So you’ve about finished your shiny new app, and you’re ready to unveil it to a salivating world (or so you hope). Only one thing left to do: create that glimmering landing page that your potential users will see and instantly be enlightened about what your app does and why they should use it.

There’s just one problem: you’re just a humble developer / designer, and you don’t have thousands of dollars to shell out to a professional marketing firm.

Cue “The Perfect Landing” method

The premise is simple. You can’t possibly know exactly what your audience needs to hear, so instead of creating it yourself, you iteratively create it with them.

What you’ll need:

• 1 Internet connection
• 3 non-techie friends, who have an Internet connection, and know nothing about your product
• 1 techie friend, who also knows nothing about your product

Okay, let’s get started.

1. Bust out your favorite IM client, and start a chat with Non-Techie Friend 1. Start explaining to them what your product is about, in a way that makes them realize that they need to have it. It’s just a conversation; it doesn’t need to be difficult, and you can take your time. When you start to notice that they fully understand what your app does, and why it would be useful to them, you can end the chat.
2. Go over the chat log (this is why you need to talk to them online) and pick out the most salient points of the conversation, the essential phrases that you think made them truly understand your app. Be very stingy here: less is better than more, and it’s okay if you skip over some important stuff; you’ll get it back in the next few steps.
3. Start a chat with Non-Techie Friend 2. Start explaining your product using only the vital phrases you extracted in the step above. If they understand everything, you’re done. If not, go ahead and add in some more details that will get them to where they need to be.
4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 with Non-Techie Friend 3, continuing to separate the wheat from the chaff until you have a concise, clear description of your product.
5. Finally, take the finished description to your techie friend, and confirm that they don’t read it and say, “Well, this is stupid.” Basically, it should be simplified enough that anyone in your target audience can understand it, but not too dumbed down that it just seems obvious.
6. Acquire and drink a piña colada. You deserve it.

One important point: don’t skip step 6. It’s essential to the process. Trust me.

Why it works

The goal is to create the most succinct description of your product that will appeal to the entire range of your target audience. So by talking to your target audience, you can actually see what they need to hear, and by using your previous conversation to improve your description for the next one, you simultaneously shape your product description into its ideal form, and test it on a real live potential user.

And that’s not all. You can use this method to create blurbs for the media, improve slideshows, and even come up with ideas for new features. You just have to be a bit creative with it.

Run along, now

Congratulations on your new product launch. Hope you enjoyed your drink.