A Step-by-Step Guide to Optimizing Magento Store Performance
Magento, a leading eCommerce platform, is well-known for its customisation and robust features. However, if not properly configured, your Magento store’s performance will never reach its full potential. For example, Magento offers various search engine optimisation features.
Unless these features are supported by an equally powerful Magento 2 SEO extension, improving your rankings and user experience can prove to be quite a challenge. Likewise, there are numerous Magento third party apps and services which can give your store a much-needed boost.
In this article, we will guide you in detail regarding optimising your Magento store performance. When we talk about optimisation in the context of performance, the discussion can go on and on. Therefore, we will limit our focus to areas that will generate the greatest impact.
Optimising Your Magento 2 Store Performance
1. Server Optimisation
Unfortunately, this is one area which often gets neglected. When setting up the store, most merchants tend to get the cheapest hosting service. Their reasoning is that they don’t need an expensive hosting right now and they can easily upgrade once there is a need for it. However, we recommend choosing the best and most reliable provider right away. Our experience tells us that dedicated or VPS hosting is the best choice.
In case you already have the best hosting possible, focus on server optimisation. For instance, ensure you are using the latest PHP version. For example, the latest PHP version 8.2 offers significant improvements over the older versions. Likewise, cache mechanisms like Redis or Varnish can improve loading times. Lastly, cleaning the database regularly can avoid common server-related issues.
2. Magento Updates
Surprisingly, a lot of merchants are still running their stores on Magento 1. While it may still get the job done, but not for long. Magento 1 has reached the end of its life a long time ago. So, it is imperative that such store owners migrate to Magento 2 right away. The latest version is much more secure, faster, and offers considerable features that can boost your store’s overall performance.
If you are already running Magento 2, you need to update it to the latest version. Each update comes with new features, fixes, and security patches. This ensures that your store is always up to date and free from any vulnerabilities. Also, caching and store performance go hand in hand. We recommend enabling full page cache. Here’s a detailed tutorial on how to enable full page cache in Magento 2.
Based on our experience, we recommend that you opt for Varnish Cache over built-in caching mechanisms. The reason is that Varnish Cache is more powerful and simply a lot better. The only downside to it is that it can be a bit challenging to set up. However, there are a lot of detailed guidelines available on it online. Here’s additional information on Magento 2 Varnish Cache.
3. Search Engine Optimisation
Just by making your store search engine friendly, you’ll notice a significant improvement in the store’s overall performance. SEO can be further divided into three – on page, off page, and technical. All three go hand in hand. In other words, you must focus on all three for the best results. Magento offers a wide range of built-in SEO features such as image optimisation, canonical tags, rich snippets, and more.
By combining them with a SEO extension, you’ll get the best possible results. In SEO, focus on areas like image optimisation. Compress the images but without impacting their quality to improve the page loading time. Ensure that images are served in next-gen formats. Use a Magento 2 SEO extension to monitor duplicate content and implement canonical URLs or hreflang tags to avoid duplicate content penalty.
Additionally, using content delivery networks ensure that users access content from the closest servers. Another often overlooked aspect in SEO is the importance of clean and SEO-friendly URLs. A URL must be easy to read and include the primary or at the very least secondary keyword. Implementing breadcrumbs can enhance the site navigation experience.
Moreover, fix all broken links. We recommend redirecting 404 pages to relevant URLs for enhanced user experience. All the content (on page copy, blogs, and any other content) must be keyword rich. Do not use AI for the content as search engines like Google are penalising AI content. So, hire an expert writer for this purpose. Lastly, ensure product descriptions are unique and perfectly describe the product in question.
When optimising your website for the search engines, avoid these common Magento 2 SEO mistakes. Almost every merchant commits these mistakes, thereby undermining their store’s visibility. Apart from the above tips, we recommend going through our 9 tips to boost your Magento 2 store’s SEO performance. After implementing these tips, you will see noticeable improvements.
4. Check Third Party Extensions
Like other eCommerce platforms, Magento allows you to link your store with as many third-party extensions as you wish. These extensions provide additional features that Magento 2 does not offer. However, not all extensions are beneficial for your store’s performance. Therefore, the first recommendation is to install extensions only from reliable Magento marketplaces.
Secondly, don’t forget to monitor these extensions. Remove unnecessary extensions or those that offer overlapping features. Only use one extension at a time rather than two or more for the same purpose. When you update your Magento to the latest version, some extensions become incompatible. Therefore, it is imperative that you remove these extensions altogether or update them to ensure compatibility.
5. Check the Mode
Magento offers 3 modes: production, default, and developer. The last two are for testing and debugging. Therefore, avoid using them unless you need to undertake changes. Switch to the production mode for a faster and seamless user experience. To check the current mode, just use the following command:
bin/magento deploy:mode:show
Magento will display the current mode after:
**Current application mode** section
To change the mode, type:
bin/magento deploy:mode:set production
Replace production with other two modes to switch to any of them.
6. Security
Furthermore, implement the HTTPS protocol to enhance your store’s security and improve SEO performance. Google and other search engines give more preference to HTTPS, thereby making your webpages more visible. Certain web browsers are more aggressive when it comes to caching HTTPS content, thereby improving the website’s loading speed.
7. Theme
Lastly, we recommend using a lightweight theme. If you are using a custom theme, ensure that it is well-optimised. This will improve the loading times. Also, a well-designed theme makes it easier for user to navigate the website and find the relevant products. Don’t forget to block the default theme pages from being indexed. You can use the robots.txt file for this purpose. Otherwise, this will impact your SEO strategy and affect your ranking.
Conclusion
This concludes our article on how to optimise your Magento store’s performance. We have tried to cover every possible area that will have the greatest impact. If you have a specific query or are facing issues with your store’s performance, don’t hesitate to contact MAGETOP. It is a leading Magento extensions and custom development company. With years of experience under its belt, no issue is unsolved for the MAGETOP team.
