Pre-Sale landing page for a SaaS boilerplate - please roast it 🔥
Hey there 👋
So I'm trying to validate the idea for a SaaS boilerplate for my audience (from my programming blog).
I put together this Gumroad page and a blog article to see if there's any interest.
The problem is that I don't have any experience creating (good) landing pages. What if people are just turned off by my bad copy? 😄
Here's the link to the page:
https://fgerschau.gumroad.com/l/saas-boilerplate
Any feedback or linking to helpful resources would be highly appreciated 🙏
Thanks!
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I run a Javascript SaaS boilerplate (https://usegravity.app) so here's my two cents:
I see new boilerplates popping up almost every week and then disappearing just as quickly.
Your landing page makes this look like another 'me too' product that just lists a bunch of features included in every other boilerplate. It doesn't answer any critical questions:
Why are you building a SaaS boilerplate?
What problem does your boilerplate solve that has not been solved by existing established boilerplates on the market?
What are you going to offer that existing solutions do not?
Without very clear answers to these questions, I think you're going to struggle to position this in a niche that already has big players.
Thanks for the honest feedback! Probably the most useful I got from the comments here 😄
The reason I'm trying to launch a boilerplate is that I already have an audience with my coding blog. I will take your advice to heart and iterate a bit on the positioning—I don't want to directly compete with your boilerplate.
Your boilerplate looks amazing, btw. It includes all the features one could wish for 🙂
I wonder, how did you find your first users? Did you already have some kind of audience?
Why would someone from your audience purchase it versus a well-established boilerplate that has been around for years and is well tested, secure and robust?
Good question, I'd say because they already know and trust me; but that's probably not enough.
Nvm, just came across your IH podcast interview again, which already answers these questions.
Thanks again for the feedback; not trying to become one of those copy-cats 😄
Then you need to differentiate, there are new JS boilerplates launching every week and the disappear as quickly because the founder assumed that just building features is what sells a boilerplate.
OP, I have a PHP Symfony one, I just want to echo what Kyle has said here.
Your landing page says if there is enough demand, while I understand why you put that there. The fact is there are plenty of bootstraps out there so if there if I want one I'll just go buy one and not wait 3-months for you to release yours.
I think if you go forward you need to realise that you're not really going to have lots of people biting your hand off for this. Starting a new project and investing in a bootstrap isn't something people do on a spur of the moment (or most of the time they don't), it's a once per project and often once per many projects decision. So it's something people will need to hear about and re-hear about until it comes to the point where they're wanting to buy.
I have A/B testing which can be used as standalone library/functionality in an existing application and I thought that alone would get people biting my hands off. Most aren't even that bothered.
Yeah, waiting three months isn't ideal, but I need to get some sales before building or otherwise, I'll end up building something nobody wants (again).
I try to get them with huge discounts and the community feature. Maybe I should make this more prominent on the landing page.
I spent about a year on mine before I launched it due to wanting to have flexibility in it to allow everything to be replaced and things like that. Mines isn't so much a SaaS Bootstrap as a Business Application Framework. It's designed to build business applications a SaaS or not. I built 3 applications on it as part of the development process to build it to ensure it was flexible. While I did that I worried like you are of building something no one wants. But in the end, I realised that even if no one wants it, I'll be able to use it to build other things. It'll allow me to build new applications really quickly and I would be able to pivot into other things.
So for me, all the time and effort I spent building it was never really going to be wasted as I would still have the code and I would be able to use it in the future to help me.
lol everybody's indirectly promoting their thing in the comments
@csallen might wanna take a look at the data, but there's a huge trend in self promoting these days (started about a month or so ago)
My exact thoughts lol.
Alright - I apologize in advance for being a bit harsh here.
But a roast is a roast 😁
Here are my 2 cents:
As soon as I see "gumroad" in your link, I'm not even gonna click it.
Cause I know:
While Gumroad probably works fine for a $5 notion template you sporadically want to test if you can monetize, it really does not give a good impression with something serious!
The impression is: You didn't even bother setting up a custom landing page.
Why would you bother putting care into the boilerplate?
It's a huge no from here!
If you really want to roll something like this, look carefully at what @kylegawley is doing with his product.
He's been spending a huge amount of time presenting his product in just the right way - and, presumably, 100x more time making his product insanely good.
That's the impression I want to be left with if I'm gonna even consider buying something like this.
I published a saas template on GitHub recently - as a part of a YouTube video.
It's 100% free... I wouldn't ever consider monetizing it.
But it doesn't seem like yours contains that much more?
So, action points:
Hope it helps 😊
Hey Simon, thank you so much for this useful feedback!
I prefer harsh feedback to unsuccessful launches (already had enough of those haha).
I've been watching some of your YouTube videos, and I'm excited that you took the time to review my idea 😄
It's true that my boilerplate isn't very special yet, but I wanted to avoid building something without knowing if anyone would be interested.
Competing head-to-head with Kyle would be close to impossible right now, as he's put an incredible amount of work already into this.
