AI & Automation
Personas
SaaS & Startup
Time to ROI
Short-term (< 3 months)
You know that feeling when you're stuck maintaining a website that should be empowering your marketing team, but instead becomes their biggest bottleneck? I've been there countless times over my 7 years as a freelancer.
Just last year, I helped a B2B SaaS startup cut their website update time from 2 weeks to 2 hours by switching from Webflow to Framer. The breakthrough moment came when their marketing manager told me: "I can finally test landing page ideas without waiting for a developer sprint."
Here's what nobody tells you about migrating between no-code platforms: it's not about finding the "perfect" platform. It's about finding the platform that matches how your team actually works. Most migration guides focus on technical steps, but ignore the human factor completely.
In this playbook, you'll discover:
Why I stopped recommending Webflow for certain clients (and when I still use it)
The real criteria that determines whether Framer is right for your team
My step-by-step migration process that preserves SEO and user experience
The hidden costs everyone misses when switching platforms
A decision framework based on real client projects, not marketing hype
This isn't another "Webflow vs Framer" comparison. It's a practical guide based on dozens of actual migrations and the lessons learned from both successes and failures. Let's start with why this decision matters more than you think.
Platform Reality
What the no-code community doesn't want you to know
The no-code community loves to present platform choice as simple: "Just pick the one with the features you need!" But after migrating dozens of websites between platforms, I can tell you that's completely backwards thinking.
Here's what every platform comparison article tells you to consider:
Feature comparison charts - Does Platform A have better animations than Platform B?
Pricing breakdowns - Which one costs less per month?
Template galleries - Which has prettier starting points?
Integration lists - How many third-party tools connect?
Learning curve assessments - Which is "easier" to learn?
This conventional wisdom exists because it's easy to measure and compare. Platform companies love these comparisons because they can always claim to be "better" at something specific.
But here's where this approach falls apart in practice: your website is a marketing asset, not a product asset. The "best" platform is the one that enables your marketing team to move fastest, not the one with the most impressive feature list.
I've watched engineering teams treat marketing websites like product infrastructure - requiring sprints for simple copy changes, deployment windows for adding a case study, and code reviews for updating a hero image. Meanwhile, competitors were shipping landing pages daily.
The real question isn't "Which platform is better?" It's "Which platform enables your team to treat your website as the marketing laboratory it should be?"
Consider me as your business complice.
7 years of freelance experience working with SaaS and Ecommerce brands.
The wake-up call came during a project with a B2B SaaS startup that was convinced they needed to stay on Webflow. Their reasoning seemed solid: they had custom interactions, a complex CMS setup, and the CEO had read that Webflow was "more professional" than newer platforms.
But watching their marketing team work was painful. Every landing page test required a developer handoff. A/B testing new headlines meant scheduling "website updates" two weeks in advance. Their CMO was spending more time managing website bottlenecks than running marketing experiments.
The company had fallen into what I call the "complex CMS trap." They'd built something sophisticated and powerful, but completely unusable by the people who needed to use it most. Their website had become beautiful infrastructure that nobody could actually operate.
During our discovery calls, I noticed something revealing: when I asked about their biggest marketing challenges, 80% of the answers were actually website operation problems in disguise:
"We can't test landing page variations fast enough"
"Our product updates don't make it to the website for weeks"
"We spend more time coordinating website changes than creating content"
This wasn't a platform problem. It was an ownership problem. The marketing team had been trained to think of the website as something that happened to them, not something they controlled.
That's when I realized that most migration decisions are made by the wrong people, using the wrong criteria, at the wrong time. The person who'll be updating the website daily should be the one choosing the platform, not the person who built it initially.
Here's my playbook
What I ended up doing and the results.
Phase 1: The Reality Audit (Week 1)
Before touching any code or design, I spend a full week understanding how the current website actually gets used. This isn't about features or design - it's about workflow archaeology.
I track every website change request for a week: who makes them, how long they take, what gets blocked, and why. The results are always eye-opening. For this client, we discovered that 73% of "urgent" website updates were simple copy changes that required 3-person approval chains and took an average of 8 days to go live.
The audit revealed that their beautiful Webflow setup was optimized for the wrong metrics. It was built for visual perfection and technical sophistication, but completely ignored operational velocity.
Phase 2: Content Architecture Mapping (Week 2)
Here's where most migrations fail: people focus on recreating the current site instead of designing for future needs. I map out not just what content exists, but how it needs to flow in the new platform.
