Client: National media publisher with a high-traffic content platform
Role: Migration Strategist • Performance Optimizer
Timeline: ~1 month
Stack: AWS (legacy), WPEngine (target), CI/CD, CloudFront, PHP, Bitbucket Pipelines
🚨 The Challenge
The platform was bleeding money on AWS.
Legacy code was slow, fragile, and over-scaled to compensate.
WPEngine was the target—but the code and infrastructure weren’t ready.
Migration risks were high: downtime, broken features, and unstable UX.
🧠 My Role
I stabilized the codebase and led a zero-downtime migration—cutting infrastructure costs and laying the groundwork for scalable, low-risk deployment.
🔧 Solutions Delivered
Ran a backend optimization sprint to kill major performance bottlenecks
Transitioned blocking scripts to lazy-loading, speeding up first render
Rebuilt caching layers for frontend + server-side, tailored to WPEngine
Cleaned up database bloat: autoloaded options, transients, and legacy cruft
Implemented rollback-ready CI/CD with Bitbucket Pipelines
Added observability and hardened error handling for smoother ops
Standardized deployment processes for fast, safe releases
📈 Business Outcomes
Zero-downtime migration to WPEngine—millions of visitors, uninterrupted
Slashed infra costs by cutting AWS over-provisioning
Faster deploy cycles, freeing engineers from dev-ops firefighting
Legacy code stabilized—modernization-ready foundation in place
Fewer emergencies, more headroom to focus on actual growth
* * *
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