My 3hr Landing Page Build Strategy in 2025

Today I built a wait list landing page for a new project of mine.

I did it in around 2 hr 55 min. This is a PB for me.

I could definitely have done it faster, but with the trade offs I wanted, I am quite happy.

The Strategy

Note: I'm not affiliated with the brands mentioned.

1. Audit current state of drag-and-drop website builders

Time: 45 min | Cost: $0

• I really wanted to find one but couldn't find anything that felt slick and cheap out of the box for a developer tool.
• I still don't enjoy wordpress.
• I will use Webflow for the landing page if I get big enough, due to the sheer value of quick landing page iteration, but I cannot will myself to pay $18 /month rn.

2. Find an html/tailwind template

Time: 20 min | Cost: $0

• I found this cute 5 y/o tailwind template from tailwindtoolbox.
• I can work really fast in tailwind, and just wanted some static html site so I didn't lock myself into any engineering decisions and could host it on a CDN.

3. Customize the template

Time: 1 hr | Cost: $0

• Haven't done much pure HTML in a while, makes you realize me nice components are.
• I wanted to have a code snippet hero image and found this neat little web app.
• Another nice web app to get an emoji as a png for my temporary logo.
• I added a little extra to the landing page with the planned features.

4. Buy a domain

Time: 15 min | Cost: $10.16

• I went with PorkBun, which is my first time using them. They're really neat and dev friendly. I probably will stick with them now over Namecheap.
• They have a free email forwarder built in, which is super nice. It's great for signing up for services that you'll want to use for the new project.
• Note: Found a $1 dollar coupon code: VIKAS for .com domains. Probably not worth the time looking for it, but whatever.

5. Sign up / Configure an email tool

Time: 15 min | Cost: $0

• Signed up to EmailOctopus with new custom domain email address.
• I knew I'd use EmailOctopus, they're great for indie hackers, nice free tier, and really simple.
• Generated a form to collect emails into the list

6. Add email form to HTML & Test email sign up

Time: 5 min | Cost: $0

7. Deploy Webpage

Time: 15 min | Cost: $0

• I used Github Pages, where I host this website already.
• Super easy to post a static site and point a custom domain at it.
• PorkBun can actually autofill Github's DNS into its DNS settings, which was so cool. Saved me some time.
• Let's ignore the few minutes I waited for DNS propagation and my SSL cert loading.

Results

Time Spent:

2 hrs 55 min

Cost:

$10.16

Deliverables:

• My own website
• Customizable code / theme
• Functioning Email list
• No hosting / email fees

Thoughts

This would be easy to speed up if repeated. I could get it down to 1 hr if I did an exact copy with a different idea.

This was originally posted on my own blog, c0n0.com, if you'd like to get emails about my posts.

I also wrote another 2nd part to this on why I make waitlists for side projects.