7 Highly Effective CDN-SEO Tips to Boost Your Rankings

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Content Delivery Network or CDN is the modern-day messenger pigeon that races across time and distance to deliver information.
To put in simple words, CDN is a group of proxy servers that deliver content to the users within a quick time from the nearest server.
Luckily for us, CDNs cannot be shot down by enemy kingdoms and don’t die from fatigue. But their responsibility to deliver timely content is far more urgent as the wrath of online shoppers can be deadly to Ecommerce businesses.
When in the hands of innovative businesses, CDNs can be used as a potent weapon to boost overall visibility. It is a great tool to minimize the page load time, improve security, boost search engine rankings and optimize content availability. Its main goal is to keep the request-response time as low as possible so that pages load faster.
This will ensure that popular search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo will display links to your website content right at the top.
This way, visibility being can be easily achieved, which is SEO's primary goal. And this, in turn, will attract more traffic which will translate into direct revenue. A study by Bing shows that websites that appear on top of a search garner 42% traffic while websites that appear second and third only receive 11% and 8%.
As CDN reduces and optimizes page loading time significantly, it directly impacts the search engine results. Customers will find your page faster, spend less time purchasing your services, and hence will have a hassle-free online experience.
Let's have a quick look at seven ways in which your SEO ratings can be effectively improved using CDN.

1. Minimizes Page Loading Time

In the internet world, speed is good; speed doesn't kill. Having pages that load less than three seconds is crucial to your company's performance online. Fast page speed is a valuable asset that must be acquired for successful SEO.
Time and again, studies have shown the relevance between SEO and site speed. Google had announced once in 2010 and again in 2018 that site speed is a significant ranking factor. Amazon found that sites that took an extra 100 milliseconds to load saw a one percent drop in sales.
It’s believed that websites with loading speeds below 3s are considered good to fetch better ranks on SERP. Webmasters can check site speed on Pagespeed Insights or GTMetrix.
And CDNs play a major role in keeping this number at a minimum. As it brings the user and original server closer, data gets transmitted faster. Pages load faster. This, in turn, ensures a low bounce rate and high dwell time which directly boosts conversion rates.

2. Crunch the Images for Maximum Optimization

Content online is rarely created without visual aid. But it is far easier to click a picture than to send it. This is because images occupy a ton of space. Studies show that unoptimized images can make websites load three or four times slower than normal. This will have disastrous results on search engine rankings.
A CDN is every Ecommerce company's best bet to prevent this from happening. With their automatic image optimization capabilities, CDNs will help in reducing image size without compromising image quality.
Here’s how CDN helps deliver your images to the users without delay.
They offer diverse compression and image format options as well. This directly improves the website's performance that is sent to the user by the CDN from its cache data.

3. Provides Indication for Duplicate Content

Google and other search engines majorly frown upon duplicate content being found in multiple places. This will impact your rankings and drastically affect your accountability. With the help of CDN, you can avoid these using canonical headers and caching algorithms.
Through such canonical links, the network informs search engines that certain content is a copied version and clearly states where it can find the original version. This is usually indicated by adding an HTTPS before the link.
However, it is always advised for Ecommerce businesses to use their original domain even while operating a CDN to feature high on SERP rankings.

Related : Best Ecommerce Business Ideas that You Can Start Today

4. Boosts Availability of Content

A CDN enables you to store static data or commonly searched pages with unchanged information for long periods. Online users more frequently look up such pages. And these don't need to be retrieved from the central server located miles away, thus reducing page load time considerably.
A CDN works to fetch information to the users within a jiffy.
By tweaking the HTTP header, you can decide how long static data should be cached in the CDN. For example, home and product pages for most websites remain unchanged irrespective of time and location.
Other pages known as dynamic data like the checkout or delivery page, which is subject to change, can be stored in the main server. These features mainly focus on reducing page load time which in turn directly improves SEO.

5. Keeps Your Content and Website Secure

Though firewalls and antivirus are standard options for web security, CDN has become a fast-rising popular choice. By using better hardware technology, diverting traffic from the server, and quick functional scalability, CDN performs a vital function of protecting your content. And it does this pretty well.
Moreover, CDN is adept at preventing and fighting DDoS attacks that are powered by harmful malware.
Also, as CDNs act as a middleman between the user and the server, it prevents heavy traffic from bombarding the server and protecting its overall performance. But businesses must be cautious while choosing the right CDN provider to prevent future attacks by hackers.

