We recently launched our new website at ITXDesign.com that features our new line of VPS Servers, Dedicated Servers, and Shared Web Hosting Plans.  After the launch we were tasked with quickly optimizing the site to take advantage of some of the latest optimization and caching tools.  The first thing you should do before making any changes to your website is test the site using webpagetest.org.  This will allow you to establish a benchmark on where your test ranks.  Run the test:

When we first ran the test we had very low rankings for:
<ul>
	<li>First Byte Time</li>
	<li>Compress Transfer</li>
	<li>Compress Images</li>
	<li>Progressive JPEGs</li>
	<li>Cache static content</li>
	<li>Effective use of CDN</li>
</ul>
Our goal was to get all A's since we're over achievers, however it wasn't an easy task.  Our visitors appreciate a fast loading website so we began the process of speeding things up.

This tutorial is primarily for Wordpress Websites as that's what we use for our corporate sites.

Step 1.  We installed and configured WP Super Cache.  To complete the install login to your worpdress admin, click Plugins, and then search for "WP Super Cache".  Click the install and the activate the plugin.  This alone will address a lot of the issues.  Once the install is complete go to the settings for the plugin, Click the Easy tab, and then select "On" caching.  Then Click Update Status.  After this we would suggest clicking the Advanced Tab and be sure to select the following options:
<ul>
	<li>Cache hits to this website for quick access. (Recommended)</li>
	<li>Use mod_rewrite to serve cache files. (Recommended)</li>
	<li>Compress pages so they’re served more quickly to visitors. (Recommended)</li>
	<li>Cache rebuild. Serve a supercache file to anonymous users while a new file is being generated. (Recommended)</li>
</ul>
Then Click Update Status

This will enable the WP Super Cache Plugin, however there's still one more step.  After applying these changes you must click Update Mod_Rewrite Rules.  This will update your .htaccess file automatically with all of the caching directives so caching is enabled.

This step really helps with the <strong>First Byte Time </strong>and<strong> Compress Images</strong>.  It causes your website to create a cache version of each of your dynamic pages.  In other words it speeds up the first response from the server since it doesn't happen to make multiple mysql calls and generate the page on the fly.

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