Make your WordPress website faster than Apple.com FREE! - Part 1 the CDN

Is your website loading slowly? In this guide I will teach you step by step how to make your website load faster than Apple.com and GoDaddy.com. Website speed is critical for good SEO.

Don't worry, I made this one easy for everyone to follow, just read on!

The first thing we need is a Content Delivery Network. This is a network of cache servers all over the world that make copies of your website. When a user makes a request, the content is served from the local copy which is close to the customer. This avoids the need to transfer data from a remote server through the various networks of the internet to reach your customer. See the two diagram below.

This is the traditional setup. Customers in China and Germany will have to go through various networks in the cloud to reach the server in the US. Even the customer in the US who is the closest to the server may need to go a distance to get to the US server.

Using a CDN will allow us to have a copy of the website near the customer's computer to access, without having to go long distances and through various networks to get to the original server in the US. Instead, now the customer's request is handled by the local cache servers.

The great part about this is: Setting it up is nowhere near as complicated as it looks.

First head over to Cloudflare.com and create a free account.

Click on sign up

Type in your email and choose a password

Type in the domain name of your website.

Select the free plan and click on confirm plan.

Do not change any DNS settings

Simply click continue

Write down the name servers that cloud flair wants you to use.

This step will be different depending on who your host is and where they put the links for you to click on. You want to update your domain name servers to point to CloudFlare's DNS servers. The following instructions are for Mobilize My Business web hosting customer, but they can be easily adapted to fit your needs if you use a different domain registration service. You just have to use a little common-sense to figure out where the options are once you log in to your web host.

Log in to your Mobilize My Business account, ignore any advertisements or messages.

Click on the person icon on the top right.

Click on My Products.

You should see the domain you purchased in the list here.

Click on DNS and scroll down to the section called Name Servers

Click on Change settings and paste in the name servers CloudFlair wants us to use.

Change the type to custom and enter the servers given to you by CloudFlair earlier.

Click Save

Thats it. In a few moments CloudFlare will be the middle man between you and your customers. Now there is one last thing that we need to do. We need to enable caching to speed up your site!

While logged into couldflare.com, click on the DNS square shown above. You will see your DNS settings. You will want the domain name record and the www listing to be in proxied mode. If one of the is not, it will show a grey cloud, if it is active it will show an orange cloud. If either of the items show a grey cloud, click on the grey cloud to turn it orange indicating that proxy is active. See the picture below.

Now you have a speed optimized website that makes the industry leaders look like silly clowns, and the best part is that you did not have to pay a cent to do it!

Keep an eye out! Soon I will be writing part 2 of my guide to speed up your website!

Enjoy your new found speed!