The sudden surge in website traffic is the dream of every online store owner.
If you are already trying to use social media, search engine optimization (SEO) and other marketing strategies to promote your website, your traffic may grow steadily over time. However, what if the traffic of your store suddenly increases?
Does your website have the ability to deal with it? If not, you may encounter some problems, these problems may cause you to miss the reputation of sales or damage your reputation:
The performance of your website may be affected, and your webpage may be loaded loaded Slow
Your website may be completely closed
Users may encounter problems when checking out and shopping carts
Therefore, in order to avoid all these, it is important to be important. It is to try to measure when it may occur and understand how to prepare for your e -commerce website to cope with surge in traffic.
Can you predict when your website will attract a large number of customers?
This is not always the case, but there are some common reasons here:
123] Well -known website mentioned or linked back to your website.
Your product or content is promoted by online influencers.
You release the content of trend or popular theme.
The specific time of your seasonal products in the holidays or a year will attract more attention.
Your website \”viral spread\” on social media.
You and/or your company attracted attention on the media (for example on the shark tank)
Any of these things will increase your website traffic, but imagine If some of them happen at the same time. If you don’t want to miss sales, you need to prepare in advance.
How to prepare your online store to increase traffic
When preparing a website for a large number of customers, consider the following categories: technical adjustment, testing and inventory.
Technical adjustment
1. Check it with your custody company.
The first thing you should do is check your website custody package. Many hosts limit the amount of resources that your website and traffic can be used, especially if you use a shared host plan (meaningFollow you to share server space with other customers). If you are expected to increase website traffic, it may be time to shift from a shared hosting plan to a more powerful plan, such as cloud custody.
The cloud custody plan with a load balancer is a good choice, but if you are not sure or do not know where to start, please contact your network custodian to understand their suggestions.
Your perfect solution will completely depend on your current website traffic and how much you expect it to increase.
Also ask them what will happen if they reach resource restrictions. Some hosts will transfer you to a higher level to accommodate additional traffic and then charge you, which is better than the custody company. If it uses too many resources, it will completely close your website.
2. Make sure your website is the latest.
Update your website is always important, but when you look forward to a large number of new visitors, it becomes particularly important. Update your theme and plug -in, and your PHP version. You can contact your custody company to understand your current version and request to update it to meet WordPress requirements.
Important reminder: Before making any changes, please backup your current website.
If you need to upgrade your PHP version, use a free PHP compatible plug -in checker to ensure your theme, plug -in and resource compatibility.
3. Use content delivery network (CDN).
CDN stores your website content on many locations around the world. When someone visits your website, the content will be loaded from the nearest available server to speed up delivery. This may sound complicated, but your visitors will benefit from the improvement of speed, especially if you have global audiences. In short, this solution is very suitable for website traffic that may be poured into, because a \”interrupt\” will not stop people from accessing your website because you will have \”\” \” Copy.
If you are looking for high -quality free CDNs, consider JetPack, which also has many additional functions, such as image optimization.
4. Install the cache plug -in.
Another way to help stabilize the performance of the website is to cache. This helps reduce the \”communication\” between WordPress and databases by creating temporary static HTML versions on the creation page.
Therefore, WordPress does not need to run to your database to obtain information (especially at high traffic), but can provide the cache version of your client, thereby speeding up loading time and improving performance. Some cache plugins can be seen:
wpp Super cache W3 total cache The fastest cache of WP
Test
1. Operating website performance and speed check:
Basic measurement of the speed and performance of your website is very important, especially when you plan to poured in a lot.
One way to check the speed of the website is to use free tools, such as Google or GTMETRIX’s Page Speed \u200b\u200bInsights. Both options will analyze your website and provide you with suggestions on how to improve the speed. For example:
Optimize your image (we provide a complete tutorial on how to perform this operation here)
Use the browser cache (as described above)
] Use CDN (as described above)
Reduce CSS, HTML, and other scripts (you can use the cache plug -in above to complete)
You can also use free P3 (free P3 (free P3 ( Plug -in Performance Analyst) Plug -in Plug -in Performance Check.
If you use it, make sure it will be discontinued after completion, because it may occupy a large amount of resources for a long time.
by checking the performance and speed of your website and making necessary changes to improve your improvement For scores, your website will be able to better deal with a wave of traffic.
2. Running pressure test: Once you optimize the technology of the website, you can run the \”pressure test\” to ensure that your website can cope with customers ‘citizens’ cope Increase.
How can you do this?
Use the load test tool to \”forge\” the traffic of your website has increased and view itPerformance. By testing this with different quantitative traffic, you can determine the number you can handle that you can handle without a significant impact on performance.
Important reminder: Before performing this operation, make sure your database is optimized, your server settings are correct, and you have enough recovery options.
We recommend that you perform pressure tests on temporary websites instead of real -time websites. Please note that you must accurately understand the functions of your website. Your on stage must be the same as your real -time website settings.
The execution pressure test may be a bit complicated, so it is best to leave it to intermediate and advanced website developers. This is a great article that helps you understand more information about relevant specifications and entry methods.
If you want to use the load test without your own hands, there are many websites dedicated to Woocommerce to help you.
Inventory
Finally, when preparing for potential traffic, please consider your inventory.
Although you may not be able to accurately predict when the surge will occur, it may occur, but you are ready It is always better than a major opportunity.
Look at the sales of your last traffic peak. This will help you understand what will happen in inventory.
Then, check your WOOCOMMERCE inventory carefully. Do you want to show your customers the number of remaining inventory products? Do you want them to buy products that are postponed?
Do you set a notification to let you know if the inventory is insufficient or out of stock?
In terms of inventory, Woocommerce provides a lot of options for your products. View our documents here! If you are looking for more control and flexibility, we provide extensive expansion to help you.
Conclusion
In short, the surge in website traffic is very exciting! However, if your website is not ready for this, it will also bring pressure.
Therefore, whether your website is surging in traffic or customer surge, it is very important to understand your choice in advance, so you can make a game plan.
and because you can’t predictThe surge occurs, so it is always a good idea to continue to follow the optimal practice in maintaining website renewal, backup and optimization speed.
3. Use content delivery network (CDN). 
