Two of the most crucial aspects of a website is its performance and safety.
Users want your website to load fast. A website that loads faster is preferred by Google.
Safety is certainly not fun and you don’t want to lose your business because of a “hack attack” on your website!
Here are 9 simple ways that you can easily implement in order to make your website safer and load faster:
1- Use HTTP Keep-alive Response Headers
Every time an interaction happens between the browser and the server, the browser requests a file and the server returns an OK.
If you have the HTTP Keep-alive headers on the server then the browser needs to accept this OK only once while transferring a number of files. This drastically reduces the network overhead and improves the speed.
To add HTTP Keep-alive header, simply edit the .htaccess file and add the following code in it:
<ifModule mod_headers.c>
Header set Connection keep-alive
</ifModule>
2- Utilize Lazy Loading
Lazy loading is a technique whereby web elements (images, videos and scripts) are not rendered unless they are needed. This ultimately helps to speed up the website.
If you are running a WordPress site, then you can simply install the Lazy Load XT plugin. It is a fully customizable plugin that lets you lazy load images, YouTube videos, iframes and Vimeo videos.
3- Implement a CDN
CDN stands for Content Delivery Network.
CDN helps to distribute your web files across different web servers and lets the browser access several files at the same time thereby improving the file download speed.
There are several CDN providers like Incapsula that provide security, web caching, load balancing and DDoS mitigation.
A CDN has high capacity infrastructures and distributed data centers. It helps to save bandwidth and improve latency time which in turn boosts the performance of the website.
4- Minimize Javascript and CSS
It is always recommended to adopt a minimalistic design. Try minimizing Javascript and CSS as this will reduce the size of the requested resources and in turn will improve the speed of the site.
5- Install Security Plugins
Here is a list of top security plugins to keep your site secured:
WordFence: It allows Country Blocking, Scheduled Scans, Password Auditing and real-time updates. It offers a two-factor authentication, and you can even check if your website IP address is being used to Spamvertize.
All in One WP Security and Firewall: It reduces security risk by checking for vulnerabilities, and enforcing the latest recommended WordPress security practices and techniques.
BulletProof Security: It offers Firewall Security, Login Security, Database Security & Backup, Logging Security, HTTP Error Logging, FrontEnd – BackEnd Maintenance Mode and other features.
6- Make use of Parameterized Queries
A parameterized query is a type of query where placeholders are used in place of parameters and parameter values are supplied at execution time. It is recommended to use parameterized queries in order to avoid SQL injection attacks.
An example parametrized query is shared below:
$name = $_REQUEST[‘name’];
$email = $_REQUEST[’email’];
$params = array($name, $email);
$sql = ‘INSERT INTO CustomerTable (Name, Email) VALUES (?, ?)’;
7- Switch to HTTPS
In order to provide critical security and data integrity, you should always have HTTPS in your website.
HTTPS does not allow leakage of communication between servers and client browsers. It protects the user data and also prevents exploitation of images, cookies, HTML and scripts.
HTTPS protects the privacy and security of your users and never discloses any sensitive information.
8- Use Super Strong Passwords
Creating a super strong password is an important consideration to boost up the security of the web server.
Here are some guidelines to create strong passwords:
- Use at least eight characters.
- Have lower-case letter, upper-case letter, number and punctuation mark.
- Use Lookalike characters like O as in Oscar and the number 0.
- Don’t use common words or personal information.
9- Take the Mobile Friendly Test
People are using their mobile devices to browse websites. Hence, it becomes crucial for your business to have a seamless mobile presence. The Mobile Friendly Test from Google lets you view your website as a mobile viewer might view it and provide suggestions to make your site faster.
There are several things to do to improve the performance of your website. The above mentioned 9 things are the most crucial ones that will surely help to make your website faster and safer.
