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Quick aside, these are all marketing sites, so if you're looking for application UX/UI inspiration (which I was) this is not the thing. A good number of these

Quick aside, these are all marketing sites, so if you're looking for application UX/UI inspiration (which I was) this is not the thing. A good number of these are aimed at developers, meaning I'm in their target market. So I'm going to state my opinion, knowing full well that these tactics are super prevalent which means presumably they work and I may well be an outlier. But I hope I'm not... ...so with that hope in mind... If you want to market to me (Us?) - don't build this shit. Seriously, just don't. If I'm your target market, this isn't actually good web design. Yeah, it's eye catchy, but you're making me dig for what I want to know: Does this actually solve my problem? The more marketing flash you put on top of that, the more I experience a sneaking suspicion that you're all style and no substance. If you want to sell to me, use good clean UX that is pleasantly styled, but not flashy. And get to the point. Show me exactly what I need to know as fast as humanly possible, with a minimum of distraction and cognitive load. Show me your features. Show me your UX. Don't use graphical representations of your UX, show me the real thing. Screenshots of actual use cases. Show me how you handle the use cases that matter to me, your prospective user. The more you hide your actual product, and try to distract me with fancy flash, the less likely I am to open up a conversation. I don't have time for this shit when I'm shopping for dev tooling. Make it as easy as humanly possible for me to determine whether you solve my problem in the way I need as quickly as humanly possible. Maybe I'm an exception, but personally I think good web design is a design that communicates quickly, clearly, and cleanly while minimizing cognitive load. These are not that. Many of them are expressly the opposite of that. Edit: For those of you saying that sales are targeting managers not devs... uh... well... uh... I spent the last 5 years as DevOps/SRE Manager/Director so... uh... some of us keep our dev sensibilities I guess?

no_wizard 3y ago
The reality is in most cases, the sales of developer focused tools or services goes to management, not the devs themselves. I'm certain due to human psychology, that the more "polished" a site looks, it translates into more leads
- doctorpangloss 3y ago
  Nah, the reality is that most developer tools are B2C in disguise (with B2B pricing), and that in fact these polished marketing sites are perfect for the junior developers and PMs at large orgs who actually adopt free trials of things. From your parent: > Does this actually solve my problem? The more marketing flash you put on top of that, the more I experience a sneaking suspicion that you're all style and no substance. This kind of person doesn't pay for stuff or asks too many questions. "CTOs" are the worst customers. They are always nickel and diming, willing to go through immense grief to "just" "use" "open source" and squeeze free from everywhere. This isn't bad, it's aligned with successful businesses. I'm saying that the people who pay for stuff are lazy, too, in a good way.
freedomben 3y ago
There are dozens of us (Arrested Development reference)! Seriously though I think we are pretty rare for wanting to cut through the BS. I've talked with a lot of people about this and while many will agree with me, when they actually see the results they don't like it as much as the flashy. It's disheartening.
ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago
They are not targeting developers. They are targeting managers who can get a promotion based on adding the shiny new thing in the company. Having said that, I recently enjoyed Val.Town's homepage [1]. It manages to keep things fun while showing me what I can actually do with it. [1] https://www.val.town/ https://www.val.town/
- ornornor 3y ago
  Val looks pretty interesting, thanks for sharing.
- dbingham 3y ago
  Well, I spent the last 5 years as a manager. I guess I just kept my dev sensibilities. Yeah, I like Val's. That's how you do it :)
reaperducer 3y ago
The more marketing flash you put on top of that, the more I experience a sneaking suspicion that you're all style and no substance. The second site featured is promoting "Become a 10x designer!" That tells you everything you need to know about how substantive this list is.

no_wizard 3y ago

The reality is in most cases, the sales of developer focused tools or services goes to management, not the devs themselves. I'm certain due to human psychology, that the more "polished" a site looks, it translates into more leads

doctorpangloss 3y ago
Nah, the reality is that most developer tools are B2C in disguise (with B2B pricing), and that in fact these polished marketing sites are perfect for the junior developers and PMs at large orgs who actually adopt free trials of things. From your parent: > Does this actually solve my problem? The more marketing flash you put on top of that, the more I experience a sneaking suspicion that you're all style and no substance. This kind of person doesn't pay for stuff or asks too many questions. "CTOs" are the worst customers. They are always nickel and diming, willing to go through immense grief to "just" "use" "open source" and squeeze free from everywhere. This isn't bad, it's aligned with successful businesses. I'm saying that the people who pay for stuff are lazy, too, in a good way.

freedomben 3y ago

There are dozens of us (Arrested Development reference)! Seriously though I think we are pretty rare for wanting to cut through the BS. I've talked with a lot of people about this and while many will agree with me, when they actually see the results they don't like it as much as the flashy. It's disheartening.

ilrwbwrkhv 3y ago

They are not targeting developers. They are targeting managers who can get a promotion based on adding the shiny new thing in the company. Having said that, I recently enjoyed Val.Town's homepage [1]. It manages to keep things fun while showing me what I can actually do with it. [1] https://www.val.town/ https://www.val.town/

ornornor 3y ago
Val looks pretty interesting, thanks for sharing.
dbingham 3y ago
Well, I spent the last 5 years as a manager. I guess I just kept my dev sensibilities. Yeah, I like Val's. That's how you do it :)

reaperducer 3y ago

The more marketing flash you put on top of that, the more I experience a sneaking suspicion that you're all style and no substance. The second site featured is promoting "Become a 10x designer!" That tells you everything you need to know about how substantive this list is.