6. Acts as a Backup Server

A CDN acts as a perfect backup for the main server as it ensures that the website always remains active. This way, customers can access it at any time or location. And companies usually operate with multiple CDNs, which further act as more backup servers.
Hence, if the main server or a CDN in one location malfunctions, user requests are redistributed automatically to other CDNs closest to the user location. This way, users never lose access to your website. This dramatically improves your chance of getting a high SERP ranking.
The image below shows how another nearest server renders content to users in case of an issue from one server.
Another advantage of using CDN is that it can minimize the byte size of your content. This way, information gets transmitted rapidly to the user.

7. Improves Overall Site performance

All the above-listed points make sure information reaches your target audience with minimum hurdles. CDN is an easy-to-set-up and cost-effective option to hone your SEO strategy. It's one of the fastest methods to ensure maximum utilization of your website with minimum effort.
This also ensures users get faster access to your content.
Creating engaging content, SE-optimizing your website, setting up multiple backlinks, and all other efforts will go in vain if your page load time takes an eternity. This improves the overall user experience by keeping the bounce rate at a minimum.
It enables you to deal with heavy online traffic from multiple locations and time zones with ease, hence keeping your profits growing. Akamai has found that websites that have a high sales rate load 26% faster than others.

Top 6 CDN Providers That You Should Check out

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1. Akamai

Managing close to 300,000 servers for customers from 135 countries worldwide, Akamai is undoubtedly one of the oldest and most experienced CDN providers. They continue to remain stalwarts in the industry due to their impressive customer support team.
With a response time of 31 milliseconds, Akamai has been ranked in the fourth position for its overall performance by Global CDN rater, CDNPerf.
Experts highly recommend Akamai to large enterprises with data-heavy projects as they focus on providing extensive security services to tackle malware, XSS, and SQL attacks. One of Akamai’s drawbacks is its complicated configuration which makes setting up a cumbersome process.

2. Cloudflare

Backed by intelligent routing technology and intuitive UI, UX interface, Cloudflare is a popular CDN software option. Industry beginners especially prefer it due to its clear-cut pricing model, user-friendly configuration, and unlimited bandwidth usage.
It is trusted and used by industry giants like Reuters, Zendesk and has a decent response time of 36 milliseconds. It is hugely popular in Asia and Africa and picks up locations that other companies miss due to its widely placed edge servers.
One of its top features is Cloudflare’s ability to compress and optimize images by 35%.

3. Google Cloud

Like all things Google, their CDN service also has made a mark for itself in the industry. With its fast response time of 27 milliseconds and low latency rate, Google Cloud CDN is an excellent option to consider while choosing a CDN provider.
CDNPerf ranks it as the 2nd best CDN provider in performance and 10th in RUM uptime. Being part of the Google Cloud Platform is this software’s most significant advantage.
This means available connection to Google’s app engine, DNS, and storage among a long list of other services and software. However, pricing is an issue of concern as it might be costly for small enterprises.

4. Stackpath

Laying down maximum emphasis on security features, Stackpath is one of the most reputable CDN providers in the market. Its unique load balancing and malware blocking features have made it an excellent choice for a security system.
By acquiring Maxcdn in 2016, Stackpath has proved that constantly improving its CDN services is one of its primary focus areas. Later, they hired multiple individual companies to improve unique functions like IP services, DDoS mitigation, traffic management, and encryption.
Their standout feature is EdgeRules which is a powerful tool that allows customers to tweak the behavior of its CDN at different phases of a CDN request.

5. Fastly

After being acquired by Google in 2015, there was no looking back for this CDN provider. Fastly is known best for its instant purging and website optimization features. It is the second most preferred provider in the UK due to its fast response time of 27 milliseconds.
It extracts dynamic data from the original server much faster than its competitors, thanks to a powerful DSA. It also optimizes static content through the Varnish software for accelerated web and mobile consumption. Fastly is usually preferred by tech-savvy companies due to its complicated setup process.

6. KeyCDN

Known best for its affordable pricing schemes, KeyCDN is a high-performance CDN provider for upcoming and small enterprises. Companies on a budget find KeyCDN a convenient choice as they charge on a per-user basis instead of a bulk package.
Easy usage is this Switzerland-based provider’s overarching theme. This includes their website, traffic based-pricing model, customer service, and neatly outlined plans. They have provided plenty of screenshots and easy-to-understand tutorials to guide customers.
Another standout feature is their Origin shield. This allows the user to pick a particular KeyCDN server to be the source rather than the original server.

