy’ practices! I make sure to go through my plugins at least 2-3x a month because I’m always trying new ones that people recommend. I find a lot that I don’t find so useful so I have clear those out every so often because I don’t want anything slowing down my site.
I didn’t know about the slash one, I’m really glad that you mentioned that. I’m going to be sure to use the slashes from now on!
Thanks for another really useful post, Ana!
Stacy@Grow With Stacy´s last blog ..Becoming an Advanced Early Riser
Hi Stacy,
Good to hear that you’ve been doing that already. It can really do wonders right?
Take care
Ana
Thanks Ana,
I need to work on my site’s speed so this article came at a perfect time. I’m too embarrassed to reveal what it is at the moment but I’m sure with the tips you’ve given us, it’ll improve in no time. Appreciate the tips!
Talk soon,
Thu
Thu Nguyen@BloggingFor´s last blog ..Have You Written An Alexa Review Yet Here’s How
You’re welcome Thu. I’m glad you drop by. You can start working on them now and see it goes.
Take care,
Ana
Super tips here Ana
I use permalinks but didn’t know about the benefit of the “/”, very cool.
I follow most, especially kicking plug-in’s to the curb. I’ve never been much into bells and whistles anyway.
Thanks for sharing!
Ryan
Ryan Biddulph´s last blog ..How Are Deep A Squats Similar to Personal Development
Hello Ryan,
Glad you came by. It’s really surprising how changing a small detail can actually make a big difference.
Have a nice day,
Ana
Hi, Ana-
Great tips! I’m ashamed to say that my siteload was 5.3 seconds, which I consider atrocious! Apparently, I fell into the “ooh…that’s shiny” trap, and had far too many plugins activated. I’ve murdered a few of them, thanks to your reminder. I’ll have to wait to see what my new “official” loadtime is, but I can tell it’s much better already… around half.
Thanks!
Doc Sheldon´s last blog ..Search Experience – Now- Part Two
You’re welcome Doc. I think that’s one of the most common problem we bloggers have, that’s why I decided to share these tips.
All the Best,
Ana
Hi Ana,
I’m floored. My site takes 7.6 seconds to load. Yikes…thank you for the tips. Guess I have some work to do.
I’m thankful to have your speedy solutions to my slow as molasses blog!
Heather
Heather C Stephens´s last blog ..2 Things Sesame Street Can Teach You About Building a Network Marketing Internet Business
You’re welcome Heather. I’m happy to share those techniques. Go for it
All the Best,
Ana
Google won’t verify my site for some reason…even though I already use analytics
Great info though!! I’ve been reading all of your posts!
What do you mean by “won’t verify it”, Kelly?
I’d love to help.
Ana
It keeps saying “Unable to Verify at the this time”
As per your permalinks = /%postname%/
So, you mean for a site not to have a structure is a good practice for SEO?
I see how it will work for blogs but for a site that has many categories isn’t be a good idea to have at least: /%category%/%postname%/ ???
May I ask an opinion on http://www.domain vs’ http://domain
Thank You Ana for the article - I love them all! *Smiles
Your Friend,
Slavik G
Slavik -
You always make sure to ask some brilliant questions!
1. /%postname%/ - is still a structure. You want your permalink to be as short as possible, while still containing your main keywords in it. I don’t see any benefit in including your category in every link; for SEO purposes or otherwise.
2. Canonicalization: essentially, I don’t think it matters whether you choose http://www.domain or http://domain, as long as you stick to it and build all your links to the same URL. I touched on the issue in this post: https://trafficgenerationcafe.online/high-search-engine-ranking-optimization/
Let me know your thoughts!
Ana
I think it is a mater of getting done and then see what could be more optimized… Things are changing with SEO. Google makes 300-400 tweaks per year. So, SEO will stay with us and our sites…
On your suggested article I liked the #5
Thank You!
Slavik G
Hey Ana,
Awesome tips list, I love the one titled “Delete Plugins without mercy”, I hate installing Unnecessary Plugins because all they do is not only crowd your blog and make it look so unprofessional, but it also increase the chances of getting errors because the more Plugins you have the higher chance one of the will contradict with another.
