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27 Comments

What do you use to build your landing pages?

I have a quick initial question. Do you build your own landing pages, or use off-the-shelf products, for validating initial market interest? If you do build your own, how simple do you keep things? I have a background in software, but don't want to build the world's fanciest site just to validate initial interest 😀

#ask-ih

  1. 4

    HTML, CSS, and JS ;)

  2. 3

    Same. I'm a developer but I prefer spending my time on product work than creating html/css for a landing page. I generally buy a 15$ html theme from themeforest.com and adapt it to my needs.

    1. 1

      Yeah, I feel like I fall into the same boat re product vs crafting a landing page. Ta for the link to ThemeForest, I'll store that away for later reference!

  3. 3

    I just whip mine up the old fashioned way using HTML and CSS.

    However, I plan on using Carrd.co for more stuff in the future. If you need to some non-static functionality (e.g. a form for collecting email addresses), Carrd makes it super easy.

    1. 1

      Thanks! Carrd.co looks awesome - definitely filing that one away for future reference 👍

  4. 2

    I spent a lot of time building mobile app landing pages for clients so (shameless plug) I built www.applight.io to solve this problem for mobile apps specifically.

    For most landing pages (including my own for Applight) I just whip something up in JS/HTML or buy a theme though it's annoying as heck to edit later when you inevitably want to change things :) Building it from scratch is almost easier than trying to learn how someone set up a theme.

    Also, checkout http://bulma.io, https://getbootstrap.com/ and https://tailwindcss.com for great places to get started without having to write all the css yourself.

    https://instapage.com is great, but their pricing went up recently (though, so did their features... so i'd check that out for sure). Their A/B testing is awesome, so if you're looking for something really robust, you'll find it there.

    1. 1

      Thanks for the thorough response! I'll keep Applight in mind should I go down the app route. Though my experience is limited in this domain, more generally I find DIY results in me learning more and knowing what everything does rather than pulling something off the shelf (although the latter is usually faster). I've used Bootstrap before, but hadn't come across Tailwind or Bulma, I'll add those to the toolbox for sure!

      1. 2

        Couldn't agree more! Honestly I built Applight to help me learn more about Vue.js so we're on the same page :)

        Bootstrap is awesome, and honestly, I'm loving Bulma (and https://buefy.org if you're using Vue.js). The benefit of using a framework like that is really just getting to use various components that save lots of time (nav bar, full-height sections, grid layouts, etc) while still being able to overwrite & customize whenever.

        Whatever route you go, get something out there asap if you're just looking to validate!

        If the idea is solid selecting any of the above methods (or any mentioned on here) will definitely work, the only thing that won't is spending too long and not putting it out there.

        Good luck!!

  5. 2

    https://sheet2site.com/ is super intuitive, can be built quickly, and the creator is a super responsive indie hacker.

    1. 1

      Oh, this is a neat idea! I'm leaning towards something I can customise a little more, but I really like this concept.

    1. 1

      Thanks! Yeah, someone else suggested carrd, and it looks good. I'll check it out for sure.

  6. 2

    I use Stitches(https://stitches.hyperyolo.com/), shameless plug-- a tool I made a while ago, to generate templates, then alter its html/css to suit each project's needs.

    Like@betaflag said, I much prefer to spend time in the product than building the landing pages, so this tool really helps myself to speed up the process.

    It really doesn't take long and cost $0 to go from scratch to finish. For example, this site (https://spider.amie-chen.com/) only took me roughly 40min total.

    1. 1

      I just had a quick play around with Stitches, I really like it - nice one! Super simple to use, and doesn't tie me to a particular toolchain. Will definitely give it a go when I next need a landing page. Ta!

    2. 1

      I really like the simplicity of stitches, good work! I would totally use that with a static site builder (ex: Jekyll) and button to deploy and host it on GitHub Pages where you can also edit the files after!

      1. 1

        Thanks @betaflag and yeah, you can absolutely do that with netlify too!

  7. 2

    I'm using Webflow right now. Have also tried convertkit and leadpages. I find webflow to be the easiest to customize to my liking.

    1. 1

      Webflow keeps popping up everywhere. As a developer who has more fun designing than developing I really like the concept. However, the fact to pay a fairly "high" monthly fee vs just stitching something together once I need it has just not convinced me yet. 🤔

      What do you think about this and how do you like webflow?

      1. 1

        I guess it depends on how you value your time. For me, the monthly fee is far less than I would pay doing it myself (i.e. I value my time at a much higher rate than I pay Webflow). Webflow allows me to take something from concept to a solidified idea I can quickly present to the world without setting up hosting, registering domains, etc.

    2. 1

      Oh cool, another tool to add to the list! Webflow looks pretty nicely featured, will definitely check it out when I next need a landing page 👍

  8. 2

    I used to setup a static site and host it on S3 and integrate it with mailchimp to see how interested people were, but I actually ended up creating a platform that allows me to simplify this process.

  9. 2

    I typically build out my design elements in HTML/CSS/JS, and whenever I'm happy with the patterns, I integrate those bytes into a barebones WP theme structure. I find that to be the quickest way to assess the frontend visually while being able to utilize forms and other functionality on-the-fly.

    1. 1

      Cool, thanks! I've never played around with WordPress, but I could see it being a good fit for landing page stuff.

      1. 2

        Definitely.

        Once you master Wordpress theming and overall architecture, it becomes a breeze to assemble a barebones WP site and then have the option to utilize plugins wherever necessary. Content management isn't even necessary in this scenario.

        If you want to expedite the design/coding upfront while still utilizing Wordpress, there are lots of landing page templates available on ThemeForest.

        If I were shooting for rapid feedback and not a designer/developer, I'd probably go for something off-the-shelf -- Leadpages, Unbounce, SquareSpace, etc. It just comes down to whatever works best for your situation without hindering your focus.

  10. 2

    Wordpress and a decent theme with some nice page templates normally works for me :-)

    1. 1

      Nice, ta! For some reason I completely forgot about Wordpress, makes perfect sense for this application.

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