Strategy · Inspirations

Inspirations

The websites and brands that informed Espanda. Annotated with what we're extracting from each — and what we're deliberately skipping.

Every reference is here for a reason. The point isn't to copy any one brand — it's to triangulate across all of them. Each entry shows the founder's note from the original conversation, the specific qualities being pulled, and (where relevant) what we're not going to do.

Workspace / unified

2 references

Monday.com

monday.com

Founder note

“Didn't like the landing page, not very impactful. After scrolling I liked it. It has a character, good colors, big sections and elaborations. Overall UI is not screaming Tailwind on top of Next.js template. Not typical SaaS website plain and boring.”

What we're extracting

  • Character — illustrations, mascots, brand-led visual language
  • Big content-dense sections with elaborations (not Sarvam-spacious)
  • Multi-color confidence — uses 4-5 colors as a system
  • Distinctive hover and scroll states
  • Detailed feature pages with use cases
  • Doesn't read as a Tailwind-on-Next.js template

What we're skipping

  • The landing-hero pattern feels generic and lacks impact
  • Animated stock-photo cheerfulness in places (we want vibrant, not manufactured)

Notion

notion.com

Founder note

“Nice landing page, icons and interactions are very good.”

What we're extracting

  • Iconography — clean, slightly hand-drawn, warm
  • Micro-interactions on every clickable element
  • Landing-page composition (this one we DO like as a hero pattern)
  • Emoji-as-UI-language (especially for AI agents — informs our agent system)

What we're skipping

  • “Build your own system from a blank canvas” energy — we deliberately escape this

Agency-specific

1 reference

Buffer

buffer.com

Founder note

“Landing page is good, colors are good.”

What we're extracting

  • Color palette — bright, friendly, confident without being childish
  • Landing-page composition (good hero pattern reference)
  • Content density — useful info per scroll

Indian-rooted

2 references

Sarvam AI

sarvam.ai

Founder note

“Colors, scroll animations, overall visuals are very good but too much blank space.”

What we're extracting

  • Indian-rooted color confidence — saffron/red without apology
  • Scroll-driven animation craft
  • Bold visual identity — unmistakable
  • Sets the precedent for an Indian AI brand done with global polish

What we're skipping

  • Excessive whitespace — Espanda is content-dense

Razorpay

razorpay.com

Founder note

“(Reference for Indian-rooted, globally polished.)”

What we're extracting

  • Indian polish — clean documentation, confident type
  • Founder-narrative-forward marketing
  • Premium feel without trying to look American
  • Direct evidence that an Indian SaaS brand can be globally credible

Design craft

4 references

Webflow

webflow.com

Founder note

“Landing section not very good but typography is perfect. Good colors and animations are also very nice.”

What we're extracting

  • Typography craft — premium display pairing, careful weight and tracking
  • Color sophistication — saturated but composed
  • Animation polish on every interaction
  • Site-level visual design that earns its keep

What we're skipping

  • Their landing-hero pattern feels less convincing than the rest

Linear

linear.app

Founder note

“UX is good, I like the line diagram and inner animations.”

What we're extracting

  • Line-art and technical illustration style
  • Inner / ambient animation craft
  • UX flow precision
  • Restraint as luxury at the surface level
  • Confidence of the typography

What we're skipping

  • Spaciousness — Espanda is content-dense, not airy

Vercel · Geist

vercel.com/geist

Founder note

“(Aspirational reference for design-system-as-public-artifact.)”

What we're extracting

  • Generative UI patterns
  • Motion that earns its weight (not animated for the sake of it)
  • Dark mode with personality, not just inverted colors
  • The design system as a brand artifact (not a private Figma file)

Phantom

phantom.com

Founder note

“(Reference for taking complex/intimidating subject and making it approachable.)”

What we're extracting

  • Playful visuals that make a complex space (crypto) feel safe and fun
  • Custom illustration ownership
  • Brand color used aggressively but not gaudily

Editorial / outside software

3 references

Aesop

www.aesop.com

Founder note

“(Outside-software ref. The discipline we want in marketing surfaces.)”

What we're extracting

  • Restraint — tells you what's needed and nothing more
  • Intelligent copywriting, never breathless
  • Retail spaces as brand artifacts
  • Premium without using the word

Tata

www.tata.com

Founder note

“(Outside-software ref. The patience we should aim for in brand voice.)”

What we're extracting

  • Indian heritage brand done with global polish — directly relevant to our positioning
  • Doesn't apologize for being from India; doesn't lean on it either
  • Confident, calm, generations-of-trust feel

Kinfolk

www.kinfolk.com

Founder note

“(Outside-software ref. Aspirational pace/composition for long-form Espanda content.)”

What we're extracting

  • Editorial design — pacing, photography, restraint
  • Type as a feature, not decoration
  • Premium feel through space, not flash

Anti-references

brands we're escaping

The clarity of the brand often comes from what we're not. These are the visual or behavioural archetypes Espanda is consciously fighting.

SAP / Salesforce

Enterprise grey, patronizing tone, complexity-as-flex. The exact opposite of what an agency owner wants.

Generic ERP archetype

Utility-name (e.g. 'ProwPlus'), feature-list homepage, no point of view. Brand we're escaping.

Notion's blank-canvas energy

Hands the user an empty Lego box and tells them to figure it out. We ship templates and opinions.

Basecamp's over-simplicity

Condescends to growing businesses. Treats agency owners as if they need fewer features instead of better ones.

Animated stock-photo cheerfulness

Manufactured, ad-agency feel. Smiling people pointing at laptops. Real screenshots, real teams, real artifacts only.

AI bro hype

Buzzwords, breathless announcements, fear-mongering about job replacement. We earn trust by showing what the agent did, with the receipts.

How to add to this list

Edit lib/inspirations.ts and append a new entry to the inspirations array. Each entry needs: name, URL, category (one of the five), 3–5 brand colours as hex, a list of liked qualities (specific, not vague), an optional disliked list, and the founder note. Keep annotations sharp — “the way the type breathes on the hero” beats “the design”.