Ask HN : What is your feedback on our site's new name and landing page?
Hi, We are currently testing our landing page for the Site that we have developed. The original name of this site was Phoenary but we changed to GemShelf www.gemshelf.com since the former was a little not too clear. GemShelf is a Knowledge Management tool and Collaboration Platform where 1) can store everything in one place (PDFs, Word files, text, photos, audio etc.),(2) search through everything, anytime, anywhere, on any device because it has offline capability (3) can import and export and share information easily, upload photos, smart capture and we're also planning on incorporating OCR technology.
So what do say about the landing page and the new name?
10 comments
[ 0.32 ms ] story [ 31.2 ms ] threadThe only thing your landing page would need to be to get sign ups is to state and show how your are different. I don't need to switch to your service to do the three things you have listed. I still think there is great room for improvement in online storage, and hope you can build something that comes closer to that.
Whenever somebody posts a request like yours on HN, I always go to the link right away, so as not to be influenced by your HN description. Then I read your description, and it is amazing how often the description on HN is different from what the website says. Yours is a perfect example of this.
Your whole description of a "Knowledge Management tool and Collaboration Platform..." is a horrible way to describe what you're doing. It's full of a bunch of buzzwords, and I assume most people wouldn't know what you're talking about, but you've done quite a good job on your website of describing the product, so stick with one message.
Another reason to go with the messaging on your website is that a 'knowledge management tool and collaboration platform' (said in your most serious voice) limits your market to professionals only, when there is no reason for that. If your massive market ends up being 25-35 year old women planning their weddings, go with it. So don't overly define your product in the early stages if you can get away with it, and in this case I think you can.
Ok, now to ACTUALLY review your website.
"Your Group Content in One Place, Organized" - that's a great start, it's simple and well defined. However, I think you could improve it a bit and make it more compelling. Your name "GemShelf" can be easily forgotten, but I think what you're trying to say is "You have a bunch of content you love and want to share. These are your Gems, GemShelf lets you organize and share your Gems".
The only reason I made the connection with Gems is because you've asked us for input. Without that, I probably wouldn't have made the connection, and therefore your name may be forgotten.
"Collect, organize and share the content that matters most to you and your group." - again, really well done. My only concern is the "group" thing, and I wonder if people will try to figure out what their "group" is, and if they have a "group". It might be better to just cut it out after "matters most to you", as you've already said 'share' which implies they'll be sharing with somebody. But maybe that just needs to continue to be tweaked. But again, great start.
"GemShelf is a single, easy to use, hub for your group’s content. Once you use GemShelf, you’ll quickly realize that there is no better way to:" - huh? 'single', as opposed to? Less is always more, so if any word here isn't needed, ditch it. I'd just say "Once you use GemShelf..."
"an Evernote Alternative, " by saying you're an evernote alternative (which you may be), I think you're casting yourself in a light that many people won't understand. Evernote is big, but not that big, and I suspect more people have heard of it than have actually used it, and used it well. This might not be necessary, again, it's putting yourself in a bucket where I don't think it is needed. You've done a good job describing yourself to this point, I never would have compared you to Evernote up to then. "Group Evernote Alternative" and then you did it again.
SCREENSHOTS!!! Fantastico!! Oh please tell me that is not what your site looks like!? You've done so well up to this point, I worry that I look at that screenshot and it looks so busy. You were going to make this simple! I know it's probably a work in progress, but go with the feature limited screenshot if you have one. It could be just that I'm looking at a minified version of the site, maybe it's fine in full detail, but it just looks busy and a bit tired with the gradients and such.
Hope this is helpful, seems like a cool product. Best of luck.
You can't have a new product targeting both professionals and consumers. These are very widely different markets, that buy differently, that you'll reach differently, for which you need different messaging, features etc.
For a new product, the more targeted and focused your audience, the better.
"for professionals" for example is far from targeted enough.
"for growing startups" is a more focused audience: they tend to hang out at the same place (online on forums or offline in conferences for example) they exhibit some of the same buying behaviors, they have similar needs, etc.
Not saying "growing startups" is a good target for OP's product but just using it as an illustration.
But does the actual problem that we're addressing on the landing page make sense to you?
"for professionals" is both not specific enough and also far too buzz-wordy. A good market for this might be help desks, or small startups that offer round-the-clock support. Round-the-clock support usually means at least one person per shift, and small startups don't generally have a lot of overlap there -- so they have an increased need for quickly findable knowledge, which means that they need knowledge management.
Target that, or something like it. If you can niche further, do it -- if that niche gets traction, expand it slightly. If it doesn't, change it altogether. Expansion can occur in the form of a new site with different branding or subsites.
There are plenty of startups that make accounting software, but of the ones I've worked with, the one killing it the most is the one that makes accounting software "for landscaping companies". If you're a landscaping company, looking at a hundred different accounting packages, your choices are now limited to the best known (e.g., Quickbooks), and/or the ones most specifically targeted to you. You won't win that comparison every time, but you'd rather be in the top 3 90% of the time than in the top 100 100% of the time.
1) Like diorray has pointed out, start by changing your fonts. Verdana and Georgia may not be able to cut through. Have a look at the Open Sans and other Google fonts like Lato etc.
2) Dont restrict yourself to mere CSS. Start utilizing the power of JS and AJAX. I see that you are currently using jQuery and jQuery UI, but you dont seem to be using AJAX with your forms.
3) Start using CSS sprites. You have way too much HTTP requests, and on my system its taking close to 20s to load your page. A normal user is never going to wait that long.
4) Change your logo. Make it look professional
5) You seem to have a lot of CSS and JS files. Minify them all, and merge them into one or two files.
http://www.gemshelf.com