Hero Above the Fold: What a Deeptech Homepage Has to Say Before the Scroll
A homepage's first screen has to do three jobs in a few seconds: state the claim, make the commitment, and anchor it in a name or principle. This article breaks down the hero lines on two sites I built, Ula Capital and Pathway Bio, gives a fill-in template, explains why a short branded video behind the three lines now makes sense (with data from Wistia's State of Video Report), and ends with three tests founders can run on their own first screen.
The Part Everyone Reads Is the Part Nobody Writes
Founders put weeks into the middle of the deck and the depths of the website: the methods, the market slide, the technology page. The first screen of the homepage, the one part every visitor is guaranteed to see, usually gets whatever was written fastest. A mission statement. A mechanism. A line that could sit on a hundred other sites.
A visitor gives that first screen five to ten seconds. In that time it has to answer three questions: what is this, who is it for, and why should I keep reading. If it doesn't, the rest of the site never gets a chance. This is the Academic Trap at its smallest scale: one screen instead of a whole deck.
Three Lines, in This Order
The strongest heroes I've built share a simple anatomy. It isn't a template to copy blindly. It's a way to check what a first screen is doing.
The claim. One line that says what is true or what will change, in plain human words, with no mechanism.
The commitment. One line that says what you do about it, and for whom.
The anchor. One line that makes it yours: your name, or the principle that backs the claim up.
Three short lines are easier to read than one long sentence, and each line can only do one job, so there's nowhere for jargon to hide.
Teardown One: Ula Capital
The hero on the Ula Capital site, which I designed as part of the launch brand, reads:
We Supercharge the world's potential.
We improve the foundation of humanity by empowering founders and investors to reach new heights.
We are Ula.
The first line is the claim, and it's about the world, not the fund. The second is the commitment, and it names both audiences, founders and investors, in the same sentence. The third is the anchor, and it's simply the name, said the way a person introduces themselves. Every sentence has an actor, and nothing on the screen needs a glossary. You can see how it fits together in the Ula Capital case study.
Teardown Two: Pathway Bio
The hero on the Pathway Bio site, which I also built, reads:
Cancer is as unique as the individual themselves.
We will treat it as such.
Whenever possible, treatment should be informed by the patient's individual biology.
The claim is a human truth that anyone can nod at. The commitment is six words long. The anchor is the principle that makes the science relevant, and it comes last, as the reason the commitment is credible rather than as the thing standing between the reader and the point. The full story is in the Pathway Bio case study.
The Version Most Sites Ship Instead
Here's a hero that most deeptech sites could swap their logo into: "A proprietary platform leveraging advanced analytics to optimise outcomes." It has no claim, no commitment and no anchor. It describes a mechanism and leaves the reader to work out why it matters. It isn't wrong, and that's the problem. Nothing in it can be disagreed with, and nothing in it is memorable.
A Fill-In Template
Write three short lines, then read them out loud.
The claim: [Something true, or something that should change, in words a non-specialist would use.]
The commitment: We [verb] [the specific people] so they can [outcome].
The anchor: [Your name], or [the principle that makes the commitment credible].
Here it is with an invented example, a company that detects battery faults early: "Batteries shouldn't fail without warning. We help fleet operators see faults before they become failures. We are [Company]." Notice what's missing: no technology, no acronym, no adjective doing the work of a fact. The science belongs underneath, as the proof.
Then Let the Screen Move
Words win the five-second test, but motion tends to catch the eye first. A slow, branded video behind the three lines gives the visitor something to look at while they read. The Ula Capital hero sits over a moving field of light, and Pathway Bio runs custom animation and video through the site, so the first screen feels alive before anyone scrolls.
There's data on how people watch short video. Wistia, a video hosting company, analysed more than 13 million videos on its platform for its State of Video Report and found that videos under a minute average a 52% engagement rate, meaning viewers typically watch about half of the video. Engagement falls as videos get longer, and Wistia notes that viewers of its one to five minute videos usually drop off around the halfway point. That measures videos people choose to play, so it isn't proof that any background loop holds attention. It is a useful guide to length: keep it short, and put the idea that matters in the first half.
Custom branded video used to mean a studio, a crew and a budget most early-stage companies would rather spend on the next experiment. It doesn't any more. With a solid brief and a designer who understands what the company is trying to say, a short branded loop is now within reach of a startup budget. I made that argument in more detail in Your Science Is High-End. There's No Excuse for a Website That Isn't.
A good brief is short. It covers six things.
1. The three lines. The video exists to support them, so the designer needs to see them first.
2. One visual idea. A single image that carries the claim, not a collage of everything the company does.
3. Palette, lighting and materials. The same ones as the rest of the brand, so the video looks like it belongs.
4. What it must never show. No invented instruments, no fake data, nothing a reader could mistake for a result. Video sets the tone, and the proof stays in the real data.
5. Where it plays and for how long. A hero loop, a loader and a section break are different jobs with different lengths.
6. How it behaves. Muted, looping, light enough for a phone, with a still frame for anyone it doesn't load for.
The designer's job is to say no to the generic. Left alone, most video tools will hand you the same glowing molecule everyone else gets. An understanding designer keeps the one idea that carries your claim and throws the rest away, so the video reinforces your three lines instead of competing with them.
Three Tests Before You Ship It
1. The logo swap. Put a competitor's logo on your three lines. If they still work, rewrite them.
2. The read-aloud. If you wouldn't say it to someone across a table, it isn't ready. I wrote about this in Your Site Reads Like a Methods Section.
3. The five-second stranger. Show the first screen to someone outside your field for five seconds, then ask what the company does. Their answer is your real headline.
For a deep tech or biotech startup, those three lines are also the heart of the brand identity. If the hero line still reads like a research paper, that is the Academic Trap showing up in the first five seconds. You can see how I handled it in the Pathway Bio case study.
Once the three lines are right, they should also be the first thing in your deck, which I covered in Your Deck and Your Website Are One Document. Getting these three lines right is the first thing I work on with founders, because everything else on the page has to hold up what they promise.
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