ScienceAlert: A Joomla to WordPress migration that sparked 140% revenue growth

Trusted science news outlet, ScienceAlert, was built on a custom Joomla CMS that was starting to hinder the growth of the company. The team turned to The Code Company for a migration to WordPress that led to a 140% increase in traffic and ad revenue.

The Challenge

Wrangling a complex infrastructure to evolve the business and unlock new commercial opportunities

ScienceAlert’s Joomla setup had evolved over 15 years into a complex infrastructure that was no longer fit for purpose. The dwindling support and popularity of Joomla started to hamstring the business:

Outsourcing support became difficult
Basic fixes were costly and time-consuming
Issues with complex URL structures and a subpar editorial experience
Poor page speed impacting Core Web Vitals scores

This resulted in ScienceAlert being unable to pivot or innovate quickly enough, and they decided on a move to WordPress

“I really love how The Code Company helps us achieve what we want rather than trying to force us into the next gadgets. They suggest ways to help make us more money, make the site faster or make our editorial flow quicker”

Fiona MacDonald, CEO ScienceAlert

The Solution

Migration and rebuild

The Code Company built a new, lean WordPress environment that:

Increased site speed and core web vitals scores
Managed complex URL redirects that preserved SEO
Seamlessly integrated its ad setup
Vastly improved the editorial experience and time to publish
Allowed ScienceAlert to move away from AMP
Leveraged native plugin integrations with Apple News, Smart News, and Google News.

“We immediately saw an increase in revenue because our site speed went up so much that Google started favouring us a lot more. And we didn’t have any downtime at launch.”

Fiona MacDonald, CEO ScienceAlert

Results

An immediate boost

ScienceAlert saw an immediate 64% improvement in site page load time, which led to a better SEO standing, and a 140% uplift in traffic and ad revenue.

The brand can now also leverage industry-standard integrations via WordPress’s vast plugin library, allowing them to spend money on meaningful development work rather than the basic foundations.

The company now has a lean and flexible tech stack that can harness the open source WordPress community and is adaptable to future requirements.