Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Medium-term (3-6 months)
Two years ago, I watched a promising SaaS startup blow through $50K on a website redesign that actually hurt their conversion rates. The agency had an impressive portfolio, glowing testimonials, and charged premium rates. On paper, they looked perfect.
The reality? They built a beautiful digital ghost town. Stunning visuals, smooth animations, award-worthy design – and absolutely zero understanding of how this startup actually acquired customers or what made their users convert.
This isn't an isolated case. After working with dozens of startups over 7 years, I've seen the same pattern repeat: founders choose agencies based on portfolios and promises, then wonder why their "investment" didn't move the needle on revenue.
Here's what I learned from both sides – as someone who's hired agencies and as someone who's been the agency. The selection process most startups use is fundamentally broken, and it's costing them time, money, and momentum when they can least afford it.
In this playbook, you'll discover:
Why portfolio quality is a terrible indicator of startup success
The one question that separates real experts from pretty-picture makers
My framework for evaluating agencies based on business impact, not design awards
Red flags that signal an agency will waste your budget
How to structure partnerships that align agency incentives with your growth goals
Ready to make a choice that actually drives results? Let's dive into what the industry won't tell you about website strategy and agency selection.
Industry Reality
What startup founders typically hear about agency selection
Walk into any startup accelerator or browse any founder forum, and you'll hear the same advice about choosing a web design agency. It's become startup gospel, repeated by advisors, investors, and "experienced" founders alike.
The conventional wisdom goes like this:
Look for agencies with impressive portfolios in your industry
Check their client testimonials and case studies
Ensure they understand "modern design principles"
Get quotes from 3-5 agencies and compare pricing
Choose the one that "gets your vision" and fits your budget
This advice sounds logical. It's what I followed when I was starting out, and it's what 90% of startups do today. The problem? It's optimizing for completely the wrong things.
Here's why this approach fails consistently:
Portfolio quality has zero correlation with startup success. Those beautiful case studies? They're usually for established companies with existing traffic, brand recognition, and marketing budgets. A design that works for a Fortune 500 company can actually hurt a bootstrapped startup.
Testimonials are worthless unless they specifically mention revenue impact. "Beautiful work, great communication" tells you nothing about whether they can build something that converts cold traffic into paying customers.
"Understanding your vision" is startup fluff. What matters is understanding your customer acquisition channels, your conversion funnel, and your business model constraints. Vision is cheap – execution that drives revenue is what counts.
The agencies that sound the most convincing in sales calls are often the worst at actual delivery. They're optimized for winning pitches, not building businesses.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
Let me tell you about the moment I realized how broken the agency selection process really is. I was working with a B2B SaaS client who'd just gone through exactly the conventional process I described above.
They'd chosen an agency with a stunning portfolio – seriously, every project looked like it belonged in a design museum. The agency had worked with recognizable brands, charged premium rates, and their sales pitch was flawless. They "totally understood the vision" and promised a website that would "elevate the brand and drive conversions."
Three months and $40K later, they delivered exactly what they promised: a visually stunning website that looked incredible in screenshots. The problem? It completely ignored how this startup actually got customers.
This wasn't a company that relied on brand recognition or emotional purchase decisions. They were selling B2B software to technical buyers who found them through Google searches, read detailed comparison articles, and needed to see specific features and integrations before converting.
The agency had built them a lifestyle brand site optimized for awards, not a lead generation machine optimized for revenue. Beautiful hero sections with abstract messaging, but buried pricing and feature information. Smooth animations, but slow load times. Award-worthy design, but terrible SEO structure.
The kicker? When we analyzed their old "ugly" website versus the new "beautiful" one, the old site was converting 40% better. They'd paid premium prices to hurt their business.
This experience forced me to completely rethink how startups should evaluate agencies. I realized that everything I'd been taught about agency selection was wrong, and I needed a fundamentally different approach.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
After this disaster (and several others I witnessed), I developed a completely different framework for evaluating web design agencies. Instead of looking at what agencies say they do, I focus on what they actually understand about startup growth.