Does CDN Have a Significant Effect on SEO?

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• As page load time is one of the most crucial search engine ranking factors, CDNs significantly affect overall SEO.
• They help pages load faster, which draws more online traffic to your website, giving you a high SERP ranking.
• On the whole, a CDN is one of technology’s greatest gifts to boost your Ecommerce performance.
• Multiple studies show online shoppers will not purchase if a particular site takes longer than three seconds to load. Here’s an interesting stats on the same.
  
• CND is an excellent tool for compressing data-heavy images, which is another significant factor in faster page load.
• It can increase your company’s visibility and overall user experience, a key factor for SEO.
• It also helps in stabilizing and protecting your website from open connections and malware attacks. This ensures that your website always remains online and seldom crashes.
• But just relying on CDNs to improve rankings is a foolhardy tactic. Experts advise Ecommerce companies to create Search engine optimized, unique content, which you can disseminate through CDNs.
• As a CDN system diverts online traffic to its server instead of the main server, you can potentially increase your international customer base without exhausting your site.
• They also significantly bring the bounce rate down, which directly affected your page ranking on Google.
• It is an easy-to-setupcost-effective option to reap many benefits, including better security, SEO booster, image optimization, and faster page speed.
• CDN also helps in making your website more mobile-friendlier. Search engines consider this as an evaluating factor while ranking websites. Around 75% of online shoppers purchase their phones. And 53% will never return if they have a bad mobile experience with your website.

CDN SEO FAQs

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1. Is a CDN Good or Bad for SEO?

A CDN does a whole lot of good for amplifying SEO for your Ecommerce website. It greatly helps in loading the pages faster, which improves the overall user experience.
It has a significant impact in keeping the bounce rate low and increasing online traffic, which will automatically boost your SERP rankings on Google or any other search engine. However, take great care while choosing a CDN provider.
Here’s an example of a website whose appearances in SERP increased drastically since adopting CDN.
An unqualified CDN company will vastly reduce the prospects of achieving maximum SEO benefits.

2. How Does CDN Affect SEO for an Ecommerce Website?

A slow website means fewer potential customers, less online traffic, low rankings, and minimum or no visibility. Companies invest in CDNs to precisely avoid such scenarios.
CDN essentially improves page load time, and as this is an important ranking factor, it will greatly affect your website’s performance online.
Other than this, CDN prevents websites from crashing by protecting them from malware attacks and heavy traffic. This makes your website available to all. It improves scalability and content availability too.

3. Does CDN Harm SEO?

If you invest in a well-experienced CDN provider and get the network set up correctly, a CDN has no negative effects on SEO. Its effect is quite the opposite. CDN improves your website’s reputation, visibility, and trustworthiness.
Also, Google authorities have mentioned many times that using CDNs won’t hurt the websites.
When unique, SE-optimized content created using white hat techniques is distributed via CDN, it will reach your target audience faster. It is cost-effective and a relatively easier method to boost your SERP rankings.

4. How Can I Make My Website More Mobile-Friendlier Using CDN?

Mobile-friendly pages are given a lot of credit by search engines which automatically rank such pages higher than others. And you can boost this quality using a CDN.
One of CDN’s features is Front End Optimization, or FEO, which greatly helps with a website’s mobile phone performance.
Its signature feature of decreasing page load time, reducing chances of website crashing, diverting online traffic, and strengthening security, are also crucial factors to improve your mobile-friendly quotient.

5. Should Small Companies with Little Online Traffic Also Invest in CDN?

Though CDN usage is recommended to all kinds of online companies, it is not mandatory to invest in one. Depending on the number of customers, their locations, their browser cache data, and the type of products being sold, one can take a call.
For example, suppose your main server is located in Philadelphia, and most of your customers live in New York, Allentown, and Lancaster.
In that case, a CDN server will not drastically reduce your page speed. But there are other advantages to a CDN like low cost of bandwidth, improved security, data backup, which are helpful to all companies. Sign up for a free CDN trial and do A/B testing before taking a final call.

6. What Is a CDN, in Simple Terms?

A CDN works like a post office. It picks up and delivers content as requested by the user. It is located in many places so that it can provide the content as quickly as possible. This way, the user doesn't have to wait for long to read what was written.
A CDN deploys its server at various locations, just like how the post office network has multiple smaller offices worldwide. Each server serves as the closest point of reference to the user and acts as the middleman between every user and the website's main server.
Speak to our CDN expert to know more about CDN and its impact on search engine optimization.