My idea here was to repurpose some of the code that I built for a previous project—but I see now that there's a lot more to it than just posting it to Gumroad.
I will take your advice and work on the landing page and features to provide more value. Maybe starting at a lower price point helps as well.
Thanks again for your input!👌
Great 😁 And thanks for taking the feedback right up, even though it's a bit harsh.
(I'm like you, I prefer harsh feedback as well 😉)
Generally, I think the approach of testing if there's interest first is great.
But in this case, I think you already have that validation from simply looking at Kyle's product (among others, there are multiple of these out there).
Kyle is also very open about sales and figures on Twitter, so the interest is definitely there, thus, in this case, I think you can skip a lot of the validation part and instead start to think about how to position yourself.
Features, offer, pricing (as you mention), are all good considerations.
Those are the things you need to test out, and that definitely will require more than a Gumroad page.
That said, I don't think the idea here is in any way doomed at all.
Good luck!
Also, thanks for checking out my YouTube videos 😊
Hey Felix,
That's interesting, I could actually be a subscriber... I am intrigued. Why would I not click? Hard to say at this point. I tried to elaborate with audio messages you can listen to here: https://www.vero.fm/page/recr0b7ryEsc8Mv0R/
I hope it ll make sense, this is only my 2 cents
Cheers!
Hey Ben, thanks so much for taking the time to review my landing page. You brought up some good tips on what to improve, thanks!
I see that you're the founder of vero.fm? I love the idea, it makes the feedback so much more personal!
One small bug that I caught (in case you're not aware already) is that the emojis don't seem to be perfectly aligned with where you initially put them—everything seems to be placed 300px above the actual content.
For example, the feedback for the "about me" section was displayed on the picture for "Why I'm doing this". Otherwise, it's a very interesting product! :)
Awesome! I am happy this helps. I realized that if I had a place to leave feedback with voice, I did not procrastinate on that... So I made the tool for myself first as I'm often requested to provide feedback.
Yeah, there are some problems with the zoom for the moment (+ this is a really really early prototype 😅)... Have you tried checking it with 100% zoom?
I'm at 100% zoom, but on a 13'' mbp. It seems to me that the position changes based on the height of the browser (or size of the screen)—so unless the viewer uses the same device, the icons will be out of place.
Here's a video of what I mean:
https://giphy.com/gifs/cHXuGiNEDVayBCN9vj
This can maybe be fixed by changing the coordinates based on the height of the image.
I hope this is somewhat useful. I already signed up for the product hunt launch 😄
Haaaa, yep, it does not behave well with the zoom 😝 On a mac (and without the inspector with responsive mode), it can be ok... but still sketchy ^^
It is one of the first fixes I'll do when I am back behind my text editor next month. Are you on a mac? Browser being Chrome?
Yes, your suggestion is exactly what I had in mind. Anyway, you'll be the first to know when this will be fixed.
And, oh I forgot, WELCOME AMONG THE AUDIO FANS 🤪
See you, Felix!
Yes, it's chrome on a mac 😄
Got that 🙌
Thanks
I am posting weekly updates on the product on https://www.producthunt.com/upcoming/vero-verbal-roasting
I am currently checking in with people and see if it is only me scratching my own itch. And if I meet other audio fans, I am planning product updates for next month 🙌
Luckily fellow IndieHackers have made solid resources available.
I’ve been in marketing for +6 years and this is still the best resource: https://www.indiehackers.com/post/my-step-by-step-guide-to-landing-pages-that-convert-9daefb2064
Hey Felix,
As far as layout goes, this needs some work. Maybe Gumroad isn't the best place for this landing page to live and be worked on.
First:
library.relume.io has some kickass landing pages you can copy straight into Webflow and they're free for a seven day trial. You can stylize them in Webflow to up your aesthetics.
Have a consistent Call to Action that will shoot the user over to Gumroad from there 🤘
Second:
Check out this landing page framework from Donald Miller and the Story Brand Team. You don't have to use all sections, it's a template for creating good copy and quelling any fears a prospective buyer might have.
https://learncreateshare.net/marketing-made-simple/
Skip to the section titled "A Website that Converts."
Cool project, dude! Hope you score some downloads and make your buyers happy.
Thanks for the resources!
Relume looks great, I may give it a try when upgrading from the Gumroad editor 😄
Hi Felix.
I can talk about landing page for hours.
But I can suggest a shortcut.
You should read Julian Shapiro's handbook Growing a Startup.
This solves all problems for you.
Good luck.
Thanks, I will check this out!
😁 https://www.julian.com/guide/growth/intro
+1 for this comment. Go check Julian's guide I think it will make this landing page 100x better.
Seems like a lot of feedback from people who have similar products here, so here's my perspective as someone who would be a potential buyer. I'm currently rebuilding Curlsbot and yeah, I have a lot of trouble just choosing a stack. I would buy a boilerplate if it helped solve my problems and offer specific features I need. I think for me my biggest pains are design and data/user management. I need to be able to store/manage a lot of product data for example. I need something that's easy for me to manage, is fast, and isn't going to cost too much.
