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15 Comments

Any feedback on our landing page?

Hi Indie Hackers! I'm very new to indie hacking and honestly don't really know what I'm doing regarding most parts of it (I'm a developer), but me and a couple other people are working on a side project and I'm doing my best to learn everything I need to know to help it succeed.

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    Hey Travis, thanks for posting! Here's my thoughts:

    • It took me a second to realize what it means to improve your stride. I didn't immediately realize that we're talking about running here. The picture sort of tells you that, but it could be interpreted as more of a relaxing atmosphere than a girl running. The name "Smarter Stride" also helps, but also isn't immediately obvious. "AI-Powered Running Plans" really starts to make it clear, but I didn't see it until scanning around for a bit. And users on a smaller screen will need to scroll before they see it (it's "below the fold").
    • When I clicked "Find out more" I was confused about what had happened. I was expecting a modal and thought I was in a modal for a second, so I was looking for an "x" but couldn't find it. I eventually realized that it scrolled you down the page. More importantly, I was expecting to be shown more information, but instead I was prompted to give you my email. I found that a little bit startling. With all the spam and lack of privacy these days, I don't like just giving away my email to anyone.
    • I think it's pretty clear what you're providing, but not totally clear. Maybe make it more clear that you're going to give people running workouts (or exercises?) that will help them get faster.
    • Here's an important piece of advice - benefits, not features The feature you're providing is a running plan. That's great, but what is the benefit? If you're a user, why do you care? How is this going to benefit your life?
    • One question I find myself asking is why I should trust you. How do I know that your running plans will be good? How do I know they'll be better than the alternatives? Why is AI necessary here? I think that these are important questions to address. Think of this as your opportunity to sell your product. Imagine you walk up to someone in person and say, "Hey, I offer AI powered running plans. Ready to sign up?". No, you'd probably want to provide them with more information first, and perhaps a demo or free trial.
    • For any type of form or sign up, common UX advise is to really cut out any fields that aren't truly necessary. Why do you need the users name and birthday? If they really do serve an important purpose, it would be good to explain in the form why you're asking for it.
    • https://www.nngroup.com/articles/113-design-guidelines-homepage-usability/ is a good resource.
    • http://sensible.com/dmmt.html and http://sensible.com/rsme.html are fantastic reads for anyone getting started with UX (which anyone building web apps should be doing).
    1. 1

      Thanks for the in-depth feedback! I plan on completely redoing the landing page based on what I've read in this thread and will be sure to take all of the stuff you listed into account. Also, thanks a lot for that resource, I was looking for something like that but didn't run across it.

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        Awesome! It's really great that you're seeking feedback and testing things. Keep doing that and it'll turn out great. We're always here once you finish your redesign :)

        1. 1

          Great, thanks! Really glad I found this place.

  2. 2

    reduce the size of your main banner image. Looks to be pretty large (kb) and takes a while to load.

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      Yeah, I threw that up right before I posted it here because there was just a gradient before but it's definitely too big. Thanks for the tip!

  3. 2

    Hi there,

    Cool idea! When I saw the first line "improve your pace with AI" I was thinking this would some sort of hardware piece that is with me on my run or calculating my pace

    It seems like Smarter Stride is offering training plans and a way to store information about my training?

    I'm a runner and currently use Strava to track my pace, distance and time. I'm happy with the product and community.

    My coach in high school had workouts planned for us all season long. I do miss having a training plan like that. Most plans I've found online are super basic, the same workouts only slightly modified week after week.

    It would be awesome to hear a little bit more about who you are and why you're building the product on this landing page.

    It sounds cliche, but sharing your Aha moment about why you wanted customized running plans and why you're qualified to help people train

    An example running plan on the site for users to checkout would be amazing. Maybe sign up for email and you send the first sample plan?

    On a more technical level, try switching your site to https as it gets rid of that "not secure" warning in Chrome. That's just the nerd in me though

    1. 2

      Hi Connor, thanks for the feedback! You got what it does exactly right! Strava is also my go-to for recording runs, and since there are so many great options for recording runs, we didn't want to reinvent that wheel.

      Most online plans being basic is exactly why I wanted to build this! They have no awareness of how advanced of a runner you are, what kind of training patterns most effectively help you improve, etc.

      I'll definitely incorporate the stuff you mentioned into the landing page. I knew it looked bare but I wasn't sure what else to put.

      Regarding https, I plan on upgrading to a paid tier of Heroku, which includes an SSL certificate, once I incorporate some of the feedback I got here, so that will be taken care of soon!

      Thanks again!

  4. 2

    Interesting idea.

    Got a mobile score of 23 on https://developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed/insights/?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.smarterstride.com%2F&tab=mobile.

    Figure out who you're targetting, most likely semi professional runners? Or will you be targeting coaches who pass the software down to their students. Once you have that figured out you can reword your landing page for your target audience.

    Quick tips to improve current landing page

    • Add image of the app
    • Add how it works so (does it use your mobile or a special device?)
    • Pricing section
    • Testimonials from runners/coaches
    • Not sure why you're asking for date of birth on the email subscription form.

    Few quick questions ;)

    Did you look at any templates/landing page builders?
    If so why didn't you use them?

    1. 1

      Thanks for the feedback!

      I did check Google's PageSpeed tool and I'm not really sure what's up with it because the first contentful paint definitely doesn't take 7.1 seconds. I am currently using the free tier of Heroku so the server goes to sleep after 30 minutes and has to wake up which might affect it, but you'd think rerunning it would fix that. I plan on switching off the free tier once I implement some of the feedback I get here so hopefully that will help.

      I'll do some research and talk to some people to get a better idea of what niche we should be targeting.

      Regarding testimonials, I guess once the service is ready I should run a beta and have a few select people use it for a bit for that?

      I'll switch over to a template too, I made the landing page before I thought to check if such a thing exists and wasn't sure if it was necessary to switch, but I do know that design isn't my strong suit so I'm sure it's worth it.

      Thanks again!

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        I believe the tool uses internet speed as well, not sure if that is what is causing the long delay.

        I'm currently building a landing page builder, if you want to try it out that would help me out a lot. While using it I can show you the best strategies to convert visitors to customers and help with copywriting.

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          That would be great! Feel free to send the details to the email in my profile or just post them here.

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    It's great :) Maybe the list of features looks too much like a list :D Incorporate icons, different colors can be a great choice. As a runner, I totaly understand the product :D

    Subscribe to newsletter, need to test it :D

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      Yeah, judging by your comment and the one above, I'm going to switch over to using a template because design definitely isn't my strong suit. Thanks for subscribing!

  6. 1

    "improve your stride" sounded like a catchy tagline, didn't know you literally meant stride!

    Really cool idea otherwise though, using AI to improve your walk.

    Just my 2c!

    Also, if you're looking for feedback on the idea itself I have a market research service where for $12 you can ask 100 people a question and then follow-up with interviews if you want. https://scoops.io/

    Just thought it might help. You could ask "Would you like it if an artificial intelligence program tracked how you walk and gave you feedback to improve your health?" and see how many people would pay for it and how much!

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