Here's my playbook for choosing an agency that will actually move your business forward:
Step 1: The Distribution Question
Before looking at any portfolios, I ask one simple question: "Walk me through how you'd approach our customer acquisition strategy through the website." This immediately separates real business partners from pretty-picture makers.
The wrong answer sounds like: "We'll create a beautiful, user-friendly experience that builds trust and drives conversions." Generic, vague, could apply to any business.
The right answer sounds like: "First, I'd want to understand your main acquisition channels – are you primarily SEO-driven, paid ads, or founder-led content? Then we'd structure the site architecture around those specific user journeys..." Specific, strategic, shows they think about websites as distribution tools.
Step 2: The Anti-Portfolio Review
Instead of asking for their best work, I ask for their most successful work – meaning the projects that drove the biggest business impact for startups specifically. Then I dig into the metrics.
I want to see before/after conversion rates, organic traffic growth, lead generation numbers – actual business results, not design awards. If they can't provide these metrics, they're not measuring what matters.
Step 3: The Technical Reality Check
Most agencies optimize for visual impact over technical performance. I test their understanding by asking about page speed optimization, mobile conversion differences, and SEO implications of their design choices.
The agencies that immediately start talking about Core Web Vitals, mobile-first indexing, and conversion rate optimization know they're building business tools, not art projects.
Step 4: The Constraint Test
I present real startup constraints: "We have $15K total budget, need to launch in 6 weeks, and our main goal is improving trial signups from organic search." Their response tells me everything about their practical experience with startups.
Good agencies don't try to talk you out of constraints – they work within them intelligently and suggest the highest-impact improvements for your specific situation.
Reality Check
Look for agencies that ask about your customer acquisition channels before discussing design aesthetics.
Metrics Focus
Prioritize agencies that can show specific business results (conversion rates leads generated) from previous startup projects.
Constraint Wisdom
Choose agencies that work intelligently within startup constraints rather than trying to upsell premium packages.
Business Partnership
Select agencies that position themselves as growth partners not just design service providers.
Using this framework completely changed the quality of agency partnerships I've seen. Instead of pretty websites that hurt conversion rates, startups get functional tools that actually drive business growth.
The most dramatic example was a SaaS startup that followed this playbook and chose an agency focused on conversion optimization over visual awards. The result? 180% increase in trial signups within 60 days of launch.
But the real victory wasn't just the immediate metrics – it was building a website that actually supported their business model. Instead of fighting against their acquisition strategy, their site became an integral part of it.
The agency they chose wasn't the prettiest or most expensive, but they understood that this startup's success depended on organic search rankings and trial conversion optimization. They built accordingly.
Compare this to startups that followed conventional selection wisdom: beautiful sites that require massive paid ad budgets to drive traffic, or stunning designs that convert poorly because they prioritize aesthetics over user intent.
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
Here are the key lessons I've learned from watching startups choose agencies (both successfully and disastrously):
Portfolio quality is inversely correlated with startup success. The most award-winning agencies often understand established businesses, not scrappy startups with unique constraints.
Ask about distribution strategy before design strategy. Agencies that immediately want to discuss your customer acquisition approach understand that websites are business tools, not art projects.
Demand startup-specific metrics. "Beautiful work" testimonials are worthless. You want conversion rate improvements, lead generation numbers, and organic traffic growth from similar-stage companies.
Test their constraint-handling skills. Startups have unique limitations. Good agencies work intelligently within them; bad agencies try to talk you out of them.
Avoid agencies that sell "vision alignment." This is usually code for "we'll build what looks impressive in our portfolio, regardless of your business needs."
Look for technical depth, not just design skills. Site speed, mobile optimization, and SEO implications matter more than visual creativity for most startups.
Choose business partners, not service providers. The best agencies position themselves as extensions of your growth team, not external vendors completing a project.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups specifically:
Prioritize agencies experienced with trial conversion optimization and SaaS growth metrics
Ensure they understand freemium vs. paid trial implications for site structure
Look for experience with technical product demos and feature comparison pages
For your Ecommerce store
For ecommerce specifically:
Focus on agencies with proven ecommerce conversion optimization experience
Prioritize mobile-first design expertise since most ecommerce traffic is mobile
Ensure they understand product page optimization and checkout flow psychology