[01]
Frozen in 2005
The site reflected early 2000s web standards. No significant updates in 20 years. Compared to competitors' modern, image-forward sites, it gave a poor first impression for a firm of SAA's calibre.
A 20-year-old website rebuilt for the next 25 years of architecture
SAA interiors + architecture had a site built in 2005 that their own team couldn't edit. We replaced it with a modern Webflow platform that their marketing team manages independently — and that now generates 2,574 organic clicks in five months from a standing start.
2,574
Organic clicks (5 months)
89,975
Search impressions
2,198
New users (GA4)
57%
Traffic from organic search
At a Glance.
Client
SAA interiors + architecture (Shlemmer+Algaze+Associates Interiors & Architecture, Inc.)
Industry
Architecture, Interior Design & Real Estate Measurement
Market
United States - headquartered in Culver City, CA with offices in Irvine, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Iselin NJ, and New York
Scope
Full website redesign and platform migration — 20+ pages, custom map integration, SEO keyword research
Tech Stack
Webflow CMS · Google Analytics 4 · Google Search Console · Microsoft Clarity · YouTube embed · Custom Google Maps
Timeline
Sept 11, 2025 (contract) → Dec 22, 2025 (go-live) — 15 weeks
Services
UX Research · UI Design (3 homepage directions) · Webflow Development · SEO Keyword Research · Custom Map Development · CMS Training
Contract value
$10,650 (website + custom map integration)
Website Before we touched it.
Goals and Approach.
Reimagine the digital brand
Replace a 20-year-old placeholder with a website that reflects SAA's current scale, sophistication, and competitive positioning — inspired by firms like Bain & Company and EwingCole.
Showcase the portfolio
Build a filterable project showcase with detailed case study pages, high-quality imagery, and categorisation by practice area — making SAA's work visible and compelling.
Give the team content control
End the 20-year dependency on developers. Build in Webflow CMS so Emily, Maria, and Marissa can update content, add projects, and manage practice areas independently.
Position for the next 25 years
Support practice area expansion (Healthcare, Measurement Group), lead generation, and serve as SAA's primary digital business card for prospects and recruits.
Build an SEO foundation
Establish technical SEO, analytics, and content infrastructure — particularly around the Measurement & Analytics practice group — to support organic growth and content marketing in 2026.
Differentiate from competitors
Show SAA's agility, process-driven innovation, and client-first approach versus larger, less flexible firms — through design, content, and how the site itself is structured.
Reimagine the digital brand
Replace a 20-year-old placeholder with a website that reflects SAA's current scale, sophistication, and competitive positioning — inspired by firms like Bain & Company and EwingCole.
Showcase the portfolio
Build a filterable project showcase with detailed case study pages, high-quality imagery, and categorisation by practice area — making SAA's work visible and compelling.
Give the team content control
End the 20-year dependency on developers. Build in Webflow CMS so Emily, Maria, and Marissa can update content, add projects, and manage practice areas independently.
Position for the next 25 years
Support practice area expansion (Healthcare, Measurement Group), lead generation, and serve as SAA's primary digital business card for prospects and recruits.
Build an SEO foundation
Establish technical SEO, analytics, and content infrastructure — particularly around the Measurement & Analytics practice group — to support organic growth and content marketing in 2026.
Differentiate from competitors
Show SAA's agility, process-driven innovation, and client-first approach versus larger, less flexible firms — through design, content, and how the site itself is structured.
Reimagine the digital brand
Replace a 20-year-old placeholder with a website that reflects SAA's current scale, sophistication, and competitive positioning — inspired by firms like Bain & Company and EwingCole.
Showcase the portfolio
Build a filterable project showcase with detailed case study pages, high-quality imagery, and categorisation by practice area — making SAA's work visible and compelling.
Give the team content control
End the 20-year dependency on developers. Build in Webflow CMS so Emily, Maria, and Marissa can update content, add projects, and manage practice areas independently.
Position for the next 25 years
Support practice area expansion (Healthcare, Measurement Group), lead generation, and serve as SAA's primary digital business card for prospects and recruits.
Build an SEO foundation
Establish technical SEO, analytics, and content infrastructure — particularly around the Measurement & Analytics practice group — to support organic growth and content marketing in 2026.
Differentiate from competitors
Show SAA's agility, process-driven innovation, and client-first approach versus larger, less flexible firms — through design, content, and how the site itself is structured.
Detailed Design Process Over Guesswork.
Onboarding Call
Onboarding Call
September 10, 2025. A 45-minute onboarding call with Emily Bartels and Maria Gontea from SAA, and Anand from Quixta. We walked through SAA's 25-year history, their three practice areas (Office Interiors, Healthcare, Real Estate Measurement), the pain points with the current site, and what success looks like. SAA had already completed our questionnaire in detail and organised all supporting materials in a shared OneDrive folder — logos, brand statements, target group analysis, competitor benchmarking, and example RFP packages. Weekly Thursday calls were established. The contract for $10,350 (Webflow CMS) had been signed the day before, after a negotiation from the original $11,850 quote that included a $2,150 discount based on SAA sharing their existing marketing research to reduce upfront discovery.
