I've just signed up with a webhost that allows me to have SQL Server setups. I upsized one of my database backends, set it up and connected without many issues.

The major issues seems to be speed. It is SLOW, especially if there are any queries involved. What is process that speed dependent on and what's the best way to speed things up?

I'll admit that the structure of the db is not the greatest and could probably use some further normalization, but it's also not very big. Is structure very important in regards to speed?

Thanks.

Structure is integral. Not having tables indexed correctly, having queries performing cartesian joins, nested aggregate queries ... all of this will affect the performance of your queries.

I would also ask about the throughput with your webhost. You could have everything optimized but only have a 1GB pipe or less. What about other sites that are on the same SQL Server as yours? You could be on a server that has heavy queries from other requests. This will affect your performance as well.