Turn Your SaaS Website Into a Scalable Growth Engine
In this post, I will walk you through the exact three step framework I use to turn any SaaS website into a scalable growth engine that drives signups and demo bookings.
Most SaaS founders think a good looking website is enough to drive growth. The truth is that great design only works if it is built around a clear conversion strategy.
I learned this first hand at a SaaS company where our website consistently drove high value demo bookings that turned into six figure deals. Over time, I saw how a website can either become a predictable growth engine or just a pretty brochure that does not really move the needle.
This framework is built to help you turn your website into the first one.
The Reality of Unpredictable SaaS Growth
When I worked at a SaaS startup, I saw how unpredictable growth can be.
One month you are celebrating signups. The next month everything just stops.
In the early days, everything was founder driven. Every sale, every demo, every email came from the founders.
In 2020, I joined the company as one of the first employees. There were four founders and I came in on a one month internship to do everything design. The website they had in the beginning was mainly there to make the company look legitimate.
Five years later in 2025, they have 45 employees. That is roughly an 800 percent increase. They are active in three countries. The growth over those five years has been huge and also very unpredictable.
I spent four years there as design lead. It was an amazing experience and I learned a lot. One of the biggest lessons was how hard it is to design and develop for a company with unpredictable growth, and with money that has to be spent wisely.
You need to ask a lot of hard questions:
- Who is the ideal customer
- Is it B2B, B2C or B2G
- What percentage of the market is realistic to gain over time
- How fast do we need to grow to get a strong position
- What happens if we do not grow fast enough
- How do we grow with unpredictable demand and limited resources
- Where is the balance between money, time and ambition
During the four years I was there, we had three different websites. The last one we built was by far the best.
The first website looked good, but there was limited strategy behind it. The company was still figuring out which customers to target long term, what value those customers were looking for and how we should package that value.
The last time we redesigned the site, we took a completely different approach. We followed a clear process. We had a dedicated team working on it. We built every section around our target audience.
The market was complex and hard to target with just one message, so we actually divided the website into two. We built a system where users could switch between two different target groups, and we spoke directly to both at the same time.
This time, with a clear process and a structured approach, everything clicked for me.
Growth does not come from design alone. It comes from the strategy behind it. When you combine design with data, process and a scalable mindset, your website starts driving real business growth for your SaaS.
To sum it up:
- Scalable systems help you handle unpredictable growth
- A clear strategy helps you get the most value from every dollar you spend
That is what this framework is about.
Step 1: Understand the Business Model
Before any design happens, I always start with one question:
How will the business actually make money?
It sounds obvious, but a lot of SaaS websites are built without a clear link between design and the growth model.
I always start by asking two core questions.
Question 1: What is the main growth driver?
Are you trying to:
- Increase self served signups
- Get more demo bookings
- Drive more sales calls
If your model is product led, which is usually the case for signups, the website has to create instant clarity and remove friction. Every second counts. You need to get people into the product and quickly turn them into committed users.
If you are demo driven, the goal shifts a bit. Now you are trying to persuade and pre qualify. You do not just want more demo bookings. You want the right people to book a demo.
If you are sales led, the website becomes more of a sales enablement tool. You need more case studies, clear return on investment, strong numbers, testimonials and credible content that your audience can relate to.
Question 2: How do people discover you?
Do they find you through:
- Content and SEO
- Referrals
- Paid ads
- The product itself
If it is content driven, design should educate and nurture.
If it is ad driven, the website needs to match the message from the ad and help with conversion. When people click an ad and land on your page, the promise from the ad and the content on the page need to match very well.
If it is more product led, the job is to move the user from curiosity to a click and then to the first aha moment inside your SaaS. That needs to happen as fast as possible.
I always build around the behavior that can increase revenue based on the conversion goal of the business. If your website does not accelerate your growth, it is basically a brochure or a slide deck you could throw in the trash after a networking event.
Once you truly understand how the business grows, everything else becomes easier to design and prioritize.
Step 2: Design for Conversion
Now that you know what drives growth in your business, the next step is to design for conversion.
This is the fun part for a designer like me, but it is also where many SaaS websites fail.
Typical problems:
- Messaging is too technical
- The main conversion goal is unclear
- Users do not know what to do next
- Important psychological elements are missing, which increases friction, confusion and trust issues
- The content is not relatable
Founders are usually very close to the product. That often leads to technical or generic messaging that makes users bounce.
The goal is simple. Clarity should always be the foundation.