Design System.
Detailed Development Process Over Guesswork.
Development — Next.js
Onboarding Call
Building in Webflow CMS November–December 2025. Anvish Shetty (Quixta developer) built the site in Webflow CMS. CMS collections were created for team member bios (with pop-up display), portfolio projects (with filtering by practice area, project type, and location), and Insights articles. Custom-coded elements included the ELEVATE framework visualisation on the Healthcare page, which required custom code beyond Webflow's native capabilities. A YouTube video embed was added to the homepage — the client chose YouTube over Vimeo for cost reasons. The staging site was deployed at test-441466.webflow.io. Webflow hosting cost: $14/month (vs $28/month had we gone with WordPress on Cloudways).
- Planning & Scoping
- Participant Recruitment
- Data Collection
- Analysis & Synthesis
- Planning & Scoping
- Participant Recruitment
- Data Collection
- Analysis & Synthesis
Building It Right.
Tech Stack
Wordpress
PHP
HTML5
Javascript
Cloudways
WP Rocket
WebP Images
Heartlink Booking Widget
Notable Technical Challenges and Solutions
SEO continuity on launch
Every existing URL mapped and 301-redirected before go-live. Domain authority preserved — rankings improved within weeks of launch rather than the months a reset would have required.
Healthcare schema markup
LocalBusiness, MedicalBusiness, and Review schema implemented across all pages. Direct result: 933 additional clicks from Google Review Snippets — a rich result format competitors without structured data can't access.
Mobile performance at 90+
All images in WebP, lazy loading enabled, WP Rocket caching, and Cloudways server-level caching stacked. GTMetrix and PageSpeed audits run before launch. 90+ scores achieved across all tested pages.
Booking widget integration
The Hearlink booking widget integrated with matching visual styling — no off-brand redirect, no friction break between the site and the booking flow.
Integrations Configured
Google Analytics 4
Traffic, user behaviour, and conversion event tracking
Google Search Console
Search performance monitoring, index coverage, Core Web Vitals
Microsoft Clarity
Session recordings and heatmaps for ongoing UX analysis
Hearlink Booking Widget
Embedded appointment booking system, styled to match the site
GDPR Cookie Consent
ICO-compliant cookie banner and consent management
Live Chat
Patient enquiry chat widget for pre-booking questions
Why We Built this in Webflow
[01]
Budget & Timeline fit
A 40-page custom build at $4,600 in 8 weeks. WordPress's battle-tested ecosystem let us move fast without sacrificing quality. A comparable Next.js build would have added 4–6 weeks and significant cost — not the right trade-off for every client.
[02]
CMS the client can actually use
Ibrahim and Ajmal update clinic hours, staff bios, and blog posts without touching code or raising a ticket. WordPress's admin panel works from day one — no training, no dependency on Quixta for routine content changes.
[03]
Healthcare plugin ecosystem
Schema markup, GDPR cookie consent, live chat, Google Maps, and Hearlink booking widget — all covered by mature, maintained WordPress solutions. Building this in a headless stack would have been cost-prohibitive.
[04]
Full HTML control for SEO
No page builder. No theme. Custom PHP templates for every page type — complete control over heading structure, schema injection, canonical tags, and Core Web Vitals. The 42% position improvement was built into the markup from day one.
[05]
Scalable hosting on Cloudways
Deployed on Cloudways (DigitalOcean), not shared hosting. Server-side caching, WP Rocket, WebP images. Fast, scalable, and the client controls their own hosting account — no lock-in to any proprietary infrastructure.
[06]
Full ownership on delivery
On go-live: full source code, admin credentials, all design files, CMS walkthrough. No retainer required to keep the site running. No per-seat licensing. No platform fee that scales with traffic. The site belongs to them — not to any vendor.
What Changed After launch
2,574
Organic clicks · Jan–Jun 2026
89,975
Search impressions · GSC
2.86%
Average CTR · GSC
2,198
New users · GA4
1,259
From organic search · 57%
55s
Avg engagement time · GA4
90%
US traffic · GSC clicks
76%
Desktop traffic · GSC
Month by month Growth Trajectory
The site launched December 22, 2025. Search Console data begins January 20, 2026. Every number below started at zero.
Monthly search performance (GSC)
Jan 2026 (partial)215 clicks6,624 imps3.2% CTR
Feb 2026506 clicks9,298 imps5.4% CTR
Mar 2026542 clicks22,007 imps2.5% CTR
Apr 2026447 clicks20,782 imps2.2% CTR
May 2026512 clicks21,565 imps2.4% CTR
Jun 2026 (partial)352 clicks9,699 imps3.6% CTR
Traffic sources (GA4 — new users)
Organic Search1,259 users57%
Direct754 users34%
Referral132 users6%
Organic Social46 users2%
Other (email, AI, etc.)7 users<1%
A note on the numbers: impressions tripled from February to March as Google indexed the full site, but CTR dropped from 5.4% to 2.5%. That's expected. The site started appearing for broader, more competitive queries — some at position 50+. The branded queries (where SAA ranks #1–5) maintain a 20–60% CTR. Non-branded discovery is still early; it requires the content marketing and blog investment that Maria and Emily are planning for 2026.
