Services · Build · Web design & development
Headless CMS. A back end your team stops asking us about.
Sanity, Prismic and Contentful, modelled around how you actually publish. The measure of a CMS is how rarely you need a developer.
A CMS is only modern if the team stops raising tickets
Headless separates content from presentation: the CMS stores structured content, the front end renders it. You get a fast site, content reusable across web and app, and no theme dictating what a page can be.
The catch is that headless makes the content model your responsibility, and a bad model is worse than a good monolith. Model it as a pile of rich-text blobs and you have rebuilt WordPress with extra steps and fewer safety rails.
So we model properly, real content types with real relationships, and we design the editor experience as deliberately as the front end. That is what turned a decade-old WordPress into something AIP Foundation's team runs themselves: see the AIP Foundation case study.
How we actually do it
Model the content, then design the editor.
- 01 · Model the content, not the pages
- Programmes, locations, people, products, the real entities of the business, with the relationships between them. Model these correctly and pages become views onto them rather than one-off documents.
- 02 · Choose the platform for the job
- Sanity for structured, relational content and a highly customisable studio. Prismic where slice-based page composition suits the team. Contentful for larger multi-brand estates. We are partners, not evangelists.
- 03 · Design the editor experience
- Sensible field names, helpful validation, previews that reflect production, and blocks drawn from the design system so an editor cannot compose an off-brand page.
- 04 · Migrate the archive properly
- Scripted migration rather than copy-paste, with the old URL structure mapped to the new one so search equity survives. We test record by record against the old site before launch.
What you get
Deliverables, not adjectives.
- A documented content model with entities, fields and relationships
- A configured studio with validation, previews and role-based permissions
- Component-to-block mapping so editors compose from the design system
- Scripted content migration with URL mapping and redirects
- Editor training and documentation for the people who will use it daily
Questions, answered straight
No fluff, as promised.
Which headless CMS should we choose?
It depends on the team more than the tech. Sanity suits structured, relational content and teams who want a tailored studio; Prismic suits slice-based page building; Contentful suits large multi-brand estates. We will recommend against a rebuild if your current CMS is fine.
Will we lose SEO when we migrate?
Not if the migration is done properly. URL mapping and redirects are planned before the build, and we test them before launch. We have run this on decade-old estates without losing the archive.
Can our team really manage it without developers?
That is the entire point, and it depends on the editor experience rather than the platform. Model the content well and design the studio deliberately and yes, day-to-day publishing stops involving us.
Related services
This never works in isolation.
Proof from real work
Clients where this was the job.
Stuck waiting
on a developer?
Tell us what you're working on. You'll get an honest answer about whether we can help, and exactly how.
Prefer email? hello@saigon.digital