The Problem
Yellow Book CPE, a continuing education platform for government auditors, approached us with a complicated and inefficient WordPress website. Despite receiving up to 50,000 monthly visitors, the website suffered from severe performance issues as it was overloaded with over 60 plugins. Also, as their features expanded, which included e-learning courses, live seminars, self-guided classes, and ebooks, the client needed additional custom features and a more streamlined, reliable system to support their growing user base.
Our Solution
We started with an initial performance audit and optimizations by reducing plugin dependency, improving load times, and introducing advanced caching and deployment strategies. However, we quickly became a long-term partner and developed new features. Those included a custom student dashboard and a certification tracking system, all within WordPress but with a very customized backend.
What We Did
After assessing the website, we identified poorly optimized areas that needed refinements. We optimized the website by eliminating unnecessary plugins and replacing some of them with lightweight, custom-built features. We also enhanced caching techniques, optimized database calls, and scheduled deployments for low-traffic times, such as nighttime, to minimize interference with active users and handle high traffic demands.
We developed a fully custom-built student dashboard so that users can track their course progress, manage certificates, and access all purchased materials in one place. In contrast to standard WordPress setups, we used extensive backend logic and plugin customization according to their education workflow.
We developed a custom certification tracker that keeps a track of CPE credits, generates completion records, and complies with government auditing standards. The system is well-integrated with the course platform and backend to provide accurate and timely updates for all enrolled students.
After fulfilling all the initial requirements, we’ve become the go-to collaborator for Yellowbook. As the platform continues to grow, we're actively working to scale infrastructure, improve user experience, and add high-value features that benefit both users and business goals.
Client Success Stories
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See AllAquila Bernard
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Their customer service is excellent — they’re incredibly accessible and available, which I appreciate. Furthermore, they have enough experience and bandwidth to fulfill all my needs. They’re one of the best vendors I’ve worked with.
Oscar Martinez
Project Manager
Idea Maker's portfolio is what drew us in. Their design style was in alignment with what we were after. We had initial consultations with 3 companies that we had narrowed it down to. Once we had our initial meeting with Tom at Idea Maker we knew we had the right choice to make. Their communication style works well for us.
JR Krebs
Project Lead, Legal Company
I have never had a site like this built before. I felt that Idea Maker and Tom had built numerous sites like this, and they were pros.
Ryan Beachum
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This is a boutique development firm where the Founder is directly involved with the project and the primary contact. This is unlike many development firms where you are simply handed off to developers that are not stakeholders. This is an important distinction that results in much better project accountability.
John Larkin
CEO, Advance CPE
The way they understand the requirements we present to them is fairly solid. Both in terms of bringing their own interpretation in nailing the requirements and their design sense. By the time we launched, I had gotten significantly more value from our collaboration than what we had discussed in the original specs.
Brennan Lodge
Founder, BLodgic LLC
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