How to optimize a website for better performance and user experience?

Optimizing a website for better performance and user experience involves a few steps that focus on improving load times, ensuring mobile-friendliness, enhancing navigability, and providing engaging, relevant content. Optimization is also crucial in the context of SEO, an important part of digital marketing. 

To optimize your website for a better performance take these steps (below I elaborate about each step in details):

1. Improve Page Load Speed
2. Ensure Mobile-Friendliness
3. Enhance Navigation and Site Structure:
4. Optimize Content
5. Improve Technical SEO
6. Enhance User Interaction
7. Regularly Monitor and Test

Start from improving page load speed

First things first, to check how your website performs go try Google’s PageSpeed Insights tool.

Optimize graphics components 

Compress images without compromising quality. Current standard is a WebP for images (alternatives are AVIF and JPG). Try not to use PNG (this is a lossless format and the files will be heavier than WebP, AVIF or JPG.) Never-ever use TIFF. Concern SVG – you should be careful not to export raster images or vector graphics with a lot of elements in this format. In such a situation, if SVG was included in the code inline (and not in the <img> tag), it could even generate a browser “crash”. When it comes to videos, and you don’t just embed YouTube or Vimeo links, use WebM format. MP4 is acceptable, but WebM is better. 

Enable Browser Caching

When users visit your website, their browser downloads various files like images, stylesheets, and scripts to display the content. By enabling browser caching, you configure your server to store these static resources (unchanging files) on the user’s device. This means that when they visit your site again, their browser can quickly load these files from their local storage instead of downloading them all over again, significantly reducing load times on repeat visits.

Minimize HTTP Requests

Every time a user’s browser needs to load a file from your server, it makes an HTTP request. The more files it needs to load, the more requests it makes, which can slow down your website. You can minimize these requests by combining multiple CSS and JavaScript files into single files, reducing the number of plugins (which often add their own files to load), and using CSS sprites—where you combine multiple images into a single image and use CSS to display only the part you need. This reduces the number of individual files the browser needs to load, speeding up the page.

Use a Content Delivery Network (CDN)

A Content Delivery Network (CDN) is a network of servers distributed around the globe. When you use a CDN, your website’s static content (like images, stylesheets, and scripts) is copied and stored on all these servers. When a user visits your website, the CDN delivers the content from the server closest to them. This reduces the distance data has to travel, resulting in faster load times, no matter where your users are located.

Minify CSS, JavaScript, and HTML

Code for your website often contains unnecessary spaces, comments, and other characters that are helpful for developers but not needed for the browser to display the site. Minifying your CSS, JavaScript, and HTML means stripping out these unnecessary characters to make the files smaller. Smaller files load faster, leading to quicker page load times. This process doesn’t affect how the site looks or functions but makes the code more efficient to transfer and process. 

Make sure your website is mobile-friendly*

*I would only add one IF here: “if your website’s traffic is in majority from mobile”. Okay, as of 2024, mobile devices excluding tablets accounted for nearly 60 percent of web page views worldwide. However it does not mean your website’s traffic will be 60% from mobile. Keep it in mind and check your own page statistics 😉

Responsive Design

Responsive design means creating a website that automatically adapts to the screen size and resolution of the device it’s being viewed on. Whether a user visits your site on a desktop, tablet, or smartphone, the layout and content will adjust to provide the best possible viewing experience. This eliminates the need for users to pinch, zoom, scroll excessively or wait for eternity to load, making your website more user-friendly and accessible on any device.

Mobile-First Indexing

Google now primarily uses the mobile version of your website for ranking and indexing in search results. This shift, known as mobile-first indexing, means that your site’s mobile version needs to be as detailed and functional as the desktop version. If your mobile site lacks content or functionality, it could negatively impact your search engine rankings. Ensuring your mobile site is robust and comprehensive helps maintain or improve your visibility in search results.

Touch-Friendly Design

On mobile devices, users interact with websites through touchscreens. To make your site touch-friendly, ensure buttons and links are large enough to be easily tapped with a finger. Additionally, design your navigation to be intuitive and easy to use on a touchscreen. This involves spacing out clickable elements to prevent accidental taps and ensuring menus are straightforward to navigate, enhancing the overall user experience on mobile devices.

Enhance navigation and site structure

Simple Navigation Menu

A simple navigation menu is crucial for a positive user experience. It should be clear and straightforward, allowing users to quickly find the information or pages they need. This means using concise labels, logical categories, and a clean layout. A well-organized menu helps users navigate your site effortlessly, reducing frustration and encouraging them to stay longer.

Breadcrumbs

Breadcrumbs are a secondary navigation aid that show users the path they have taken to arrive at a particular page. Typically displayed at the top of a page, breadcrumbs help users understand their current location within the site’s structure and provide an easy way to navigate back to previous pages. This feature enhances usability, especially on complex websites with multiple levels of content.

