Rogue Startups

RS358: Your Design Sucks

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In this episode, Craig sits down with Francois Brill, Head of Product at Castos and longtime design collaborator, for an honest and entertaining conversation about what it really takes to build great-looking products in the age of AI. Using Outlier as a live case study, Francois walks through the marketing site and product UX in real time, calling out the small but costly design mistakes that make AI-built tools look generic. From embarrassing mismatched button styles to cognitive overload on ideation pages, this episode is a must-listen for anyone vibe-coding their next SaaS app and wondering why it just does not feel polished.

Highlights from Craig and Francois’ conversation:
  • AI-generated design is the new "tell" that your product was built without a designer
  • Picking one mode, light or dark, is almost always better than trying to do both
  • Rounded inputs paired with square buttons is one of the most common and fixable design mistakes
  • Color should guide user action, not decorate the interface
  • UX is how something works; UI is what it looks like, and they require different thinking
  • Cognitive overload kills conversion, especially on feature-rich pages like ideation tools
  • A Design MD file can teach AI your brand system so every output stays consistent
  • Code is cheap now, so the value has shifted to vision, taste, and design thinking
  • Building fast and iterating beats trying to get it perfect the first time
  • If everyone can prompt the same thing, standing out requires taste and a real system
    • Resources and Links from This Episode:
    • Clearly Design: https://www.clearly.design/ 
    • Francois on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/fbrill/ 
    • Outlier: https://outlier.so/ 
    • Castos Free Tools: castos.com/tools
    • Email me: [email protected] 
    • Find me on Twitter: @TheCraigHewitt

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      Do you have any comments, questions, or topic ideas for future episodes? Feel free to reach out to me:

      • Twitter: @TheCraigHewitt
      • LinkedIn: Craig Hewitt
      • Email: [email protected] 
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