How to Speed Up Your Website - Identifying Slow Load Time Issues
Slow Website?
When designing a website, you should consider the load time of each of your web pages. The Internet has come a long way since dial up and users have upped their expectations on speed. People who search the web for information don’t want to waste time waiting for websites to load. To make sure you site is fast enough for your visitors, here are some ways to speed your load time.
What to Do With Photos
You want to include some photos on your website to make it appealing but you need to be careful. Photos can take a lot of space. Don’t include more than a couple of photos on your page. If you do have pictures, make sure that they are not large and they don’t have high pixels. You can cut down on pixels and still have nice looking pictures on your site.
Videos on Your Site
Videos are a lot like photos in that it makes a website attractive, however, it takes up a considerable amount of space, which cuts down on load time. When including videos on your site, use a program that doesn’t play the video as soon as someone gets to your site. You can have it paused and the person can press play if they are interested.
Flashy Web Content
Animation and other flashy web content may make your site look nice but it could really slow it down. If you want to have animation, just don’t go overboard with it.
Too Much Information
A website should be set up in an organized and simple way. You want to provide information to your visitors but you don’t want to overwhelm them with too much on one web page. All this information can also slow down load time. Create a homepage that serves as an introduction with links to different web pages. Each web page can provide the additional information that the homepage did not cover.
Your Downloadable Files
If you want to have files that visitors can download make sure you use an FTP (file transfer protocol). This is one of the fastest ways to transfer files from one computer to the next.
Making Podcasts Available Quickly
Podcasts are increasing in popularity. If you have podcasts that are large MP3s, you might want to consider breaking them down into smaller files. You can make series which cut down on download time.
As a Last Resort: Consider Your Server
If you site loads slow no matter what you do, you might want to consider the server your website is hosted on. Some servers are full of other websites and can slow everyone down. Switch to a different host if you believe this is the problem.
