Before you ask AI to build a landing page, write the brief

You can ask AI to build a landing page and get something that looks convincing surprisingly quickly.

There’s a headline, some benefits, a few images and a button. You can change the colours, move sections around and keep asking for improvements.

But what are you improving it against?

Without a clear brief, reviewing the page becomes a series of preferences. Make it warmer. Make it more professional. Make the headline stronger. The page changes, but the business decisions behind it remain unresolved.

Before building, write down who the page is for, what you’re offering and what you want the visitor to do.

Start with a particular reason for visiting

A homepage needs to introduce the business to people arriving for different reasons. A landing page can address a more specific need.

Imagine an established coaching business offering support to people becoming managers for the first time.

Its homepage might explain the founder’s background and the full range of coaching services. A page linked from an email about first-time management can focus on that situation: someone has been promoted and now needs to delegate, give feedback and manage people who used to be peers.

That page has a clearer job. It should help the visitor understand whether the support fits their circumstances and whether a conversation would be worthwhile.

This is a fictional example, but it illustrates a useful starting point. Write down what prompted the visit before deciding what belongs on the page.

Describe what you can actually deliver

A vague offer leaves too much room for interpretation.

“Become a confident leader” might describe an ambition. It doesn’t explain what someone is considering buying.

For the coaching example, a useful brief would establish the format, duration, availability and scope of the support. It would also identify what needs to be discussed before accepting a booking.

Those details affect the copy and the next step. A visitor might be ready to book a defined workshop but need a conversation before committing to ongoing coaching.

Give the page builder those decisions. Otherwise, you may get a polished description of an offer you haven’t agreed to provide.

Give AI boundaries as well as material

Gather the information the page is allowed to use:

• The current offer, price and practical terms.
• Approved descriptions of your experience.
• Relevant photographs and brand assets.
• Genuine customer questions.
• Evidence supporting any claims.
• Examples of writing that sound like your business.

Include exclusions too. If you cannot promise a particular result, say so. If a testimonial is awaiting permission, leave it out. If an image is illustrative, don’t present it as a photograph of your team or premises.

Review customer material before sharing it with an AI tool. Remove identifying or confidential information that the task doesn’t need.

A useful brief makes it easier to spot an invented detail. You can compare the draft with an agreed source instead of trying to remember whether every sentence is accurate.

Review the page as a customer

Once there’s a draft, step through it from the visitor’s point of view.

Suppose our new manager arrives from an email about difficult feedback conversations. Does the opening recognise that situation, or immediately switch to a broad promise about career success?

Can they see what the coaching involves? Is the coach’s relevant experience easy to find? Does the booking button explain what will happen next?

Read the page aloud. Notice where you would have to explain something in person. That missing explanation may belong on the page.

Also check what the page asks the visitor to do. A form requesting a phone number, company size and budget needs a reason for collecting each field. Ask for the information required to take the next step.

Test the handover, not just the button

A landing page connects to other work in the business.

When someone submits an enquiry, where does it go? Who responds? Does the confirmation set a realistic expectation? If they book a call, does the booking system show the right availability?

For an online store, check the product, price, discount and delivery information all the way through checkout. For a service business, check the enquiry or booking reaches the person responsible.

Submit a clearly labelled test and follow it through. A page can look finished while the next step is still broken.

Decide how you’ll judge it

Choose a business outcome before publishing.

For our coaching example, that could be suitable enquiries that become attended introductory calls. Counting form submissions alone would miss whether the enquiries fit the service or whether anyone turns up.

Keep a record of the page version, traffic source and changes you make. With modest traffic, results may be too limited to support a firm conclusion. Use customer questions and enquiries to inform revisions while recognising that uncertainty.

The brief doesn’t need to be a large document. A clear page of decisions can be enough to begin.

It gives you something concrete to build, review and test—and a better way to judge the result than asking whether it looks impressive.

Planning a landing page or improving an existing one? Talk to Deanick about the offer, the page and the systems behind it.

This article was prompted by Nik Sharma’s Limited Supply episode, “Build a Q4 Landing Page With AI.” The episode explores AI-assisted page production; the fictional service-business example and review process above apply that discussion to an owner-led business.