A real client brief, start to finish

Cassette Futurism is a 4-year-old indie label out of Lisbon, releasing 6-8 records a year. Run by two ex-musicians, funded by Bandcamp sales and live shows.

Product: single-page landing tied to a release — hero with art and date, email capture, and a return-trigger loop (countdown, growing tribe count). It's the first touchpoint after Instagram and the bridge into the launch-day email.

A label for fans who want to be the first to know — hand-picked artists, intimate releases, and rituals around every drop.

• Each release ships with a custom landing page, not a Linktree dump
• Early-fan tier unlocks private listening links 72h before public drop
• A growing "tribe count" is visible on every release page
• Drops are paced 6-8 a year so nothing gets lost in noise

Tone: lowercase, warm, slightly conspiratorial — like a friend texting you a song at 1am. Never marketing-speak.

The label generated a landing page with AI but it feels generic — fans don't feel the anticipation, and the page reads like every other launch.

Traffic comes mainly from the band's Instagram stories and a small newsletter. 70% of visitors land, scroll once, and bounce. The few that submit their email rarely open the launch-day mail. There's no sense that something special is coming.

Design a hero + capture flow that builds genuine anticipation and converts existing fans into pre-registered early listeners.

• Communicate the release moment in under 3 seconds above the fold
• Raise email capture from ~3% to 10%+ on mobile traffic
• Make returning visitors feel progress (countdown, growing tribe)

Indie music early adopter

Late-20s music nerd who follows 5-10 small labels. Treats discovering a band early as identity, not entertainment. Lives in Spotify, Bandcamp and Instagram saves.

• Goal: hear new music before their friends do
• Goal: feel part of an inner circle around bands they champion
• Pain: generic "subscribe for updates" forms feel transactional
• Pain: forgets release dates because pages don't re-engage

Lands from an Instagram story at night, on mobile, with headphones already on. Decides in seconds whether this is worth their attention.

Every brief targets a handful of the 27 persuasion and behaviour design skills. You're scored on how you applied them, not on how the screen looks.

• Anticipation

  The release moment has to feel like something is coming, not like a form.

• Belonging

  Fans should read the page as an invitation into an inner circle.

• Scarcity

  Early access is limited in time — that limit is the reason to act now.

• Variable Reward — Tribe

  A growing tribe count gives returning visitors a reason to come back.

1. Phase 1 — Read and plan. You get the brief above plus a starting design: the generic version the client has today. Your job is to beat it, not to start from a blank canvas.
2. Phase 2 — Design and explain. You iterate in your own tool, submit the file or a Figma link, and write how you applied each targeted skill. That explanation is the training.

The clock counts down from 60 minutes. When it hits zero it keeps going in overtime — nothing locks, but the number is honest.