Free Standalone Design Tool — Engineering-as-Marketing Spec

Type: Product-build spec for Bet 2’s top-of-funnel magnet (the highest-leverage SEO + demo asset). Companion: strategy readme/ACQUISITION_CHANNELS_2026-06-15.md · kit readme/ACQUISITION_EXECUTION_KIT_2026-06-16.md §8. Thesis: Expose the existing Fabric.js design studio (designer/) as a free, no-login tool (a business-card / flyer maker). It is simultaneously (a) a search-traffic magnet for high-volume “free X maker” queries, (b) a live, hands-on demo of our single biggest differentiator, and (c) the top of a funnel that converts a slice of designers into store trials. This is the Ahrefs/Canva “free tool” playbook applied to our own engine.

Status: spec only — not built. This documents what to build and why, grounded in what already exists in the repo. Hand to engineering as the brief.

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1. Why this asset (and why it’s cheap)

We already own the hard part. The designer/ app (Vue 3 + Fabric.js, port 5174) is a battle-tested editor with text, shapes, images, filters, multi-page templates, undo/redo with IndexedDB crash recovery, and export to PNG/JPG/SVG/PDF. A free standalone tool is mostly packaging + gating + SEO surface, not a new product.

Three returns from one build:

1. SEO / traffic — “free business card maker”, “free flyer maker”, “online [product] designer” are high-volume, evergreen queries. Free tools are link magnets (Ahrefs’ free tools out-pull its blog).
2. Live demo — instead of a screenshot, the prospect uses the studio. The “wow” of our differentiator is experienced, not described.
3. Funnel — a soft, well-placed gate converts a fraction of designers into account/trial signups, attributable end-to-end.

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2. What’s already there vs. what’s new

Capability	Exists in designer/?	Work for the free tool
Canvas editor (text/shapes/images/filters)	✅	Reuse as-is
Templates / clipart / asset library	✅	Curate a free starter set per product
Multi-page (front/back)	✅	Limit to 1–2 pages for v1
Undo/redo + crash recovery	✅	Reuse
Export PNG/JPG/SVG/PDF	✅	Gate export (see §4)
No-login / anonymous session	⚠️ designer assumes a product/template context	New: standalone entry, anonymous local draft
Public marketing route + SEO	❌	New: indexable landing pages per tool
Soft signup gate at export/save	❌	New: account-create wall on export
Analytics / attribution	⚠️	New: UTM + event instrumentation (§6)
Tenant-less mode	❌ (designer runs in tenant context)	New: a landlord/marketing context, no tenant required

Architectural note (important): the studio normally runs embedded in a tenant storefront. The free tool runs on the marketing/landlord surface with no tenant. Decide early where it’s hosted (marketing site subpath, e.g. /tools/business-card-maker) and ensure the anonymous design path does not require InitializeTenancy or a tenant-scoped upload pipeline. Anonymous uploads should go to a landlord/marketing bucket with short TTL auto-cleanup, not a tenant bucket.

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3. Scope — v1 (ship small)

Product types: start with 2 — business card + flyer. (Highest search volume, simplest geometry.) Add t-shirt and poster in v2.

Per tool:

• A dedicated, indexable landing page (/tools/business-card-maker, /tools/flyer-maker).
• “Start designing — free, no signup” CTA opening the canvas with that product’s dimensions + bleed/safe guides preset.
• A curated gallery of free starter templates for that product.
• Editor: text, fonts, shapes, image upload, the free clipart/template set, undo/redo. (Hide tenant-only / pro-only controls.)
• Export gated behind a one-field account create (§4).

Explicitly out of v1: multi-page beyond front/back, 3D preview (save for the in-product demo), pricing, checkout, payment, ordering. The free tool’s job is design → signup, not order.

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4. The gate (where the funnel converts)

Let people design freely with no friction — gating too early kills the SEO/UX value. Gate only at the moment of value capture: export / download / save.

