N8n vs Zapier vs Make: the real difference founders should care about

A beautiful website without conversion systems is an expensive brochure. It looks premium, it wins compliments, and it quietly leaks pipeline. The form goes to a shared inbox. Lead attribution gets lost. No follow-up sequence. No sales alerts. No enrichment or routing. Aesthetics without systems is the reason that “we redesigned and traffic is up” still turns into “but revenue is flat.”

Aesthetics vs performance

Design matters. But performance is what converts: clear messaging, fast load times, zero-friction forms, and a back end that captures, enriches, routes, and follows up automatically. That means: every form maps to the CRM, UTM parameters are preserved, duplicates are prevented, sales is notified instantly, and sequences trigger without someone babysitting a spreadsheet. This is where Zapier, Make, and n8n enter the conversation.

The founder-first view of automation tools

Zapier: Fast to ship, huge app catalog, ideal for simple marketing ops. Great for MVP workflows and non-technical teams. Downsides: per-task pricing can balloon at scale, limited complex logic, polling delays on some triggers, and you live entirely in their SaaS.

Make (formerly Integromat): More powerful visual builder with routers, iterators, and data transformations. Often cheaper per operation than Zapier for complex flows. Better when you need branching and list processing. Still SaaS, steeper learning curve, and scenarios can turn into spaghetti if not engineered.

n8n: Open source, self-host or cloud. Suited for core operations and scale: advanced logic, long-running workflows, better control over data/privacy, versioning, and lower marginal cost if self-hosted. Requires an engineering mindset and proper DevOps. When your automations become business-critical, n8n is usually the endgame.

What actually makes a site convert

• Clarity: a headline that says who you help and what outcome you deliver.
• Speed: sub-2s load, no dead scripts, clean Webflow build.
• Proof: relevant logos, short case snapshots, simple math on ROI.
• Frictionless capture: one short form above the fold, progressive profiling later.
• Follow-up system: instant acknowledgement, qualification, routing, and sequences.
• Attribution: preserve UTMs, match to campaigns, and close the loop in the CRM.

A concrete example

Visitor submits a Webflow demo form. We capture UTMs, send the lead to HubSpot/Close, enrich via Clearbit, score, dedupe, and route to the right owner. Sales gets a Slack alert with Accept/Decline buttons. If accepted, the prospect receives a Calendly link; booking creates a Zoom meeting, a CRM opportunity, and a ClickUp task. If no booking inside 24 hours, a personalized nudge goes out. Every touch is logged. Finance can later attribute revenue back to the original campaign.

Zapier can build a light version quickly. Make handles the branching and list processing cleanly. n8n is where this becomes durable: custom logic, audit trails, retry queues, and costs that don’t spike when you run 100k tasks a month.

Cost and control, not just features

At 10,000 leads/month with 8–12 steps each, Zapier and Make can become a material line item. For prototypes, that’s fine. For core ops, n8n (self-hosted) often wins on unit economics and data control. If you need EU hosting or strict compliance, n8n’s self-hosting and open-source nature are decisive. If your team is small and speed beats control, Zapier or Make will get you live in an afternoon.

How WeCraft Studio approaches this

• Convert-first Webflow: fast, accessible, and built around the path to demo or purchase.
• Right-sized automation: we start with quick wins (Zapier/Make) and graduate critical flows to n8n when scale or compliance demands it.
• Operational clarity: source-of-truth CRM, clean data, no duplicate records, complete attribution.
• Measurement: dashboards that link spend to pipeline and pipeline to revenue.

Choosing your stack

• Need speed and simple handoffs? Zapier.
• Need complex branching and data manipulation in SaaS? Make.
• Need scale, privacy, and cost control for core ops? n8n.

The real difference isn’t the node count or the UI theme. It’s whether your website behaves like a system. Founders don’t need another pretty homepage. They need a machine that turns attention into qualified pipeline, automatically and measurably. That’s the WeCraft way: modern design, smart automation, and tangible business impact.