Tier-laddered WordPress speed optimisation — from a $1,250 audit through an $8,250 five-day engagement, with measured before-and-after Core Web Vitals on every tier. Speed optimisation is the work to book when your WordPress site is slow, you are losing rank or conversions because of it, and you want a senior developer to fix the actual cause instead of throwing another caching plugin at it.

Recent performance-relevant WordPress work: Sherwin-Williams · M.L. Campbell Training Centre · Sayerlack · Postmedia network (2011–2012 platform migration)

Most recent engagement: LCP 2.8s → 1.1s, Performance score 67 → 94. Real CrUX measurement, not a one-off Lighthouse score.

Book the 20-minute discovery call See full pricing and scope

The problem you’re solving

Your LCP is past 4 seconds on mobile and Search Console is flagging Core Web Vitals on more URLs every month. The last “speed plugin” you installed made the front-end ten percent faster and broke the cart on a fifth of mobile devices.

Most WordPress speed problems are not solved by adding a tool. They are solved by removing the weight that should not be there, fixing the rendering path, sizing the images at upload, and understanding which third-party script is actually blocking the page from rendering for 800ms.

What a performance engagement costs

Speed optimisation engagements ladder in three shapes. The full pricing matrix — including the audit-credit-forward policy — lives on the canonical Speed Optimisation service page. The shape of the buyer choice:

Performance audit ($1,250–$2,200): The audit IS the deliverable. A written findings report with Core Web Vitals breakdown, server, asset, and plugin analysis, and a prioritised fix list. Right when the team can run the fixes internally.
Optimisation engagement ($2,750–$8,250): The audit hours credit against the implementation hours that fix the findings. You pay for the work, not the work plus the diagnosis.
Ongoing retainer ($1,375/mo): Continuous monitoring, post-update verification, and the regression-watch routine that keeps the engagement gains from rotting six months later.

If the audit shows the performance problem is bigger than optimisation can carry — an architectural rebuild, a hosting migration, substantial template work — the findings route the engagement to the right build or migration tier, and audit hours credit forward. The senior-developer rate is $275 CAD/hr.

What you get

Five artifacts. Same scope every time.

A baseline Core Web Vitals report. Real-user metrics from CrUX where available, plus lab data from Lighthouse on three key templates (homepage, a money page, an article or product page). LCP, INP, CLS, TTFB. The starting line, in writing.
A diagnosis pass. Where the weight is coming from: theme, plugins, third-party scripts, image pipeline, server response, render-blocking resources. Documented with screenshots and the specific request waterfall.
An implementation pass. Cache configured properly, images sized and converted, render-blocking resources deferred or inlined, database cleaned of expired transients and orphan post meta, font loading fixed, plugin bloat trimmed where safe.
A measured after report. Same templates, same conditions, side-by-side numbers. If the work did not move the numbers, the report says so honestly.
A short written handoff. What I changed, why, and what to keep an eye on. Two to three pages. Your developer or your host can pick it up from there without another call. The walkthrough names what changed and why. The next time the cache drifts or a third-party script gets added, your team recognises the pattern.

Diagnosis uses Lighthouse, CrUX, and waterfall analysis; where AI tools accelerate the work (log triage, regression-watch summarisation), the report names them, and the senior-developer judgement on what to change is mine.

What this is not

Not a theme rebuild. If your theme is the bottleneck and the right answer is a rebuild, the report will say so and the rebuild is a separate engagement.
Not a plugin replacement project. I will retire safe-to-remove plugins, but swapping a page builder or a major plugin is its own scope.
Not a hosting migration. If your host is the bottleneck, I will tell you and recommend hosts that fit your workload. Moving you is not in this sprint.
Not unlimited revisions. One pass, measured, reported. Anything that surfaces as needing further work goes into the written handoff with an honest scope estimate.

Who this is for

Fit. Operating WordPress sites with a real performance problem and real revenue or lead flow at stake.
Fit. Marketing teams whose SEO consultant is flagging Core Web Vitals as the next blocker.
Fit. Site owners who have already tried the obvious caching plugin and hit the ceiling.
Not fit. Sites still under construction. Optimise after the build settles.
Not fit. Buyers looking for “$99 speed services” that install WP Rocket on autopilot and call it done. The audit-tier entry point is $1,250 for a written findings report; below that, you are not buying senior diagnostic time.

The five-day optimisation engagement, day by day

Day 1. Access provisioned. Baseline measurements captured. CrUX, Lighthouse, request waterfalls, third-party audit. First-impressions email by end of day.
Day 2. Diagnosis written up with screenshots. Implementation plan confirmed with you in writing before I touch the site.
Day 3. Implementation pass on staging if you have one, on production with backup if you do not. Cache, images, render path, database hygiene.
Day 4. After-measurements captured under the same conditions. Side-by-side report assembled.
Day 5. Delivery. Report PDF, written handoff, and a 30-minute walkthrough call if you want it.

Why work with me on this specifically

WordPress development since 2007. Performance work has been part of the job since well before “Core Web Vitals” was a phrase.
Audit-class engagement experience. Speed optimisation uses the same diagnostic discipline as the full WordPress Site Audit ladder, scoped to the performance surface.
Engagements with Sherwin-Williams (M.L. Campbell Training Centre, Sayerlack), prior portfolio work at the Postmedia network (2011–2012), where ad-stack performance work was a daily problem.
Author of practical WordPress and SEO articles. Speaker at WordCamp Toronto.
Senior-developer rate, $275 CAD/hr. Each speed tier is fixed-fee against scope, audit or engagement or retainer, not against time.

Common questions

Will my Lighthouse score hit 100?

Probably not, and chasing 100 is a bad goal. The right goal is field Core Web Vitals in the green for the templates that actually drive revenue. Lighthouse is a lab tool; CrUX is what Google ranks on.

What if the work does not move the numbers?

That outcome is rare but possible. If the after-report shows no improvement, the report says so honestly and recommends what would actually move the numbers — usually a theme rebuild, a hosting move, or a plugin retirement that is bigger than this sprint. The fee is for the work and the report, not for a guaranteed score.

Can you do this on a WooCommerce store?

Yes, with the caveat that very large product catalogues sometimes need a longer engagement. If your store is over 5,000 SKUs or running heavy product-filter plugins, mention it on the discovery call and I will tell you whether the sprint scope holds.

What about page builders — Elementor, Divi, Beaver Builder?

I work on builder-based sites regularly. The sprint can move the numbers significantly on a builder site; the ceiling is lower than on a hand-built theme, and the report will say where the ceiling is.

Can you guarantee a specific Lighthouse score?

No, and any agency that does is selling you a number, not an outcome. The goal is field Core Web Vitals in the green for the templates that drive revenue. Lighthouse is a lab tool; CrUX is what Google ranks on. The after-report shows the numbers honestly, whichever way they moved.

Ready when you are

Speed optimisation, three tiers. An audit-tier engagement ($1,250–$2,200) ships a written findings report you can hand to your developer. The five-day optimisation engagement ($2,750–$8,250) covers audit plus implementation. The monthly retainer ($1,375/mo) keeps the gains from rotting. Full pricing and the audit-credit-forward policy on the canonical service page.