A mid-sized US bank operating under strict regulatory oversight (SEC, FINRA) had outgrown its Contentful CMS. Costs were climbing unpredictably as content volume and API usage grew. The development team was hitting the limits of what the platform would let them customise. And in a regulated environment where control over data, security, and audit trails matters, a third-party SaaS platform was becoming a liability rather than an asset.
The bank was also planning a full website design refresh - which created a natural window to rethink the technology underneath it.
"The migration was a strategic imperative. We needed direct oversight of our data and infrastructure to meet regulatory requirements confidently. The transition was remarkably smooth, and the results have exceeded expectations - significant cost efficiencies, faster development, and a compliance posture we can stand behind."
We ran an assessment of the existing Contentful setup - content models, API usage, asset management, and compliance requirements - then designed and delivered a migration to a self-hosted Payload CMS instance within the bank’s own secure cloud environment.
The migration covered thousands of content entries, assets, and relationships. We rebuilt content models to take advantage of Payload’s more flexible architecture, implemented role-based access controls that matched the bank’s security policies, and configured audit logging to feed into their existing compliance systems. The new website design was integrated at the same time, so the bank launched with a modern frontend powered by a platform they fully controlled.
The cutover was planned to the hour. Final content was synced, the switchover happened during a low-traffic window, and intensive monitoring followed. There was no downtime and no data loss.
Annual CMS costs dropped by more than 60%, replacing unpredictable SaaS fees with manageable infrastructure spend. Page speed improved by 23%. The development team reported a significant increase in productivity - Payload’s TypeScript-native architecture and customisable admin UI removed the friction they had been working around for years. Content editors found the new system faster and easier to use.
Most importantly, the bank now has full control over its content infrastructure - self-hosted, auditable, and built to meet the regulatory standards its previous platform could not guarantee