If your ideal customer cannot tell what you do after 5 seconds on your homepage, you are losing money because you are losing potential conversions.
Design is not just decoration, even though I love good visuals. It is a tool for behavioral guidance. Psychology is a big part of a great website. It is how you move users from curiosity to commitment.
How I Approach Conversion Focused Design
To illustrate this, I looked at Notion and their homepage.
Here is how I would approach a hero section and the top of the page.
- Start with a clear value statement that passes the 5 second test
Visitors should understand within 5 seconds:- What you do
- Who it is for
- Possibly how fast they can get value
- Build the hero around clarity, proof and a strong call to action
We will usually combine:- A clear headline
- A short supporting description
- Social proof
- A primary call to action that matches user intent
- Use real social proof
This could be:- Customer logos
- Strong metrics
- Outcomes
- Relatable or data specific testimonials
- Show the value of the product, not just static screenshots
For example, Notion uses a carousel that shows different ways to use the product. A single screenshot rarely tells the full story. Show scenarios, not just an empty interface. - Make sure your call to action matches what the user wants to do
If the user wants to try the product, the CTA should make it easy to get started.
Examples:- “Get Notion free”
- “Try free” with copy like “No credit card needed” underneath to reduce perceived risk
In the case of Notion, the headline “One workspace. Zero busywork” is catchy but a bit vague. “The AI workspace that works for you” is maybe a bit clearer.
They are clearly testing different headlines, because writing the perfect headline is hard and very valuable. That is why I say their messaging is a bit unclear and they are A/B testing to hone it in.
They also use two different CTAs:
- “Get Notion free” which is product and signup focused
- “Request demo” which is more enterprise and sales focused
This can be confusing for users. Is this for solo users or for enterprise teams. Why would I need a demo if I can try it out. Is it difficult to use. These questions might not be spoken, but users will think them.
On the positive side, they use strong social proof with well known logos, which helps a lot with conversion.
That is step two. Design for conversions, not just aesthetics.
Step 3: Build for Scale
The last step in the framework is to build for scale.
I personally use Webflow, but you could also use Framer or other tools. The important part is to make your website scalable.
That is especially important for SaaS, because growth is unpredictable and the website needs to be easy to update.
A very common problem is when the team has to message a developer every time they want to change a headline or add a case study. That quickly becomes a bottleneck.
In Webflow, I always build with a scalability first mindset.
Here are some of the key elements.
Global Design System
I set up:
- Brand colors
- Typography
- UI styles
All of this lives inside a variables system.
If you want to change a color later, you change it in one place and it updates across the entire website.
CMS Collections
I use CMS collections for:
- Case studies
- Team profiles
- Blog posts
You design each type of page once, then bind fields like title, body text, images and tags to the layout.
From there, you never need to touch the design again when you add content. If you want to update something later, you change it once and it updates for all blog posts, all case studies and so on.
That is what makes it scalable.
Page Templates and Components
You can also:
- Create reusable components such as navbars, footers and sections
- Create page templates for landing pages, sales pages and other key layouts
If you change something in a global component, it updates on every page that uses it.
If you are a marketing team and need a new landing page fast, you simply duplicate a page template and you are ready to go.
A website should grow with your company, not hold it back. When growth is unpredictable, not having a scalable system will slow you down.
This is what happened to us. We had to redo the website again and again, even though we could probably have built it in a more scalable way from the start.
That is why I do not just deliver a site. I deliver a full scalable system.
Bringing It All Together
So to recap, my three step framework to turn a SaaS website into a scalable growth engine is:
- Understand the business model
Know how the company makes money and what drives growth. - Design for conversion
Build the website around clarity, psychology and the right actions. - Build for scale
Use systems, templates and CMS structures so the website can grow with the business.
This is how you move from a nice looking site to a website that actually drives consistent signups, demo bookings or whatever your main goal is.
Want Help Applying This to Your Own SaaS?
If you are reading this and thinking, “This sounds great, but how do I actually make it happen for my own SaaS” that is exactly what I help founders and leaders do.
We start with a short discovery call where we:
- Go through your current situation
- Look at your goals
- Identify what is holding you back
- Map out what to improve first
If that sounds helpful, you can book a discovery call with me using the link below. It is a quick, no pressure chat and you will walk away knowing exactly what to focus on next.
If we are not a good match, that is completely fine. The call is simply there to see if it makes sense for both sides.
Thank you for reading, and hopefully I will see you in the next one.
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