A landing page doesn't need to be clever. It needs to be clear.

Clever is a headline that makes a teammate smile in the review. Clear is a headline that lets a stranger say, in five seconds, what you do and whether it's for them. Those are not the same job, and when they compete, clear should win.

We see a lot of first versions that are visually finished and verbally unfinished. The type is careful, the product shots are almost ready, the animation is tasteful — and a visitor still can't tell who the product is for, what happens if they click, or what it costs. That isn't a design problem yet. It's a clarity problem.

Before any page goes live, we run nine checks. None of them require a unique aesthetic. All of them require you to decide what the page is actually saying.

The nine checks

1. Can a stranger say what you do in five seconds?

Read the first screen out loud to someone who doesn't work on the product. Then ask them to tell it back. If they say your category, your audience, and the job you do, the page is doing its job. If they repeat a slogan, or hesitate, the headline isn't finished.

2. One primary button, repeated. Not five competing ones.

"Start free," "Book a demo," "See pricing," "Watch the video," and "Log in" cannot all be the main action. Pick one. Put it where people look, and again after you've earned the click — below the offer, below the objections, at the end. Secondary actions can exist. They shouldn't dress like the primary one.

3. The headline is about their problem, not your product.

"The operating system for modern teams" is about you. "See which invoices are late without opening a spreadsheet" is about them. A product name can sit next to the headline. It shouldn't have to do the headline's work.

4. It loads fast on a mid-range phone, on mobile data.

Your office Wi-Fi and a designer's laptop will lie to you. Open the page on a normal phone, on a cellular connection, and wait. If the headline and the primary button take too long to appear, people leave before the clever line has a chance to land. Compress images. Don't ship a hero video if a still would do.

5. Real product shots, not stock art.

A real screen, even a quiet one, is more persuasive than a stock photo of people pointing at a laptop. If the product isn't ready to be seen, that's useful information. Show a honest crop, a short walkthrough, or a simple diagram of the actual workflow. Don't rent a feeling the product can't keep.

6. Pricing, or a clear next step, is easy to find.

Hiding the price doesn't make the offer stronger. It makes the visitor work. If you have a price, put it where it can be found without a hunt. If you don't — custom, early access, "talk to us" — say what happens next, what they'll need to prepare, and when they'll hear back. Uncertainty is heavier than a number.

7. The questions people actually ask are answered on the page.

Not the questions you wish they asked. The awkward ones: who it's for, who it isn't for, what it integrates with, how long setup takes, what happens after the trial, whether they can export their data. If those answers only exist in sales calls, the page is incomplete, and the calls are doing work the page should do.

8. It works on mobile without zooming.

Most first visits will be on a phone, even if the product is used at a desk later. Type should be readable. The primary button should be tappable with a thumb. Forms should not slide under the keyboard in a way that hides the next field. If you have to pinch to read the offer, the page isn't done.

9. Your page title and description make sense in Google and in AI answers.

The <title> and meta description are not an afterthought. They are often the first sentence someone reads about you — in a tab, in a search result, and increasingly in an answer from a tool like ChatGPT, Grok, or Perplexity. Write them in full sentences. Say what you do, who it's for, and where, if location matters. Don't stuff keywords, and don't write a line that only makes sense if you've already seen the page.

We run a version of these checks on our own site, too, at nothink.site. The standard is the same: a stranger should be able to explain us after one short look.

The order we'd write the page in

We never start with the hero section.

Pretty comes after clear. The build order we use looks like this:

First, write who it's for, in a sentence a real person would recognize. Then write the offer: what they get, not what the platform "enables." Then write the objections — the reasons a careful visitor would leave — and answer them in plain language. Then write the proof you actually have. Not the proof you plan to have. Quotes, screenshots, a short story, a credential, a before-and-after of a workflow. If you don't have proof yet, don't invent it. Be smaller and more specific instead.

Only then do we write the hero. The hero is a summary of work you've already done, not a brainstorming exercise. After the words are stable, we do the visuals: layout, product shots, type, motion.

If you start with the hero, you will fall in love with a line and then spend days trying to make the rest of the page justify it. If you start with the audience, the offer, the objections, and the proof, the hero usually writes itself.

What we skip on a first version

A first landing page does not need a blog, a video background, a customer-logo wall you can't honestly fill, or three product tours. It does not need a unique illustration system. It needs a true sentence, a single action, and honest answers.

It also doesn't need to be long for the sake of length. A short page that answers the real questions is better than a long page that repeats the slogan in six layouts. Add a section when it removes a reason to leave, not when the design feels sparse.

And be careful with "we'll add pricing later" or "we'll write the FAQ after launch." Those are often the exact sections a first visitor needs. If they aren't ready, the page may not be ready either.

Takeaways

  • Test the first screen on a stranger: can they say what you do in five seconds?
  • One primary button, repeated. Everything else is secondary.
  • Write the headline about their problem, not your category.
  • Check speed and layout on a mid-range phone, on mobile data.
  • Use real product shots. Show pricing or a concrete next step. Answer the awkward questions on the page.
  • Write the title and description as if they will be quoted without the rest of the page.
  • Draft who it's for, the offer, the objections, and the proof you actually have — then the hero, then the visuals.

Save this for your next launch. What would you add as number ten?

We're nothink, a small team that designs and builds products for startups — more at nothink.site.