5 ms·

Ask HN: Bad writing? Product unconvincing? Please review my product pages!

7 points by petervandijck 15y ago

I've written some sales-y pages for a product that's almost finished, I'd love to get some feedback on the pages here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/landing/home.html Is the writing bad? Is the product not well explained? Is the value proposition unclear? Would you sign up? Please feel free to tear this apart, I'd love any input, I've been working on this by myself so I'm getting a bit stuck... Thanks!!

petervandijck 15y ago
Clicky: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/landing/home.html http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/landing/home.html (you can click around, there are like 4 pages, it's just html, it doesn't actually do anything yet)
thaumaturgy 15y ago
Ironically, I think you might want to consider hiring a designer. The A-number-one thing I notice about it is that it's one of those nice designs that looks like every other startup's templated nice design. My eyes flit around the first page looking for a place to land; the logo and the slogan next to it go unnoticed for a bit. The icons next to each item do not add anything at all to what you're trying to say. About the second thing I notice is the Gmail-like interface; since I'm curious about it, I click through the slides, but none of them are really blowing me away. To me, there's no ... "pop". Nothing about it blows my hair back. The bottom text boxes get clipped on my 17" widescreen display. Not sure if that was intentional or not. Also, what's your target audience here? If it's other startups, then an iteration on this design might work well. If it's enterprise ... then I don't think you're going to get their attention with anything like this design. It's an interesting idea though! ...I think?
- autalpha 15y ago
  Ditto on the design and the mismatching of icons and messages. Those slides don't really seem to help your case here. But I'm also concerned with the language usages ("Stop hiring like an amateur!") can be a bit too forward, assuming and jarring. Maybe that's the "slick" way of talking that I am not used to.
pbreit 15y ago
The copy and design look fine to me. As long as you are freemium (not just a free trial!) and the service works well, you are OK to launch and and test and iterate.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
latch 15y ago
I'm not the best at these, but if it helps... I found the top half (everything above "Free Trial") distracting/confusing/not right. The Plans and Pricing and Signup buttons seem to have a weird border and the font is hard to read (maybe it's too heavy). The screenshots look a little old-school....I'd guess gmail was the inspiration..but gmail from a couple years ago (or maybe just gmail unthemed). Too many stock icons..too obviously cheap. The text under the 4 sections ("Get Organized.", "Like gmail for hiring."...) is blue and I thought they were hyperlinks. I was very sad when I found out they weren't :( The focus/hover on the pricing page is...very intense. maybe the header takes up too much space. It isn't bad though, these are more personal criticism...(though those two top buttons really do bother me). I really do find the bottom of the site - where the dithered background stops, so much nicer. I love that header font MuseoSlab500Regular
mattgratt 15y ago
I would refocus the above-the-fold copy on a 'Hire Faster' value proposition rather than a 'Hire a better tech team' value prop. I am young and foolish, but I don't see how the quality of the hire increases by using your system - but I do see how it becomes easier to manage the entire process, so I can spend more time closing quality talent and less time pushing paper. Unless I'm mistaken, this is like a hiring automation system - sort of like Salesforce.com for tracking your hiring. If I look at Salesforce.com's Sales Cloud's landing page (http://www.salesforce.com/crm/sales-force-automation/ http://www.salesforce.com/crm/sales-force-automation/) they focus on giving your reps more time selling and less time managing - maybe a good value prop for Hirely as well? I think "Don't Let Candidates Fall Through the Cracks" might be an interesting sub-head. Additionally, pull the Guy Kawasaki quote. I find it confusing and distracting. I start wondering what Guy Kawasaki has to do with your product, and start trying to connect a hiring management system with actual hire quality. I also don't see "See Everything About a Candidate on One Screen" clearly explained on the first page - which seems to be the most compelling part of your "the story of hirely" page. Hope this helps - would love to help more.
- petervandijck 15y ago
  Good stuff, rewriting :)
  - mattgratt 15y ago
    Cool - feel free to email me (email in profile) as your landing pages move along. I've done hiring at small startups so I get the product and the value.
petervandijck 15y ago
I did a totally new landing page here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/design/index.html http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/design/index.html Any better?
- thaumaturgy 15y ago
  I like that a lot more.
  - petervandijck 15y ago
    Thanks, me too :)
- bo_Olean 15y ago
  Second design looks better in content but I liked the first one. You could make the slider auto scroll with some slick graphics of your app (slider arrows are doing no good).

