Is your Sitecore website performing poorly? Find out why

by ​Sujain Thomas, Guest Contributor

​Sitecore is one of the most powerful CMS platforms that are currently available for website content management. All standard CMS platforms offer content management, but Sitecore offers much more than that. It can help the site owner add new pages using existing modules, edit, add or remove content from the pages, optimize the UX and improve webpage loading speed. However, just like any other CMS, Sitecore can also give the user performance trouble. 

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Slow load of web pages and glitches in the user experience (UX) can lead to several visitors abandoning the site. It contributes to a higher bounce rate and lower dwell time. These are important signals that Google considers while ranking a site. Glitches in your Sitecore implementation can compromise the performance and traffic of your website.

Poor-performing Sitecore implementations are not the norm. They are exceptions that can arise due to one or many problems occurring together. Therefore, if you are having site performance issues we have good news for you – it is not your website or the platform.

Every CMS platform is a result of complex architectures, code and much more. Therefore diagnosing the exact reason for the trouble in your case might take some time. In fact, there might be an interplay of at least five reasons. Get Fish Tank has spent considerable time helping Sitecore users. According to the Sitecore Partners, the top reasons you might be facing Sitecore performance issues are:

Configuration conundrums
If your website is slow, you might have your configuration to blame for that. Here are some of the most common configuration problems people have faced while using Sitecore:

• The OS may swap SQL data in case you have failed to cap the memory usage of your MSSQL at around 90%. It can result in overall poor performance of your Sitecore implementation.
• You should configure your server to compress the static content like the CSS and JavaScript elements. Not compressing them can increase the load time.
• The queries slow down when you have set the indices set to index all fields. Indexing more than necessary content can result in the snail’s pace.

Most Sitecore configuration challenges involve media. Most media is present in the database and not caching it correctly can make Sitecore pull every media file from the database and resize it according to the page. It can increase the waiting time for all visitors significantly. Moreover, failure to configure the Sitecore implementation in the new way to fetch media can cause glitches during the media requests.

Bad code
While you may think that codes are overrated when it comes to optimization of a site's performance, no certified Sitecore partner will ever agree. We have seen far too many good sites with wrong codes take a beating from search engines. Poor codes are a telltale sign of amateur developers, who do not know Sitecore inside-out. All Sitecore websites can experience performance issues when they lack maintenance (Code updates).

If your website is facing performance issues due to poorly written codes, you need to work with a certified partner to improve its performance. Sometimes, website owners have “leftover” code. If you have some as a result of a rewrite, do not delete them. Deleting these codes can slow your Sitecore website down since it will demand significant resources to power the solution.

Problems with caching
Caching might seem like extra work, but a poor configuration of caching can lead to performance issues of your Sitecore site. Sometimes, developers do not set up HTML caching on the renderings. While at other times, they set it up incorrectly resulting in additional use of resources by the Sitecore implementation.

The lack of proper HTML caching configuration can also compromise your site's ability to support increased traffic and content maintenance. It can result in the CMS fetching data directly from the database more frequently than it should. Similarly, if the developer has failed to configure the server to allow the visitor's browser to cache all static content, the visitor's browser will have to request the re-used CSS, JavaScript, and images for every request.

Poor maintenance
Almost all Sitecore partners will tell you that maintenance is the key to keeping your websites snappy and snazzy. Without proper cleaning up, updating and necessary additions your Sitecore site will become slow, annoying and burdensome. It mainly happens because the Sitecore databases use MSSQL indexes extensively. If they do not receive proper pruning and care, they lose integrity over time. The lack of maintenance can fragment the MSSQL indexes, leading to increased data retrieval time.

Sitecore inherently stores the images, videos, and documents in its media library. These take up significant space in the content databases. If the website maintenance team does not remove the unnecessary files regularly, they can consume the lion's share of the space. As the bulk of these unnecessary or outdated media files increases, the database server takes longer to load.

Unfit hosting environment
It is true for almost all websites irrespective of all CMS platforms – an inadequate hosting platform can compromise the functions of a site. Your Sitecore environment can lack the instances or CPUs to handle the necessary traffic load. Almost all hosting issues Sitecore users face depend upon the type of hosting plan they have selected.

Hosting on Microsoft Azure can give you several challenges along the path including:

• The lack of configuration to use appropriate tier
• The Lack of SQL database configuration with a necessary number of DTUs

Hosting Sitecore on any physical hardware poses a different set of challenges, like:

• Sites that experience heavy traffic might need SQL server enterprise.
• The SQL Server Professional limits the system RAM and CPUs.

Restricting your choice of hosting according to the cost can deprive you of necessary RAM, and CPU power. It can compromise your ability to configure data caching and HTML.

The only way to fix the Sitecore problems is by choosing the right Sitecore partner, who can help you update your version of the software, check the compatibility of added plug-ins, and notify you when the page loading speed deteriorates. Choosing the right Sitecore Partner can turn your website around and arm you with the latest upgrades that can turn your site into a traffic magnet.

Author Bio: 

​Sujain Thomas is a data expert. She has been working with complex database architecture and big data analytics for almost eight years now. She has been helping many leading corporations optimize their customer service and product introductions as per big data analysis and predictive analysis.

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