Welcome to TouchPoints, the newsletter that breaks down marketing collateral from top SAAS brands for inspiration and analysis.

This week we’re looking at Zoom’s Homepage, plus ads by Intercom and Zapier. Let’s dive in.

Zoom

Full Homepage

Homepage Hero

Intercom

Linkedin Ad

Zapier

Linkedin Ad

Observations

Don’t Crowd Your Homepage

Zoom’s full homepage has a lot going for it. Much of the design and copy choices are worth emulating.

One of the aspects I would instruct you to steer clear of? The lack of whitespace in the hero.

I think Zoom can get away with this because they are Zoom. They are a category leader, about as entrenched as Microsoft in the space they are in.

But from the moment I visited the page, having decided to analyze it, The first thing that struck me was “information overload”.

That being said, when you take the time to read the copy and look at the design elements, nothing is necessarily superfluous. It’s quite possible that a downscaling of the visual elements on the right would completely fix this “busy” first impression.

Alternatively, shortening the body copy might help with this problem as well.

If I have any other note about their hero section, it would be this: where are the capabilities?

Again, Zoom’s dominance in their category gives them the luxury of assuming you already know what Zoom does.

Don’t emulate that.

How to Build an Ad Around a Use Case

Zapier’s Linkedin Ad is a great example of a product with thousands of use cases building an ad around a specific set of use cases.

Namely, this ad is aimed at people who have tried and struggled to manage leads from meta ads.

They have included multiple thoughtful visual cues here.

The main ad image is a preview of their simple and intuitive product interface. The inclusion of the meta partnership badge shows that this is a solution that Meta approves of, and therefore, it “plays nice” with data being sent from Meta ads.

There is plenty of whitespace, but not a wasted word. Everything on the ad image and in the caption serves a real purpose.

Especially the quote “Connect your Meta Ads to thousands of Apps to Zapier.” Very clear feature statement.

They start with outcomes, then back up with features and capabilities. For extra credibility, they flaunt their partnership, and the bottom section is an incentive (free trial) and a clear next-step CTA.

AI Fluff Isn’t Cutting It

In Intercom’s Linkedin Ad above, we see yet another customer service/support platform leaning heavily into AI.

Again, we see the language of differentiation, but no real description of what capabilities this unique AI gives Intercom users, or outcomes that their specific instance can be expected to bring.

I will admit, the criticism that “for others, it’s an afterthought” is very true in the world of SAAS and in Intercom’s niche. But the vagueness of a statement like “seamlessly integrated” doesn’t fill me with faith about Intercom’s use of AI.

Any Questions?

Looking for more explanation about the elements of messaging that I highlight? Check out my guide here.

Anything further? I'm happy to take a break from exploring the wider world of marketing & eating chocolate chip cookies to address your questions.

Email me here.

Acknowledgements

I would like to extend our thanks to the following companies for providing examples and insights that made this edition of TouchPoints possible:

• Adfolio - For their awesome repository of B2B ads, with excellent commentary.

• Founderway.AI - An awesome resource that helped me better figure out how to run this newsletter, and forever friends of TouchPoints.

• Concise Copy - Pavlo is an absolute expert at homepage copy. Check out his value prop canvas for a super useful resource.

• Growth Therapy - Amanda is more B2C than me, but her insights about paid media and growth marketing are always welcome.

I sincerely appreciate these folks for providing great content and inspiration. It's great thinkers like these that allow me to deliver the best of modern SaaS marketing to you, our subscribers, every week in TouchPoints.