7 points by petervandijck 15y ago

petervandijck 15y ago

Clicky: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/landing/home.html http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/landing/home.html (you can click around, there are like 4 pages, it's just html, it doesn't actually do anything yet)

thaumaturgy 15y ago

Ironically, I think you might want to consider hiring a designer. The A-number-one thing I notice about it is that it's one of those nice designs that looks like every other startup's templated nice design. My eyes flit around the first page looking for a place to land; the logo and the slogan next to it go unnoticed for a bit. The icons next to each item do not add anything at all to what you're trying to say. About the second thing I notice is the Gmail-like interface; since I'm curious about it, I click through the slides, but none of them are really blowing me away. To me, there's no ... "pop". Nothing about it blows my hair back. The bottom text boxes get clipped on my 17" widescreen display. Not sure if that was intentional or not. Also, what's your target audience here? If it's other startups, then an iteration on this design might work well. If it's enterprise ... then I don't think you're going to get their attention with anything like this design. It's an interesting idea though! ...I think?

autalpha 15y ago
Ditto on the design and the mismatching of icons and messages. Those slides don't really seem to help your case here. But I'm also concerned with the language usages ("Stop hiring like an amateur!") can be a bit too forward, assuming and jarring. Maybe that's the "slick" way of talking that I am not used to.

pbreit 15y ago

The copy and design look fine to me. As long as you are freemium (not just a free trial!) and the service works well, you are OK to launch and and test and iterate.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

latch 15y ago

I'm not the best at these, but if it helps... I found the top half (everything above "Free Trial") distracting/confusing/not right. The Plans and Pricing and Signup buttons seem to have a weird border and the font is hard to read (maybe it's too heavy). The screenshots look a little old-school....I'd guess gmail was the inspiration..but gmail from a couple years ago (or maybe just gmail unthemed). Too many stock icons..too obviously cheap. The text under the 4 sections ("Get Organized.", "Like gmail for hiring."...) is blue and I thought they were hyperlinks. I was very sad when I found out they weren't :( The focus/hover on the pricing page is...very intense. maybe the header takes up too much space. It isn't bad though, these are more personal criticism...(though those two top buttons really do bother me). I really do find the bottom of the site - where the dithered background stops, so much nicer. I love that header font MuseoSlab500Regular

mattgratt 15y ago

I would refocus the above-the-fold copy on a 'Hire Faster' value proposition rather than a 'Hire a better tech team' value prop. I am young and foolish, but I don't see how the quality of the hire increases by using your system - but I do see how it becomes easier to manage the entire process, so I can spend more time closing quality talent and less time pushing paper. Unless I'm mistaken, this is like a hiring automation system - sort of like Salesforce.com for tracking your hiring. If I look at Salesforce.com's Sales Cloud's landing page (http://www.salesforce.com/crm/sales-force-automation/ http://www.salesforce.com/crm/sales-force-automation/) they focus on giving your reps more time selling and less time managing - maybe a good value prop for Hirely as well? I think "Don't Let Candidates Fall Through the Cracks" might be an interesting sub-head. Additionally, pull the Guy Kawasaki quote. I find it confusing and distracting. I start wondering what Guy Kawasaki has to do with your product, and start trying to connect a hiring management system with actual hire quality. I also don't see "See Everything About a Candidate on One Screen" clearly explained on the first page - which seems to be the most compelling part of your "the story of hirely" page. Hope this helps - would love to help more.

petervandijck 15y ago
Good stuff, rewriting :)
- mattgratt 15y ago
  Cool - feel free to email me (email in profile) as your landing pages move along. I've done hiring at small startups so I get the product and the value.

petervandijck 15y ago

I did a totally new landing page here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/design/index.html http://dl.dropbox.com/u/443080/design/index.html Any better?

thaumaturgy 15y ago
I like that a lot more.
- petervandijck 15y ago
  Thanks, me too :)
bo_Olean 15y ago
Second design looks better in content but I liked the first one. You could make the slider auto scroll with some slick graphics of your app (slider arrows are doing no good).