I really want to know specifically how the product helps solve my pains. In that direction, you might want to research your audience and find out what those are.
Thanks for the feedback!
User management seems like a recurring theme. Auth0 does most of the hard work; but I needed to sync that data with my DB and add the possibility to log-in as other users. All this stuff should of course be included in a boilerplate.
I want to largely avoid adding too specific features; but the MongoDB database that is currently included is flexible enough to handle 99% of indie hacker use-cases.
Overall, the page looks very convincing. I would do a few changes though (keep in mind that I'm a dev, not a prof copywriter):
"The Pre-Sale" -- I would move it to the bottom. You are gaining momentum describing the benefits, let's not lose it. Also, "within three months" doesn't mean much to me, it's just like "gone for 15min" on a closed door -- who knows when these 3 months started?
"Community access" -- this is a secondary benefit, would probably be better moved to the bottom as well.
"Why I'm doing this" -- this is fine for promotion, but I'm not sure about putting it on your landing page. "Why you need this" would be much much better here. So, "I didn't want" -> "you don't want", "it took me more than two months" -> "it usually takes...", "The boilerplate will be based on this project" -> "The boilerplate will be based on a real-world project" etc. In other words, remove "I, me, mine", because unless you are a celebrity this doesn't add any credibility.
Your main benefit is that you're saving time. Saving 2 months of development for $150 is a no-brainer, but these numbers shouldn't be thrown casually in a middle of a paragraph. It should be your H2 written in big bold letters at the top of the page.
One thing we developers love is using our favorite tools/frameworks in our projects. Every time I see a boilerplate, I ask myself: would I be forced to use Material UI in my project? Would I be forced to place all components in a separate folder? Would I be forced to learn Gatsby just to use this boilerplate? Or would I spend more time adjusting it to my own needs? I would love to see a boilerplate that can be customized for my habits and needs. For example, I would launch a commandline tool that would ask me a few questions and generate the app based on my answers.
This is all I wanted to say, hope it was useful. Remember, it's just an opinion of a random wannabe entrepreneur.
Now, would you please look at my own page (https://jelytics.com/) and tell me your thoughts? For example, what is the #1 reason why you wouldn't be using it?
Hey Artem, thank you so much for this actionable advice. It's good that you're a dev and not a copywriter—typical copy doesn't always work well with developers :D
I have the same issue with other boilerplates. At the moment, I can just hope that some people are attracted to this specific tech stack; but I'd want to make it easy to customize in future iterations.
Now to your landing page:
I didn't immediately get what this is about. I initially thought that it's just another analytics tool—and I'm already using plausible for that—but it turns out it's somewhat different.
I'm having a hard time positioning it against other solutions; why shouldn't I use plausible to see which campaign converts the best?
On the other side, there are tools like splitbee, that allow me to track customer funnels on top of analytics, and it even adds automations. Although I've never used a tool like that, based on the landing page, I feel like I need to use it in the future to get a better overview and avoid losing customers.
Some more concrete feedback:
Maybe I'm not your target customer, in which case you must excuse that I don't get it. It's just that I don't think that alternative analytic tools like plausible or fathom are hard to use, and I don't really understand why I should use this instead.
I feel like if you add more features around converting customers on top of full analytics, it would become a way more interesting solution. I'm thinking of automations or banners that could trigger discounts based on user actions.
But here I need to add the same disclaimer as you: this is just the opinion of a wannabe entrepreneur. I have just as hard of a time positioning my products (as you can see 😄). I wish you all the best with your products!
Thank you, awesome feedback! I can see now that I need to be more clear and more convincing. Didn't know about splitbee, gotta check them out.
Interesting idea re additional features. I'll think about it.
directly promoting not my thing 🤣
unicornplatform.com
versoly.com
Already tried versoly, but the blogging feature didn't convince me. Unicornplatform looks great, though
Thanks @kpalovic
Hey @felixgerlach founder here of Versoly what didn't you like about the blogging feature and when did you try it? Thanks a ton always trying to improve the product!
Kinda meta but I think these should be called "prospecting pages"! I wrote a little bit about it here:
https://vadosware.io/post/lets-call-pre-launch-landing-pages-prospecting-pages
As far as feedback for the product, I think if it's going to be pre-sales it should definitely have email collection above the fold (maybe no Login).
Also, I'm curious to know what you'd do about illustrations...
This is interesting as well. I wonder if the community would be even more interesting than the landing page.
I can help you with landing page DMo on twitter.com/mike_andreuzza 😊
Thanks! I'll get back to you if I graduate from the Gumroad editor
the link to the blog post goes to a 404 page on your site...
pollpilot looks neat though, might try it out on our blog 💡
Thanks! Yeah, the blog post isn't published yet.
I wouldn't have thought that I'd find a new user for PollPilot here today, but I'll take it 😄 If you need anything, just let me know.
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I think so too... but what has that link to do with this?