3 Easy Steps to Improve Your Site Speed on Squarespace

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Are you worried that people are leaving your site well before they have the chance to explore what your business offers? Do you think it’s because your site is taking way too long to load? That certainly might be the case, and it could be bad for business and for your search engine rankings.  

At Launch Happy we specialize in SEO services that get our clients noticed. We’ve written this article with you, the small business owner, in mind. Our goal is to share Squarespace SEO tips designed to improve your site’s speed and integrity while creating a better experience for any visitor who lands on your site. 

We also present simple ways to check your site’s speed and compare it to others. By implementing our Squarespace-specific and SEO-boosting strategies, you can take concrete steps to reduce site loading times and keep visitors on your site longer. The longer someone stays on your site, the higher your chances of making a sale, gaining a subscriber, and growing your customer base. 

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Test Your Speed: Is It Comparable To Other Sites? 

First, of the over 200 different metrics that Google Tracks, speed is one of the least important. Unless your site takes over 4 seconds to load, please do not worry too much about how speed will affect your SEO rankings. Squarespace sites can rank well, but speed is not one of their strengths. While we’re hesitant to suggest it, you may find it useful to check your site’s performance against other sites like Google, YouTube, or Wikipedia. Is your site really that slow compared to others? Chances are, it’s not. Your site may load about as quickly as similar sites within your industry. But if the analysis shows it’s very slow, you can start by seeing what suggestions the speed testing tool offers. If you need to, we suggest using Pingdom Website Speed Test. As a word of caution, not all Speed test tools operate the same. Always measure your site against other, larger sites as well as your direct competitors.

If you find it impractical to implement the tool’s suggestions, don’t fret. There are other ways to boost your Squarespace site’s SEO without having to get overly technical. 

You Don’t Have To Be A Squarespace SEO Expert To Optimize Your Site 

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We know that as a freelancer or business owner, you have a thousand things to do. Tweaking your Squarespace site a little here and there in the hopes of miraculously achieving the perfect search engine optimization is probably not the best use of your time.  

The good news is that you don’t have to be a Squarespace SEO expert to improve your site speed and get better, more targeted traffic. Even if you have very little time on your hands, you can take three simple steps this week to improve your website’s integrity, improve page loading speed, retain more visitors, and improve your SEO ranking. 

Step 1: Secure Your Squarespace Website 

If your site begins with http://, you will need to change it to https:// in order to make it more secure. Particularly if your site takes visitors’ information, including credit card details, it’s imperative that this sensitive info is handled securely.  

What’s more, your Squarespace site will take a hit in terms of SEO ranking, courtesy of Google, if it’s not secure. To fix this issue, do the following: 

• Log in to your Squarespace account and choose the site you’ll be changing 

• Locate Settings>Advanced>SSL 

• Select the Secure and HSTS Secure options 

That’s it! With this one simple step that takes just a few minutes to complete, you’ll have taken a big step towards improving your Squarespace’s SEO ranking. 

Step 2: Use Smaller Image Files 

One of the biggest culprits in terms of slowing down your site’s loading speed is the size of your images. If you have a lot of enormous images, or even just one gigantic image file, your site will load slower than your visitors might like.  

To fix this problem, simply get into the habit of uploading images in smaller file sizes. You can also compress your existing images before you upload them to Squarespace. TinyPNG is a good tool to use for compressing and reducing the size of your image files. 

Step 3: Enable AMP For Your Blogs 

Did you know you could make your site’s content load faster on mobile devices? It’s a very quick and easy trick that involves the Accelerated Mobile Pages option. Simply do the following: 

• Go to your main Squarespace panel and select Settings> Blogging 

• Scroll down to the bottom of your blogging options 

• Select the AMP Enabled option 

Ready For More Squarespace SEO Tips? 

Our three steps above should help improve your site’s SEO ranking over time. If you’re ready to learn more ways to give your Squarespace site’s search engine optimization a boost, turn to our free guides, where you’ll find plenty of free, helpful resources to optimize your site and, ultimately, generate more business.  

Whether you’re trying to figure out how to get the most from Squarespace for blogging, or you want additional SEO tips to have your site rank above your competitors, our guides can supply current information that’s worth your while. Browse through our guides today for great tips and SEO insights!