Growth & Strategy
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
After 7 years of building websites as a freelancer, I watched a CTO spend two weeks debating whether every heading should start with a verb. Two weeks. While competitors were launching features and capturing market share, this startup was paralyzed by WordPress perfectionism.
This wasn't an isolated incident. I've seen this pattern across dozens of client projects: engineering teams treating marketing websites like product infrastructure, requiring sprints for copy changes and code reviews for adding testimonials.
The harsh reality? Your startup's biggest competitor isn't another company—it's your own inability to move fast on marketing. While you're debugging WordPress plugins, competitors are running A/B tests on SaaS landing pages that convert 3x better.
Here's what you'll learn from my 7-year journey through every platform imaginable:
Why traditional CMS platforms kill startup velocity
The exact framework I use to choose between Framer and Webflow
How one client cut their website update time from 2 weeks to 2 hours
The hidden costs of "free" WordPress that nobody talks about
When to break my own rules and stick with WordPress
Breaking the Rules
What the startup world preaches about landing pages
Walk into any startup accelerator and you'll hear the same advice repeated like gospel:
"Just use a simple landing page builder" - they'll say. "Focus on your product, not your website." The recommended stack usually includes Squarespace for "simplicity," WordPress for "flexibility," or some drag-and-drop builder that promises "no coding required."
Here's what every startup advisor tells you:
Start simple - One page with a signup form is enough
Use templates - Don't reinvent the wheel
WordPress is reliable - It powers 40% of the web
Keep costs low - Use free themes and plugins
Focus on content - Design doesn't matter early on
This advice exists because it's safe. WordPress has been around forever, everyone knows it, and there's a developer on every corner who can help. The startup world loves "proven" solutions.
But here's the problem with conventional wisdom: it optimizes for safety, not speed. And in the startup world, speed kills everything else. While you're waiting for your developer to update your hero section, your competitor just launched three new landing page variants and discovered that video backgrounds increase conversions by 40%.
The real issue? Most startup advice treats your website like a brochure when it should be treated as a growth laboratory.
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
When I started working with a B2B SaaS startup, their brief was straightforward: revamp their WordPress website. Standard stuff, right? Wrong. What I discovered changed how I approach every startup website project.
This startup had fallen into what I call the "WordPress Trap." Their engineering team treated the marketing website like product infrastructure. Every copy change required a developer. Every A/B test needed a sprint. Adding a testimonial meant deploying code.
The breaking point came when the marketing team wanted to test different hero section copy. Simple request, right? It took two weeks because:
The developer was busy with product features
The staging environment broke
Plugin conflicts caused layout issues
Mobile responsiveness needed debugging
Meanwhile, their competitor launched five different landing page variants, discovered that social proof above the fold increased signups by 60%, and iterated their entire positioning.
This was my "aha" moment. I realized I'd been treating marketing websites like digital brochures when they should be marketing laboratories. The platform choice wasn't about features or flexibility—it was about velocity.
After analyzing dozens of similar situations across my client portfolio, a pattern emerged: startups that could iterate their website weekly grew 3x faster than those stuck in development cycles.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
After migrating over 40 startup websites from WordPress to no-code platforms, I developed a systematic approach that cuts website update time from weeks to hours. Here's the exact framework:
Step 1: The Velocity Audit
Before touching any platform, I audit how long it takes the startup to make five critical changes:
Update hero section copy
Add a new testimonial
Create a landing page for an A/B test
Add a new feature to the pricing page
Update the team page with a new hire
If any of these takes more than 30 minutes, the platform is killing their growth velocity.
Step 2: The Platform Decision Matrix
Based on my experience with 40+ migrations, here's when to choose each platform:
Choose Framer when:
Design differentiation is your competitive advantage
You need to go from concept to live in days, not weeks
Your team values animation and interaction over complex functionality
You're in a visually competitive space (design tools, creative agencies)
Choose Webflow when:
You're building beyond 20+ pages
You need robust CMS capabilities for blogs, resources, or directories
Custom integrations and workflows are part of your roadmap
SEO performance is critical from day one
Step 3: The Migration Process
I developed a 5-day migration sprint that minimizes downtime:
Day 1: Content audit and asset preparation
Day 2-3: Build core pages in new platform
Day 4: Set up redirects and SEO preservation
Day 5: Launch and team training
Step 4: Team Enablement
The real magic happens in training the marketing team to own website updates. I create custom video guides for:
Creating landing page variants for A/B tests
Updating social proof and testimonials
Adding new features to pricing pages
Publishing blog posts with proper SEO optimization
Velocity First
Stop optimizing for features you'll never use. Choose the platform that lets your marketing team move at startup speed.
Design Freedom
Framer gives you animation superpowers that make competitors look static. Use it when visual differentiation matters.
SEO Foundation
Webflow's clean code and SEO controls give you technical advantages without requiring a developer.
Team Training
The best platform is worthless if only one person can use it. Train your entire marketing team on day one.
The transformation is immediate and measurable. Here's what happened across my client portfolio:
Website Update Speed: Average time to make content changes dropped from 2 weeks to 2 hours—a 4200% improvement in velocity.
A/B Testing Frequency: Startups went from testing 1 landing page variant per month to 3-4 per week. One SaaS client discovered that moving testimonials above the pricing section increased conversions by 40%.
Marketing Independence: Marketing teams went from being dependent on engineering for every change to owning their website completely. This freed up 10-15 hours per week of developer time.
Unexpected Discovery: The biggest win wasn't speed—it was experimentation. When changing a landing page takes 30 minutes instead of 2 weeks, teams actually test their assumptions instead of just talking about it.
One client summarized it perfectly: "We went from having a website to having a marketing laboratory."
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
After migrating 40+ startup websites, here are the lessons that matter most:
Velocity beats perfection every time. A landing page you can iterate daily will outperform a "perfect" page you can't change for weeks.
Your platform choice is a growth decision, not a technical one. Choose based on how fast your marketing team can move, not how many features it has.
Train everyone on day one. The best platform is worthless if only one person can use it.
WordPress isn't always wrong. If you have a technical team that loves managing websites and you're not iterating frequently, WordPress might still work.
Migration fears are overblown. I've never had a startup lose significant SEO rankings during a well-planned migration.
The hidden cost of "free" platforms. WordPress might be free, but developer time, plugin licenses, and hosting quickly add up to more than Webflow or Framer.
Design differentiation matters more than founders think. In crowded markets, a stunning landing page can be your biggest competitive advantage.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups specifically:
Use Webflow for complex feature pages and CMS-driven content
Implement proper analytics tracking from day one
Create dedicated landing pages for each acquisition channel
Set up A/B testing infrastructure for continuous optimization
For your Ecommerce store
For e-commerce startups:
Framer works best for brand-focused product launches
Integrate with Shopify for actual e-commerce functionality
Focus on mobile-first design for better conversion rates
Use dynamic content for personalized landing pages