Richard and the crew from Pinecone Agency were incredibly accommodating in our very particular build requirements.Incredibly accommodating with our build.
— Tim Zafir

Turning a Southern California patio company’s website into its best lead source

Case study

Alum Works

A 20-year patio cover business with a strong local reputation and a website that was not reflecting it. We rebuilt it from the ground up. Monthly traffic grew by 151% in three months, organic search brought over 1,100 new visitors in six months, and website-generated leads grew by 475% year on year. These are the enquiries the team is genuinely excited to follow up.

  • The Alum Works website shown together on desktop and mobile — the homepage in a browser window headed "Patio Cover Contractors in Southern California" over a dusk pergola scene, with the responsive mobile homepage on a phone in front.
  • The Alum Works homepage on an iMac at a timber desk in front of a pegboard wall, its hero reading "Patio Cover Contractors in Southern California" over a dusk shot of a black louvred pergola, with Yelp and Google ratings above.
  • The Alum Works process section on a MacBook angled on dark steel grating, showing the numbered steps "01. Design" and "02. Engineering" with their explanatory copy.

Overview

Client
Alum Works
Industry
Home Improvement
Location
Southern California
Services

In their words

Pinecone redid our company website and it was a truly seamless, collaborative, and fun process! Our website is beautiful, functional, and already generating more business. I could not recommend Pinecone enough! Richard and the team are simply the best.
Jenny Collins Alum Works

The challenge

Alum Works has been building quality aluminium patio covers, pergolas, and outdoor structures across Southern California for nearly 20 years. That reputation was earned through excellent work. Their website was not reflecting any of it.

The site had an outdated design, no mobile optimisation, buried service pages, and a cumbersome quote process. First impressions were not matching the quality of the product — and potential customers were dropping off before they ever made contact.

The craftsmanship was there. The website just was not showing it.

  • The Alum Works Adjustable Patio Covers product page on an iPhone angled among dark volcanic rocks — the product introduction above a photo of a white louvred pergola.
  • The Alum Works mobile homepage on an iPhone set upright between dark rocks — the Patio Cover Contractors in Southern California hero with its Yelp and Google ratings.

Our approach

  1. Strategy

    The strategic foundation was simple — build confidence first, then remove every barrier to enquiry.

    • Make the quality of the work impossible to miss
    • Make requesting a quote as easy as possible
    • Built for considered buyers — homeowners investing in a custom patio cover are not impulse buyers

  2. Design

    We refined the brand identity around the quality of the product itself.

    • A cleaner colour palette, contemporary typefaces and an image-led layout
    • Each service gets its own showcase — solid covers, lattice pergolas and insulated roofs, with real installation photography and benefit-driven copy
    • A high-impact project gallery at the centre — real work does more trust-building than any headline

  3. Development

    Mobile-first throughout, structured for both user clarity and search visibility.

    • Quote forms simplified to one short form, with multiple entry points across the site
    • Semantic HTML, schema markup and clean URLs
    • Optimised load speeds across all devices
  • The Solid Aluminum Patio Cover product page on the Alum Works site — the product hero and its detail sections on material options and benefits.
  • The Alum Works gallery page — a photo strip of completed patio-cover projects above the Some of Our Works categories and the Adjustable Patio Covers showcase.

Technical deep-dive

  • Service page architecture

    Each service has its own dedicated page, built around how homeowners actually make decisions.

    • Leads with outcomes, material options and process rather than features
    • Answers the questions that convert browsers into enquiries
    • Gives each page a clear topical focus that search engines can rank
  • Quote form optimisation

    The original quote process had too many steps — we redesigned it as one short form.

    • Accessible from multiple entry points across the site
    • Reaches visitors at exactly the right moment in their journey
    • A form people actually complete — leads arrive having already done their research
  • SEO foundations

    Search visibility was built into the structure from day one.

    • Local-business schema, service-specific pages and clean crawlable URLs
    • Copy written for both the reader and Google
    • Image optimisation keeps load times fast — foundations that compound
  • AI & organic visibility

    Structured for AI-powered search tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity, where more homeowners begin their research.

    • Structured content, schema markup and semantic HTML — readable for Google and AI search alike
    • The client already takes calls from people who found Alum Works through an AI result

Results and impact

The results arrived quickly — within the first three months of launch, the impact was measurable across every area that matters.

  • +151%

    Monthly traffic growth

    • Well above the typical 20–40% post-rebuild lift
    • Held steady since — not a spike that faded
  • 1,100+

    Organic search visitors (6 months)

    • Homeowners actively searching for patio covers and pergolas
    • The right audience, arriving through search intent
  • 31%

    Direct traffic share

    • Roughly double the ~15% industry average
    • People return to the site directly, by name
  • +475%

    Website-generated leads (year on year)

    • Up from a handful of appointments the year before
    • Now the team’s most consistent source of new business

Monthly traffic grew 151% in three months. Website-generated leads grew 475% year on year. Organic search brought over 1,100 visitors in the first six months. And the leads coming through the form are the ones the team looks forward to calling.

A business with nearly 20 years of experience now has a website that reflects it — and a lead pipeline that proves it.

Key takeaway

A business with nearly 20 years of experience and a loyal client base should not have to fight to be found online. But if the website does not reflect the quality of the work, that is exactly what happens.

Let’s build something that works for your business

High-performing websites, AI-powered software, and automations — built to scale and evolve with your business.

Book a discovery call

30-minute call · no obligation

More work