Ask IH: Feedback for my website? Time management, invoicing tool for freelance developers
Hello all,
Update: I've updated the site based on the amazing feedback I received here. Thank you everyone. Will be grateful to receive further feedback.
I've been working on an idea to solve my own problem. I'm a developer and recently started freelancing, but I came across a number of challenges in planning/managing the work.
So I started working on http://www.goldenhour.co as a side project. It's primarily a time tracking and invoicing application but also has some features to help manage your freelance work like keeping track of earnings and project budgets, letting you know what you should be working on right now, which project you are lagging, etc. As developers, we are almost always working from the CLI. So I'm building this as a CLI app.
I'm planning to release the beta version next month. Here's the problem - I commented on an IH forum post (https://www.indiehackers.com/forum/post/-KoTbi9gy0VcNfrtcn9S) about the website and received about 100+ visits so far (thank you all for visiting), but nobody signed up for the beta. It's fine if the product isn't that exciting, but I really want to know if it's the product or the website that is pushing away visitors.
So I'm back here in the forum asking for critique on my website and the idea. Any feedback would help me a lot. Thank you so much for your time!
This seems very interesting. Once you make some progress send me an email (zack@codefor.cash) we could talk about an integration into https://codefor.cash
I'd love for that to happen Zack. btw, I wanted to talk to you about joining codeforcash. Will send you an email.
cool
Wow, I loaded your website and put it in my browser bookmarks before you made this post. Unfortunately, I didn't sign-up for the beta until now.
CLI is good, but I also think you need to create an API and allow custom invoices to be made. Think https://ServerPilot.io + https://Lob.com + a time tracker.
Site design wise, simplify it to something like https://ServerPilot.io and https://Lob.com
Hello Samuel. I've updated the website today. Would really love it if you can check it out and see if it looks better than the old one. Thank you.
The latest update is definitely an improvement, but needs some more work.
I'm not sure if I like orange background with the screenshot. Because the yellow background makes it hard to differentiate between your logo (which is white) and the text. You could fix this by moving the logo to the upper-left corner, and the text a bit down.
I think you need to get rid of, "Free while we are in beta, 3 months free subscription after launch" section at the bottom. Then make your gh-sc-main.png image a little bit longer, and lower the screenshot image. Then have a 'Get Early Access Now' (or something similar) button below your, "Track time, send invoices, plan and manage your work - from your CLI" text.
Get rid of the beta window in the bottom-right of the screen. It's redundant.
I'm noticing there are a lot of punctuation issues. More specifically, no periods after sentences.
I'm feeling your original font, PT Mono, was a good choice. Because it resembled me of time-sheets and accounting paperwork. I'm on the fence about this though.
New issue I didn't notice before: get SSL working, and force it on your site. Cause you're hurting your search engine ranking if you don't.
Here's a good link on designing landing pages :https://www.julian.com/learn/growth/landing-pages
I also think you also need a modern pricing table with a border even if you only have one plan. The reason being is my eyes will scan and recognize the pricing table quicker than what you already have. Just my two cents.
Thank you for the detailed review Samuel. I received the same suggestion about moving the logo to the top left from someone else too, but the problem is that the page looks out of balance without anything on the right end.
The positioning of the "get early access" button that you are suggesting was the actually in the first iteration of the website. But I noticed that it worked better at the bottom in terms of signups. I also don't want to remove the "3 month free subscription" message because that conveys the benefit of signing up for beta. Do you think I can put it somewhere else?
I'll fix the punctuation issues. I decided on "Montserrat" as the header font when I did a small branding exercise in the beginning. So I'm trying to make it work. I generally favour consistency in such areas, so I'll switch if I get more feedback about this.
SSL - the site is actually a Tumblr blog, so I'm not sure how much control I have over it. I'll look into it.
Thank you so much for the landing page resource. I actually started reading Julian's growth guide, but didn't get the time to read through even the first page. I'll go through it.
"Thank you for the detailed review Samuel. I received the same suggestion about moving the logo to the top left from someone else too, but the problem is that the page looks out of balance without anything on the right end."
A solution is to have a menu in the upper-right corner. Which, made me think you probably need one for a login link/button anyways. You can always add 'Features' and 'Pricing' as well. Of course, since it's not released yet you can hold off on the login link/button but still can keep the 'Features' and 'Pricing'.
"SSL - the site is actually a Tumblr blog, so I'm not sure how much control I have over it. I'll look into it."
https://tumblr.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/226273528-Encryption
Not sure about using Tumblr myself and especially after reading the above link.
Something else I noticed, "Free while we are in beta, 3 months free subscription after launch" seems to conflict with "Always free for 3 projects" which makes me a little confused if it's free or not.
Ok. I'll try adding features and pricing section.
The only reason I went with a Tumblr blog was that it provides a solid base to work with. I already know how to customize Tumblr themes, and I don't have to worry about hosting.
The other idea was to blog about my progress and other insights while I built the product, and Tumblr fit the bill for me with free custom domain and blog with easy customization.
clientsfromhell.net is also a Tumblr blog, but they are running it on SSL, not sure how they are doing it.
Sorry I missed your comment about pricing table. I wanted to be a bit unconventional here, but I see your point. Will explore.
Hello Samuel. Thank you for signing up and for the design ideas. Really liked lob.com layout/presentation.
