From WordPress to performance powerhouse: Gabriel Maggio Construction's SEO surge with CloudCannon
Roy Gabriel
Vice President Operations
Gabriel Maggio Construction
$4,000
monthly savings
From 50 to 90+
PageSpeed scores
100x
monthly traffic
Gabriel Maggio Construction's migration from WordPress to CloudCannon completely changed their online game — massively boosting their traffic and bringing in more motivated leads.
Based in Montgomery County, Maryland, and specializing in decks and renovations, Gabriel Maggio Construction was dealing with problems many growing businesses face: a website that just wasn't performing, expensive lead generation, and technical headaches that wouldn't quit. Their WordPress site was seriously holding them back — until CloudCannon came along.
Within the first few weeks after CloudCannon migrated the site, we'd already moved from the 4th page of Google to the first page. And we hadn't even added fresh content to it yet.
Fixing the foundations
Before CloudCannon, Gabriel Maggio Construction was stuck with a sluggish WordPress website scoring a pretty dismal 50-60 out of 100 on performance tests. They were buried on Google's 4th page, getting only about 30 visitors monthly. This forced them to rely on pricey platforms like HomeAdvisor and Angie's List, shelling out $100–175 per lead.
The technical upkeep was a real pain too, with constant security worries and trouble managing content, especially for team members who weren't tech-savvy. When they looked for help, agencies quoted them up to $2,500 monthly just to manage their WordPress site — far too expensive for a growing construction business.
A blueprint for success
After moving to CloudCannon with a site built on 11ty, things immediately turned around for Gabriel Maggio Construction.
Their page speed scores jumped from the 50-60 range to consistently above 90, with some pages even hitting a perfect 100. Maintenance became super simple — no more plugin updates, PHP patches, or database management headaches. And CloudCannon's static site setup completely eliminated common WordPress security vulnerabilities.
Roy Gabriel, who has a development background, loved being able to easily access and edit files directly, while team members with less technical know-how found creating content surprisingly easy through CloudCannon's user-friendly interface. The automatic image optimization saved hours of manual work, and the more affordable hosting significantly cut their bandwidth costs.
Measuring up
The switch to CloudCannon delivered some seriously impressive results, all stemming from the new website's optimized performance:
100x traffic increase
Ranking on first page of Google results
5% lead conversions
More than double the industry average!
Eliminated $3,000/month
On external lead-gen services
Cost per lead dropped 95%
From $100-175 to just $5-15 through Google Ads
With a site they could rely on, Gabriel Maggio Construction was able to shift their budget to more effective Google Ads and add forms with budget and timeline questions to pre-screen leads. And when they started expanding their business into new geographic areas, their website quickly started ranking in these regions, helping them grow even faster.
Renovating the workflow
One of the biggest improvements for Gabriel Maggio Construction was how much easier content editing became with CloudCannon compared to WordPress.
Roy's business partner Ron initially struggled with WordPress's complicated backend. After switching to CloudCannon, the intuitive editor made creating blog posts and updating content a breeze. "He's been having a really easy time using the editor for making blog articles or making minor content changes," Roy said.
For Roy, CloudCannon offers flexibility that WordPress just couldn't match: "I love that I could just go to files, look at something there, make a change real quick in Markdown. Or if I want to do major stuff, I can just edit the repo in an IDE, and it's all seamless."
On WordPress, the team used to spend hours optimizing images for different devices. With CloudCannon, that headache is completely gone:
We can upload images directly from our phones, and CloudCannon automatically handles resizing, optimizing, everything. It used to be an hour or two to manage a couple of new pictures on the site, and now it takes seconds.
CloudCannon lets everyone work the way they prefer. Ron uses the Visual Editor for blogs and simple updates, while Roy uses direct file access for technical changes. Both approaches work together without conflicts, eliminating the need to hire agencies for content management — saving thousands monthly on potential WordPress maintenance costs.
The Gabriel Maggio team also created hyper-local landing pages targeting specific service areas and added custom features like a budget calculator. This calculator has been especially valuable during deck season, helping potential customers understand pricing before reaching out.
Raising the roof
The return on investment from switching to CloudCannon has been huge. Gabriel Maggio have eliminated $3,000/month in lead generation service costs and cut their digital marketing spend to about $1,000/month.
The company now gets around 12 qualified leads weekly with a 20% conversion rate, thanks to their improved website performance and growing organic traffic. The time savings on content management and maintenance has allowed them to handle updates in-house instead of paying agencies $2,500/month.
The ROI already is amazing on the new site. We were spending up to $3,000 a month on HomeAdvisor leads — and we’d be lucky if one of them might make us enough money to pay that back. Now we've got a tremendously higher lead conversion rate. The new leads are vetted, and we were able to drop our advertising spend by $2,000 a month.
The final inspection
Gabriel Maggio Construction's story shows how the right tech platform can completely transform a business's online presence and its bottom line. By switching from WordPress to CloudCannon, they didn't just improve their website performance and search rankings — they fundamentally changed how they attract customers and grow their business.
Customer perception
Customer perception improved dramatically with the new site. Prospects specifically mentioned their polished web presence as a deciding factor. One recent customer who commissioned a $150,000 addition told Roy, "Your web presence was polished. It was like everybody else had pages from 1997... I just felt like you guys had a professional presence."
Competitive advantage
The new site gives Gabriel Maggio Construction a real edge in an industry where competitors often have outdated websites. Both technical and non-technical team members can now manage content effectively, giving them marketing independence without hiring expensive agencies — and letting them focus on growth instead of website headaches.
With better leads, lower costs, and a site that practically sells for them, they've gained a serious competitive edge. And while their competitors struggle with outdated sites, Gabriel Maggio Construction continues expanding into new markets with confidence.
The verdict is clear — sometimes the smartest business move isn't just building better decks, but building a better website.
Want to find out more?
Book a friendly demo call with us, and find out how CloudCannon can help your agency deploy and manage client sites more efficiently.
Tom Richardson
Solutions Architect
