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A slow website can have devastating results for a website or blog. And Google even uses speed when it determines which websites rank the highest. So if your website is slow, Google will penalize you and your competitors will be listed higher than you.
So if you have a Joomla site and it is slow, how do you improve it? Luckily, we have a great way you can speed up your website. Basically, there’s an extension for that, and it’s really comprehensive. Using this extension should help you lose less customers and rank higher in Google. And then ultimately, you will make more money!
Speed Cache
So, you’re probably wondering, what is this great extension? Well, the great extension that can really help you speed up your Joomla website would be Speed Cache Joomla Performance Extension. It was created by JoomUnited, one of my favorite websites to go to for Joomla extensions or WordPress plugins.
So why is this extension so great? Joomla have a native cache but the Speed Cache makes it even better. Speed Cache adds a new cache layer. It gives you more static content which reduces the number of database queries – and that speeds up your website. It also gives you the possibility to store the major part of the heavy page resources (such as images) in the browser cache. You can activate it on as few or as many pages as you want.
Another reason why Speed Cache is great is that it generates static cache file per Joomla user and then also works for dynamic content (like forms and sessions). All cache can also be cleaned automatically.
And here’s another great thing about Speed Cache. You can generate a dedicated cache version per device. So that way, you can be sure your Speed Cache will work well with any template framework.
Minification
Minification is a great way to get your website faster. What I mean by minification is you should try to get rid of anything unnecessary in your code. Basically, by getting rid of data you don’t need, your website will work much faster.
So that’s why it’s great that Speed Cache not improves upon your cache but it also has a tool for minification of your website. It can group, minify and defer the loading of all JS & CSS files as well as group fonts.
Image Compression
Another way to make your website faster is to make your images smaller. Because having huge image files will just make your website take longer to load. After all, images take an average of 60% of a page’s weight. So optimizing your pictures can really have a great impact on your Joomla site’s speed. And Speed Cache has a great image compression feature. It reduces image size by up to 80%!
Lazy Loading
Lazy Loading is another great way to speed up your website. What I mean by lazy loading is that when someone visits your page, only the images and videos they see are actually loaded. The images or videos that are located farther down on the page will only be loaded when the visitor scrolls down. So it’s called lazy loading but it’s not so much laziness – it’s actually just really effective. It can speed up your website quite a lot.
And once again, Speed Cache has you covered. With its lazy loading option, you can even include or exclude specific URLs and determine URL rules and image size. It’s just once again another way Speed Cache can speed up your Joomla site.
CDN
Another way you can speed up a Joomla website with a CDN. A CDN is a Content Delivery Network. A CDN is a basically a network of servers with locations in multiple geographic locations. So then when someone visits your website, the information is then pulled from the server location that is closest to them – thus making the website load faster. Now, you could pay separately for a CDN. But you don’t have to with Speed Cache. That’s because a CDN is included for free with Speed Cache!
Cost
You might think an extension this powerful would be very expensive, but it’s actually not. Currently, you can get the extension plus 6-months of support and updates for just $29 by visiting JoomUnited’s website. You can get 1-year of support and updates for just $39. So I would buy it now before the price goes up! And then you can enjoy seeing your website get much faster!
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