Yes, I'm planning to provide the whole service as an API, not just the invoices, but that'll come in an iteration after the first release.
Just curious: Is there any successful business app that is based on CLI? If you researched this market, would be great if you could share, and we'd be able to discuss further.
Hi kenn. I haven't researched the market, so I don't know. I thought it made sense to build it as a CLI app mainly because I'm aiming for developers.
CLI is just a medium and it has quite a few restrictions. So if you are considering building a CLI app, do consider the UX and see which medium solves the problem in the best way.
Hi Mahesh 🙌
It looks pretty cool, definitely something different. I am curios how it works from UX/navigation standpoint so I signed up for a beta (do notice that I am not a freelancer as of right now, so am not a target audience, but I do some development).
As the whole solution is provided as CLI, I would make a more targeted copywriting - towards (freelance) developers (ie there is not a single
developerword on the site) because not sure who else would "get it". So if you are targeting that niche, say it loud and clear - it will be much more attractive to target audience while others won't spend their time on something that is clearly not for them.Little nitpick - I would remove all distractions from a first screenshot, namely less tabs (make it single tab?) & less icons in the top bar so I can more easily focus on the important bits.
Not sure if important, but if you did not tell me it is
Golden Houraccording to logo I would say it saysGolden Howat a glance, when I squint then I see "hour" instead of "how".Follow our story belowon the bottom is a bit confusing to me, in terms that I expected some sort of chronologically ordered blog-posts or some timeline or something - but I am looking at scattered cards from various sites with some quotes here and there. So in the end I am not sure what I can really "follow" 🤔Hello Sven. Updated the website based on the feedback you provided. Would love it if you could check it out and see if it's an improvement over the previous version. Thank you.
Definitely an improvement - especially in the copy, gj 🙌 Make sure you fix the punctuation errors as well eg.
Just your CLI. You don't need anything elsemissing dot at the end.Question regarding
always free for 3 projects- does it mean that I will eventually cross the freemium version because I will accumulate over 3 projects or those are 3 live/simultaneous projects? If you know what I am asking. Like in InVision I believe you can have max 1 live project but you can always archive it so you can stay on free as long as you are not working on more than 1 project at the same time. Although the price point is really low ($5/month) and there shouldn't be any hesitation to pay for if the tool provides value I'm confused what it means exactly.Yeah, I missed the dots in quite a few places, corrected them, but missed this one. Will review the copy once again. Thank you for pointing it out.
I'm considering the concept of "archiving" a project, so that you can stay in free tier if you only have 3 "active" projects at a time. I'm also concerned about this because I definitely want my customer to upgrade to paid subscription at the earliest. So having an archiving system will increase the time frame.
Yeah, I was just asking about the system, so OK - it is 3 cumulative projects and then you have to switch. Makes sense, although I would definitely raise the price :)
I'd love to raise the price, but I've seen competitors starting at this price, so I want to start here and raise it as I become more popular and as I start providing more value.
But do you think a lower price will hinder customer acquisition? Someone I recently talked to said the product might come off as cheap at a low price point and more serious folks might not signup. Do you have any insights regarding this?
Hello Sven,
Thank you for taking time to write this. This is amazing feedback! Agree with everything you said.
And thank you for signing up. Yes, the UX is a bit tricky. I'm really focused on creating a fast UX that lets you get things done as quickly as possible.
I've been contemplating about refining the copy to make it more clear about being developer focused. Your feedback confirmed it. I'll change it.
I wanted to show the app "in context" (typically a developer has those many number of tabs open), but I think you are right. There is already a lot of noise and so much new stuff to absorb in the screenshot, it can definitely use some cleanup.
Follow our story- The idea was to actually write about my product design/dev process while I built it, along with interesting things that I learn along the process. I did skimp a little bit on the writing, so it became confusing overall. Will see what I can do.Looking at this today, I agree that the "follow our story" section is better but might belong an a separate page entirely. Perhaps adding an About page and moving this there might be more appropriate?
This is my first time seeing this and it looks really cool! I'm excited to follow your progress over the next few months since it looks like we're on similar timelines :)
Design wise, I think adding more top and bottom spacing would help break up the page. I definitely didn't read more than 50% of the words on your landing page, especially because you have so many images.
Why I didn't sign up? I actually stopped freelancing recently so I don't have a real need for it. I've also been using another tool called Freckle and have been happy with it so I personally feel too much friction switching.
I'm still brand new to this world but having read many of the IH interviews and listened to several of the podcasts, it seems like you should charge more from the get-go OR have it be free and then charge for additional features. I'm curious what more experienced entrepreneurs have to say about this though.
Good luck!!!
Hello lynnetye. I've updated the website today. Would love for you to check it out and see if it's an improvement over the previous version. Thank you.
SO much better! Looks much fresher. I don't know if I can email you but I made some styling changes and took a screenshot. I think you can make it even more readable (increasing title font sizes and weights). Good work though. If I could use an emoji I'd give you a thumbs up.
Awesome! Glad that you liked it. My email ID is maheshj@bliss24.com if you want to send me something.
sent!
Thank you so much for the feedback lynnetye. My takeaway from this is that the landing page needs to tell a better story - look and content wise. I hope I got it right. I'll work on it.
I do agree that the price is on the lower end. I decided on this price after looking at competitors in this space and the features that I'm offering right now. I'll most likely charge more in the future when the app has more features and is more widely available (not just in the CLI).