Digital Agency Action Global Communications Cut Load Times by 50% & Security Incidents by 90% with Cloudways

About Action Global Communications

Action Global Communications is an independent, full-service marketing and communications agency founded in 1971, with a strong international presence operating across Eastern Europe, the Eastern Mediterranean, the Middle East and Central Asia.

At its core, Action combines global expertise with deep local market knowledge to deliver impactful, integrated communication strategies that help organisations engage audiences, build trust and achieve measurable results.

Action offers a wide range of services including public relations, digital marketing, content creation, event management and web development, enabling clients to benefit from fully integrated solutions tailored to their specific markets.

Managing 114 applications across 20 servers, Action Global Communications turned to Cloudways to cut load times by 50% and reduce security incidents by 90%. Read the full case study to see how they did it.

Cloudways: Can you introduce yourself, describe your role at Action Global Communications, and give us an overview of the websites you currently manage?

Maria Ioulianou: I’m Maria Ioulianou, the Leader of the Web Team at Action Global Communications, where I lead the development and management of our digital platforms.

We manage a diverse portfolio of digital platforms across industries including forex, financial services, e-commerce, corporate websites, CRM systems, EU-funded projects, hotels booking engine, tourism etc.

We handle projects that experience traffic spikes of up to 2-3x during campaign periods, so ensuring performance, scalability and security is a critical part of my role.

– Action Global Communications delivers integrated services across public sector communications, multi-market strategy, production, events and web development. (Source: actionprgroup.com)

Cloudways: Before switching to Cloudways, what did your hosting setup look like, and what were the biggest challenges you faced?

Maria Ioulianou: Before switching, we were using a traditional hosting environment based on cPanel, which had become outdated and difficult to scale.

As our portfolio grew, we faced several challenges:

• 20-30% slower load times during peak traffic
• Increased time spent on manual server management and troubleshooting
• Limited flexibility when scaling resources quickly
• Inconsistent performance across different environments

Overall, the setup required significant effort to maintain and was not efficient for managing over 100 applications.

Cloudways: Which other hosting providers did you consider, and what ultimately made Cloudways the right choice for Action Global Communications?

Maria Ioulianou: We evaluated several managed hosting and cloud platforms, including options like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, and DigitalOcean directly.

What made Cloudways stand out was the balance between control and simplicity. It allowed us to leverage top cloud providers while benefiting from a managed layer that significantly reduced our operational workload. The intuitive interface, built-in performance optimizations and strong support were key deciding factors.

– Action Global Communications operates four specialised divisions including Action 360°, Action Public Sector, Action Travel and Action Studios, each serving distinct communications and marketing needs. (Source: actionprgroup.com)

Cloudways: How did the migration to Cloudways go, and were there any standout moments during the onboarding process?

Maria Ioulianou: The migration process was smooth overall. We approached it in phases, starting with a few lower-risk applications before moving our larger platforms.

One standout positive was how quickly we could replicate environments and test performance improvements before going live. The main challenge was coordinating DNS changes and minimizing downtime across multiple regions, but with proper planning, the transition was seamless.

Cloudways: How many servers and applications are you running on Cloudways today, and how easily have you been able to scale over time?

Maria Ioulianou: We currently run 20 servers hosting 114 applications on Cloudways.

Scaling has been extremely easy, we can increase server resources in minutes and deploy new environments quickly. This flexibility has allowed us to respond instantly to campaign demands and support traffic growth of over 2x without needing infrastructure changes in advance.

Cloudways: Since moving to Cloudways, what measurable improvements have you seen — whether in performance, uptime, cost savings, or client satisfaction?

Maria Ioulianou: Since migrating to Cloudways, we’ve seen significant improvements across the board.

• Up to 40-50% faster page load times across key websites
• 99.9%+ uptime, even during high-traffic campaigns
• Around 25-30% reduction in time spent on server management
• Improved ability to handle traffic spikes without performance drops

– The Cloudways Migration Tools panel gives users the choice between a self-serve WordPress Migration Plugin and a fully Managed Migration service for a seamless transition.

In addition, the platform provides a wide range of built-in tools for security and performance optimization, which has strengthened our overall infrastructure.

One of the most valuable improvements has been the excellent support, any issues we encounter are addressed quickly, which has greatly improved our team’s efficiency and confidence.

Cloudways: Have you used Cloudways Copilot for troubleshooting or day-to-day management, and how has it changed the way your team works?

Maria Ioulianou: Yes, we’ve started using Cloudways Copilot as part of our day-to-day workflow. It has made monitoring and troubleshooting more efficient by providing actionable insights and recommendations.

It helps reduce guesswork and allows our team to respond faster to potential issues, improving both operational efficiency and service reliability.

Cloudways: Are you running on the Lightning or Hybrid stack, and what differences have you noticed in performance or workflow since making that choice?

Maria Ioulianou: We are running on the Lightning stack and the performance improvements have been very noticeable.

The optimized stack has contributed to faster load times and better handling of concurrent users, especially for content-heavy websites. From a workflow perspective, it has reduced the need for manual optimization and fine-tuning.

Cloudways: Which Cloudways features or add-ons does your team rely on most, and why have they become so important to your workflow?

Maria Ioulianou: We rely heavily on Cloudways’ security and management features, which are critical for maintaining a large-scale environment of over 100 applications.

On the security side, we use advanced malware protection tools that provide real-time phishing protection, proactive defense against malware injection, automated malware cleanup, and database-level protection. As a result, we’ve seen a 90%+ reduction in security incidents and significantly minimized manual intervention when dealing with threats.

From a management perspective, tools like Site Manager give us full visibility into plugin updates, activity logs and performance metrics across all applications. This has helped us reduce maintenance time by 30-40% and proactively identify issues before they impact users.

– Cloudways Site Manager offers a free Basic plan for day-to-day WordPress management and a Pro plan at $3 per app/month for agencies managing business-critical sites at scale.

Additionally, the support team plays a crucial role, their fast response times and expertise have significantly reduced downtime and troubleshooting effort by an estimated 25%.

Overall, these features allow us to operate more efficiently, improve security across all platforms, and confidently manage 114 applications across 20 servers with a high level of control and reliability.

Cloudways: What advice would you give to other web agencies considering Cloudways, and is there anything you wish you had known sooner?

Maria Ioulianou: For agencies managing multiple websites, moving to a managed platform like Cloudways can make a major difference.

It reduces complexity, improves performance and provides the tools needed to scale efficiently.

If there’s one thing I wish we had done sooner, it would be making the switch earlier, it would have saved us significant time and resources while improving both performance and client satisfaction from the start.

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