• Designing: 100% open, no login, anonymous local draft (reuse IndexedDB).
• On Export / Download / Save: show a single-field “Create a free account to download your design” wall (email + password, or Google). On success: deliver the file and persist the design to the new account.
• Post-signup CTA (soft, never blocking): “Want to sell designs like this from your own print store? Start your free trial →” → the store-trial onboarding.
• Carry the anonymous draft across the signup boundary so nothing is lost (the silent-drop rule applies: design in → design out).

Conversion path to instrument: tool visit → design started → export attempted → account created → store trial started.

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5. SEO surface

• Target queries: free business card maker, free flyer maker, online [product] designer, [product] template free. High volume; the gate converts a slice to product trials. (Stay off saturated head terms per the kit’s guardrails.)
• One indexable landing page per tool with: H1 matching the query, a live “start designing” embed/CTA above the fold, the template gallery (each template a thumbnail with its own crawlable detail), a short “how it works”, and a single soft CTA to the store trial.
• Programmatic/template SEO: generate a crawlable page per starter template (e.g. /tools/business-card-maker/templates/minimal-bold) — the Notion/Canva template-directory playbook. Seed from product/template data; keep thin pages out (only index templates with a real preview).
• Internal-link these pages from the relevant BOFU comparison pages and JTBD guides, and vice-versa.

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6. Analytics & attribution (build in from day one)

Per the metrics work, instrument server-side where possible and tag everything:

• UTM on every outbound link from a tool page to the trial.
• Events: tool_page_view, design_started, template_selected, image_uploaded, export_attempted, account_created (source=free_tool:<product>), store_trial_started.
• A single funnel report: tool → design → export → account → trial, sliced by tool (business-card vs flyer) and by source query/UTM.
• This is the data that tells you whether the free tool earns a place as a focus channel (CAC/Volume/Fit) or stays a background asset.

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7. Guardrails (house rules that apply)

• Anonymous uploads: route through a marketing/landlord upload path with short-TTL auto-cleanup; never into a tenant bucket. Store relative paths only.
• No raw technical output: loading/empty/error states required; plain-language messages; no UUIDs/slugs/engine type names on screen (a text layer is named by its text, an image by its filename — already the designer’s standard).
• Mobile: the canvas must be usable (or gracefully degrade) at 375px; if full editing isn’t viable on phone, offer template pick + text edit and prompt desktop for full design — never a broken canvas.
• Abuse/cost control: rate-limit anonymous exports and uploads; cap canvas size/upload size; the tool is a magnet, not free unlimited rendering.
• Don’t leak tenant features: hide pro/tenant-only controls; the free tool is intentionally a subset.

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8. Build sequence (matches kit week 2–6 front-load sprint)

1. Standalone anonymous entry — render the existing canvas outside tenant context, with business-card dimensions + guides preset; anonymous local draft. (De-risk the architecture first — this is the only genuinely new plumbing.)
2. Landing page #1 (/tools/business-card-maker) — indexable, live CTA, curated free templates.
3. The export gate — single-field account create on export; carry the draft across; post-signup trial CTA.
4. Instrumentation — events + UTM + the funnel report.
5. Landing page #2 (flyer) — reuse everything; second product type.
6. Template-detail pages — programmatic SEO from the seeded template set.

Definition of done (v1): a stranger can land from Google on the business-card maker, design with no login, hit export, create an account, receive their file, see the “start your store trial” CTA — and every step shows up in the funnel report.

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9. What this is NOT

• Not a second product to maintain — it’s a thin marketing skin over the existing designer/.
• Not an ordering/checkout flow — design→signup only.
• Not a place to ship the 3D preview or pricing engine — those stay as the in-product demo that rewards the trial.

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Spec only. Grounded in the shipped designer/ (Fabric.js) capabilities; the only net-new engineering is tenant-less anonymous mode, the indexable marketing pages, the export gate, and instrumentation. Sequenced to fit the execution kit’s week 2–6 front-load sprint.