How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love My Landing Page
I used to think my landing page was a brochure. A necessary evil. You build the product, you hustle for traffic, and you put up a page because, well, you have to. Pour time into the page? Why? If the product is good and the traffic is right, it’ll convert.
Then I realized something: we were all doing it wrong.
I watched founders - myself included - pour their souls into a product, only to welcome visitors with a wall of corporate jargon that sounded like it was written by a particularly uninspired AI. We'd get a trickle of signups and convince ourselves it was a traffic problem or a product-market fit problem.
The real issue wasn't the traffic or the product. It was the handshake. The landing page is the digital handshake, and most of ours are limp, awkward, and forgettable.
The Problem with "Landing Page Optimization"
Most advice about landing pages reads like a user manual for a nuclear reactor. "Conversion funnels," "synergistic frameworks," "heuristic analysis." It’s no wonder our pages end up feeling sterile, calculated, and completely devoid of life.
The real issue isn't that visitors hate your design—it's that they can smell a soulless sales pitch from a mile away. And when your "human-centric" copy follows a 15-point checklist you found in a marketing guide, people notice. They don't read; they scan for an excuse to close the tab. And we give them plenty of reasons.
What Actually Works: Two Approaches That Don't Suck
I was lurking on a founder forum the other day and saw a perfect example of this. A founder saw two huge, immediate jumps in signups. Not from a new feature. Not from an ad campaign. They came from two small, almost laughably simple changes to their landing page.
It’s a masterclass. Here's what they did.
1. Show Your Face (Not Just Your Features)
The first signup pump came after the founder added a short, unpolished video of himself explaining the product.
This isn’t about "video marketing." It’s about trust. In a world of anonymous software, a human face is a pattern interrupt. It says, "There's a real, accountable person behind this, not a faceless LLC."
I've seen this work again and again. It works because:
It feels real. A slick, overproduced video smells like marketing. A simple webcam recording where you might even fumble a word or two? That feels honest.
It's a shortcut to understanding. You can explain the "why" behind your product in 90 seconds far better than 500 words of copy ever could.
It’s a handshake. It changes the visitor's mindset from "evaluating software" to "meeting a founder."
The key: Your passion for the problem you're solving should be the star of the show. Your product is just the supporting character.
2. Have a Personality (And Stop Being So Boring)
The founder’s second signup pump came from something even simpler: a goofy GIF of him holding a sign that said "join us."
Why did this work? Because the default for B2B software is boring. We expect stock photos and stiff, professional language. A flash of humor or personality shatters that expectation. It creates a moment of delight. It says, "We're people, just like you."
It also acts as a filter. If someone is genuinely turned off by a bit of personality, they were probably looking for a hyper-corporate solution you were never going to be. Good. They've filtered themselves out.
The key: Don't turn your page into a meme account. Just find one or two places to remind the visitor that there are actual humans on the other side of the screen.
The Real Rules of Landing Pages
Every page is different, but here’s what actually matters:
Watch people use it. Stop guessing what's wrong. Install a tool that records user sessions. Spend an hour watching real people get confused by your navigation, scroll right past your call-to-action, and rage-click on things that aren't buttons. It's painful, humbling, and the most valuable research you'll ever do.
Make one change at a time. Don't redesign the whole thing at once. You'll have no idea what worked. The founder I mentioned added a video. Saw a jump. Then added a GIF. Saw another jump. Directionally, that's all the proof you need at the start.
Talk like a person. Read your copy out loud. Does it sound like something you'd say to a friend at a coffee shop? Or does it sound like you're reading a press release? If it's the latter, delete it and start over.
Accept that your first try will be wrong. Your landing page isn't a marble sculpture. It's a lump of clay. You're supposed to mess with it. Getting it "wrong" is just tuition for learning what actually connects with people.
The Long Game
Landing page optimization isn't about finding a magic button color or a "viral" headline. It's about becoming a better communicator. It's about closing the gap between the passion you have for your product and how a stranger feels when they first encounter it.
This takes time. You’ll test things that don't work. You’ll rewrite headlines ten times. But the payoff is real: when a visitor lands on your page, they don’t feel like they’re being sold to. They feel like they’ve found someone who finally gets their problem.
Getting Started (Without the Frameworks)
Pick one section of your landing page that sounds the most corporate and rewrite it.
Open your laptop's camera and record a 90-second video of you explaining who you help and why. Don't overthink it. Add it to the page.
Install a session recording tool and set a reminder to watch three videos this week.
Find your main call-to-action button. If it says "Submit," change it to something a human would say.
Be patient and be consistent.
That’s it. No "heuristic analysis." No "conversion funnels." Just showing up consistently and trying to be a little more human.
The Bottom Line
A great landing page works when it doesn't feel like a landing page. When you’re genuinely connecting with a visitor, they want to know what you're working on. When you're just there to "convert" them, they can tell.
The best landing page doesn't feel like a brochure. It feels like meeting someone interesting who happens to be working on something cool.
And that's not a tactic you can hack—it's just being human.