By the way, when I clicked on “Site performance” under “Labs” in Webmasters tools, it said: “No data available”. No idea why it didn’t show me an evaluation of my site, my site is both added and verified too.
Thanks for sharing those tips Ana.
Sayed´s last blog ..Updated Plugins List
You are so right about the plugins, Sayed - the more you have, the more problems you are asking for.
Give Webmaster Tools a day, maybe the site took a sick day and forgot to let us know - happens.
Ana
Speed is one of many ranking factors but you also don’t need to overdo it. I have seen many sites in webmaster tools that are slower than average but didn’t lose their actual search engines ranks.
I am not sure it’s possible to be too fast, Andreas.
I also didn’t mean to indicate in any way that you can lose your ranking, but your speed can certainly help your BETTER ranking.
Ana
Hi Ana,
You’ve given us excellent tips that are well worth implementing.
Just checked my load speed. My main blog is at about 2.7 seconds average. Google Webmaster tools didn’t have exact times for the others but they seem to be one or two seconds slower. One big difference I noted was that I do have a number of images in the sidebars. The ones that are hosted directly on my writing for marketers site load quite fast. If they are hosted on another web site, even if it is the same server, they will load much slower.
So here is another tip: even though it takes a little more space, host your images in the same directory as your blog files, not on some other web site. I’m going to make this change and see if it makes a difference.
It is interesting that the fast blog needs to have Wordpress updated and has an Adsense box but the slower ones have the latest Worpress version and no Adsense. I will let you know if it is the picture hosting that makes the difference.
Lee Pound´s last blog ..Day 49 Story – The Loss of Innocence
2.7 seconds? Very respectable speed, Lee - my hat goes off to you.
Of course, there can be soooo many different factors determining speed; each site needs its individual attention.
)
Hosting images on your server will definitely save you time (providing your server doesn’t add to your loading speed problems
Let me know how the changes work for you!
Ana
Hey Anna
Great list here, Im always checking on my webmaster tools in Google, it has some great info in there if you know how to use it right and what everything means. As soon as I read this post I went to my back office and deleted about 15 unused plugins…. thanks for the reminder to get that done
cheers
Nat
Nat @online business tutorials´s last blog ..Why Don’t I Use WWSGD Plugin Anymore This Is Why…
You’re welcome Nat. So I guess it really helped you increased your speed. That’s pretty awesome.
Hope to see you again,
Ana
It is a never-ending battle, Ana! I just responded to someone on LinkedIn last night, who was looking for an SEO evaluation of his website. The first thing I checked was the load time, which was 5 seconds. It pays to start with a solid foundation, and that is the ~2-second load times, like you mention.
It’s hard to get it there, but definitely worth the effort.
LinkedIn, huh? I need to be more active on that site…
Good morning to you too!
Ana
Hey Ana,
Had NO idea about the “/” issue. Thanks a bunch!
Dan Fonseca´s last blog ..Synapses is on All My Faves!
You are welcome, Dan. As I said, every little bit helps!
Ana
Hello from Montana,
My gosh, I am really learning from you this morning. I left a comment above, but just realized it went to Facebook. I appreciate the tips and techniques that you share so freely. There is plenty of success to go around for all of us.
Have a great day.
Judy Helm Wright
Judy H Wright aka Auntie Artichoke, family relationship author and speaker´s last blog ..Mean Girls Cliques
I appreciate any comment, Judy - great to see you learning and succeeding.
Hope Montana weather is treating you well this morning!
Ana
Hi Ana,
amazing information, you always over-deliver, don’t you ? My average laoding time is 7.9 seconds which also pretty bad…
Well, I don’t think the numbers are embarassing, they’re just like they are. They’re definitely worth improving.
Thanks for sharing your tips.
Take care
Oliver
Oliver Tausend´s last blog ..Lessons From “Think And Grow Rich” – Chapter 2 “Desire”
That’s right Oliver. At least we now have the tool that we can use to increase our speed.
Cheers to that
Ana
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