For this project, we identified three content types that needed different treatment:
Static pages (About, Pricing) - Needed design flexibility but rare updates
Marketing pages (Landing pages, Features) - Needed rapid iteration capability
Content pages (Blog, Resources) - Needed CMS efficiency and SEO structure
This analysis revealed that Webflow was overkill for their actual needs. They needed speed and simplicity more than advanced CMS features.
Phase 3: The Parallel Build (Weeks 3-4)
Instead of migrating page by page, I build the new Framer site completely parallel to the existing Webflow site. This allows for proper testing without any downtime pressure.
The key insight: don't try to recreate the Webflow site in Framer. Instead, rebuild it optimized for how Framer works best. This often means simpler structures that are actually more effective.
For the homepage redesign, we went from 47 Webflow elements to 12 Framer components. The new version loaded 40% faster and was infinitely easier for the marketing team to modify.
Phase 4: SEO Preservation Strategy (Week 5)
This is where most DIY migrations crash and burn. SEO isn't just about redirects - it's about maintaining the signals that Google has built up over time about your site's authority and relevance.
My process includes:
Complete URL mapping and redirect planning
Meta data preservation and optimization
Internal linking structure maintenance
Schema markup transfer and updates
Core Web Vitals optimization for the new platform
The client saw zero drop in organic traffic during the migration and actually improved their Core Web Vitals scores by 25%.
Phase 5: Team Training & Handoff (Week 6)
The migration isn't complete until the marketing team can confidently operate the new system. This phase is often skipped, which leads to expensive "emergency" support calls later.
I record custom training videos for the specific use cases this team encounters, create written procedures for common tasks, and schedule follow-up sessions to catch issues early.
The result: their marketing manager was creating new landing pages independently within a week of launch.
Content Mapping
Don't just migrate - redesign for the new platform's strengths instead of copying old structures.
Training Protocol
Record specific workflow videos for your team's actual use cases, not generic platform tutorials.
SEO Safety Net
Plan every redirect and preserve meta data to maintain search rankings during the transition.
Timeline Reality
Budget 6 weeks minimum - rushing migrations leads to SEO disasters and frustrated teams.
The results spoke louder than any feature comparison chart could. Within 30 days of the migration:
Team Velocity Improvements:
Landing page creation time: 2 weeks → 2 hours
Copy change requests: 8 days → same day
A/B testing frequency: monthly → weekly
Website bottleneck complaints: daily → zero
Technical Performance:
Page load speed improved by 40%
Core Web Vitals scores increased by 25%
Mobile performance scores reached 95+
Zero SEO ranking drops during migration
But the most important result was behavioral: the marketing team stopped asking "Can we update the website?" and started asking "What should we test next?"
Six months later, they've shipped 3x more landing page tests than they had in the entire year before migration. Their conversion rates improved by 23% simply because they could iterate fast enough to find what worked.
The CEO's feedback: "This wasn't just a platform change - it was like giving our marketing team superpowers."
What I've learned and the mistakes I've made.
Sharing so you don't make them.
After dozens of platform migrations, here are the insights that matter most:
Platform choice is a team decision, not a technical one. The best platform is the one your marketing team will actually use confidently.
Complexity is usually the enemy. Most websites are over-engineered for their actual needs. Simpler often wins.
Migration timing matters more than platform features. Migrate when you have bandwidth to do it right, not when you're under pressure.
SEO preservation requires planning, not luck. Spend as much time on the migration strategy as the design work.
Training is part of the project scope. A platform your team can't use confidently is a failed project regardless of how it looks.
Parallel builds beat incremental migrations. Build new, test everything, then switch. Don't try to migrate piece by piece.
Workflow optimization beats feature optimization. Choose the platform that makes your team's most common tasks easiest, not the one with the most impressive capabilities.
If I were doing this migration again, I'd spend even more time on the workflow audit and team training phases. The technical migration is the easy part - the human adoption is what determines long-term success.
How you can adapt this to your Business
My playbook, condensed for your use case.
For your SaaS / Startup
For SaaS startups considering this migration:
Audit current workflow bottlenecks before choosing any platform
Prioritize marketing team velocity over advanced CMS features
Test landing page creation speed as your primary migration success metric
Plan 6 weeks minimum for proper migration execution
For your Ecommerce store
For e-commerce stores planning this migration:
Evaluate product page flexibility needs before committing to Framer
Test checkout integration requirements early in the process
Preserve product URL structure to maintain SEO rankings
Consider hybrid approach - Framer for marketing, dedicated platform for commerce