Internal Linking

Internal links are hyperlinks that connect different pages within your website. Strategically placing internal links throughout your content helps guide users to related articles, products, or information. This not only improves the user experience by making it easier to discover relevant content, but also encourages visitors to spend more time on your site, which can positively impact your search engine rankings.

Content optimization

Relevant and High-Quality Content

Focus on providing content that is valuable, informative, and engaging. Your content should address the needs and interests of your audience, offering solutions, insights, or entertainment. For example, if your audience consists of small business owners, create detailed guides on effective marketing strategies or financial management tips. High-quality content helps build trust and credibility with your users, encouraging them to return to your site. A well-researched case study on industry trends can also position your site as an authoritative resource. Ultimately, conduct your audience research to discover topics they are interested in the most.

Use Headers and Subheaders

Organize your content using headers (H1, H2, H3) to create a clear structure. This makes the content easier to read and digest, and also helps search engines understand the hierarchy and main points of your content. Well-structured content can improve both user experience and SEO. Your headers should reflect the general logic of the page’s content.

Multimedia Elements

Incorporate images, videos, infographics, and other multimedia to make your content more engaging and break up long blocks of text. However, ensure these elements are optimized for fast loading to avoid slowing down your site. Properly optimized multimedia can enhance the user experience without compromising performance. (Optimize graphics components part in this article)

Improve Technical SEO

Clean URL Structure

Use short, descriptive URLs that include relevant keywords. Clean URLs are easier for users to read and remember, and they help search engines understand the content of your pages, potentially improving your search rankings. For example, a blog post about SEO tips could have a URL like “yoursite.com/blog/seo-tips” rather than “yoursite.com/post?id=12345.”

XML Sitemap

An XML sitemap is a file that lists all the pages on your website, helping search engines crawl and index your site more effectively. Submitting an XML sitemap ensures that search engines are aware of all your content and can index it properly. For instance, if you regularly update your blog, your sitemap will help search engines quickly discover and index new posts.

Robots.txt

The robots.txt file gives you control over which parts of your site search engines can crawl and index. Properly configuring this file can prevent search engines from accessing duplicate or sensitive content, ensuring they focus on your most important pages. For example, you might use robots.txt to block search engines from indexing internal search results pages or staging areas of your site.

Enhance User Interaction

Clear Call-to-Actions (CTAs)

Use prominent and compelling CTAs to guide users towards specific actions, such as signing up for a newsletter, downloading a resource, or making a purchase. Clear CTAs help direct user behavior and improve conversion rates. For example, a bright, noticeable button with text like “Get Your Free Ebook” can attract attention and encourage users to take action.

User-Friendly Forms

Simplify forms by minimizing the number of required fields and ensuring they are easy to complete on both desktop and mobile devices. User-friendly forms reduce friction in the user experience, making it more likely that visitors will complete them. For instance, a contact form that only asks for a name, email, and message is more likely to be completed than one that requires extensive personal details.

Monitor and test your website regularly

Performance Monitoring Tools

Utilize tools like already mentioned Google PageSpeed Insights to regularly check your site’s performance. Other interesting to mention are GTmetrix or Pingdom. These tools can identify areas that need improvement, helping you maintain optimal speed and efficiency. For example, if Google PageSpeed Insights shows that your images are slowing down your site, you can take steps to compress and optimize them. (once again, tips how you can find at the beginning of this article in Optimize graphics components)

A/B Testing

Conduct A/B testing to compare different versions of your design elements, layouts, and content. This allows you to see what resonates best with your audience and make data-driven decisions to enhance your site’s effectiveness. For instance, you might test two different headlines for a landing page to see which one results in more sign-ups or sales.

Key takeaways on how to optimize a website for better performance and user experience

Optimizing a website for better performance and user experience involves a combination of technical enhancements, design improvements, and content optimization. Focusing on load speed, mobile-friendliness, easy navigation, high-quality content, and regular performance monitoring ensures that users have

1. Improve Page Load Speed: Utilize Google’s PageSpeed Insights, optimize image formats, enable browser caching, minimize HTTP requests, use a CDN, and minify code.
2. Ensure Mobile-Friendliness: Implement responsive design, prioritize mobile-first indexing, and design touch-friendly interfaces.
3. Enhance Navigation and Site Structure: Create a simple navigation menu, use breadcrumbs, and incorporate internal linking.
4. Content Optimization: Provide relevant, high-quality content, use headers and subheaders, and include optimized multimedia elements.
5. Improve Technical SEO: Maintain a clean URL structure, create an XML sitemap, and configure robots.txt.
6. Enhance User Interaction: Use clear CTAs and user-friendly forms.

Regularly Monitor and Test: Use performance monitoring tools and conduct A/B testing to continually improve your site.