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Average Google Search position Feb 2025 – Jun 2026. Position improves from ~35 (pre-launch baseline) to ~18 at launch (Sep 2025), settling at ~20 across Jan–Jun 2026.
Keyword rankings & top pages
Search QueryClicksImpressionsCTRCTR
nelson algaze117414.86%2.14
saa architects los angeles121866.67%1.11
saa design3012025.00%2.21
saa culver city4618425.00%2.17
saa interiors4910248.04%1.08
shlemmer algaze associates8512140.09%2.81
saaia13798413.92%3.39
saa architecture15855728.37%5.80
saa architects3581,92718.58%5.97
saa interiors + architecture43671560.98%1.35
Top pages by clicks (GSC · Jan–Jun 2026)
PageClicksImpressionsAvg Position
Homepage (saaia.com)178368,79531.89
Our Team3399,7075.08
Contact Us1387,2077.68
Careers1304,6844.64
About Us133,5855.41
Rodeo Drive Women's Health Center101,7898.57
Real Estate Measurement & Analytics91,4301,430
Portfolio72,4857.46
The query profile is almost entirely branded right now. That's healthy for a firm that generates business through referrals and relationships - it means people who hear about SAA can find them. The non-branded opportunity (terms like "office interior design," "architecture design firm," "building measurement services") is where the 2026 content strategy will focus.
The Live Website - Today.
What makes an architecture website different
Portfolio is the product
The project showcase is the most important section of the site. It needs to be filterable, visually rich, and structured to support case-study-level depth — not just a gallery of thumbnails. Each project should tell a story: scope, challenges, outcomes.
Practice areas need their own identity
A firm with Healthcare, Office Interiors, and Measurement practices serves fundamentally different audiences. Each practice page needs its own positioning, service model, and CTAs — while maintaining brand consistency across the site.
Team visibility matters
In professional services, people buy people. The Team page is typically the second or third most visited page (it was #2 for SAA at 339 clicks). Bios, headshots, credentials, and leadership profiles need to be prominent and easy to maintain.
CMS independence is critical
Architecture firms win new projects constantly. If adding a portfolio project requires a developer, the site falls behind within weeks. The CMS must let the marketing team add projects, update team members, and publish thought leadership independently.
Portfolio is the product
The project showcase is the most important section of the site. It needs to be filterable, visually rich, and structured to support case-study-level depth — not just a gallery of thumbnails. Each project should tell a story: scope, challenges, outcomes.
Practice areas need their own identity
A firm with Healthcare, Office Interiors, and Measurement practices serves fundamentally different audiences. Each practice page needs its own positioning, service model, and CTAs — while maintaining brand consistency across the site.
Team visibility matters
In professional services, people buy people. The Team page is typically the second or third most visited page (it was #2 for SAA at 339 clicks). Bios, headshots, credentials, and leadership profiles need to be prominent and easy to maintain.
CMS independence is critical
Architecture firms win new projects constantly. If adding a portfolio project requires a developer, the site falls behind within weeks. The CMS must let the marketing team add projects, update team members, and publish thought leadership independently.
Not every way of building is alike.
Basic tools / MVPs
Every design decision in this project was grounded in UX research, audience analysis, and competitor benchmarking. We don't open Figma until we understand who the patient is.
Mid-level platforms
Technical SEO — schema, 301 redirects, URL architecture, on-page optimisation — built into development, not added after. The site ranked within weeks because it was built to rank.
Advanced / Enterprise systems
The location page template means Direct Ear Care can open a clinic in Leeds and add a ranking-ready page themselves. The digital infrastructure scales with the business.
The Team behind this project .*
Anand Ashok
Business Operations
Project lead, client relationship, proposal, contract, strategy, weekly call management. Ran all 20 client calls across 5 months.
Chandana Vulivireddy
UI/UX Lead
Design direction, quality review on all wireframes and mockups, mood board review, design consistency across pages.
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Tanisha Balraj
UI/UX Design
UX research, wireframes, mood board, all three homepage design directions, full-page mockups in Figma.
.png?2026-07-14T08%3A38%3A29.518Z)
Anvish Shetty
Developer
Webflow build, custom code (ELEVATE framework, Google Maps integration, honeypot spam filter, conditional templates), deployment, post-launch support.
What SAA interiors + architecture Said
“"It's been a great experience working with you and your team, and we're really happy with how everything has come together. We truly appreciate all the effort and support in getting us across the finish line."”
Emily Bartels
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A few things people usually ask before reaching out.
Webflow was chosen for its visual editing capabilities, lower hosting costs ($14/month vs $28/month for WordPress on Cloudways), and the ability for SAA's marketing team to make content updates without developer intervention - a critical requirement given that their previous custom-coded site had locked them out of editing for 20 years.
Pick a time. We'll take it from there.
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