The client & summary
DropNow is a Swiss community-driven prize platform: users discover prize drops, help unlock them through community participation and enter free prize draws via quiz questions. The core objective was a pre-launch landing page to collect sign-ups and votes, followed by a complete custom web platform covering the full user flow, from registration to winner selection.
The challenge
The platform had to feel dark, premium and tech-oriented without resembling a casino, with trust, transparency and a clear Swiss identity for users aged 18 and over. Behind the scenes, drops needed to unlock automatically once fully funded, go live in the right order and stay live for a manually set time window, with emails and push notifications reaching users reliably.
Our solution
Our team built the landing page in June 2026 and the platform between June and September 2026.
Discovery and scope
The landing page brief had one primary function: collect pre-registrations and wish-drop votes before launch. The platform was specified from a written brief and project files, with the colour scheme and the Barlow typeface taken from the client's design.
Pre-launch landing page
The first draft was ready on 16 June 2026. Four revision rounds refined the headline ("the first Swiss community drop platform goes live soon"), the logo, the "Jetzt abstimmen" button and the navigation to the sign-up form. It went live on 30 June 2026.
Platform build
The first version of the Laravel platform was delivered by the end of June 2026, covering registration, drops, funding progress, quizzes, draws and winner selection. Later rounds added a live drop view, a drop map, a community area, a hall of fame, manually scheduled live windows, a drop queue that can be reordered in the interface, German notices, the client's FAQ and email templates, and a header that hides on scroll on mobile.
A drop page with the funding progress bar, support amounts and the live drop countdown below.
The drop map shows all drops at a glance: live, being funded and coming soon.
Infrastructure and launch
Our team set up hosting on Hetzner, payments with Stripe and transactional email with Resend, plus browser push notifications. After launch we worked on email deliverability and notification details in paid follow-up rounds.
Challenges we solved
Automating a live event: the drop lifecycle, from funding to going live to announcing winners, runs on schedules and rules rather than manual steps.
Who the platform is for
DropNow addresses people aged 18 and over living in Switzerland. The pre-launch site consists of the landing page, a thank-you page after sign-up and the legal pages. The client's mockups set the colour scheme, adapted with a mobile-first approach rather than followed exactly.
What mattered most at launch
The client's priorities for the landing page were clear: the colours had to be right, the page had to look good and work well on a phone, and people had to receive a confirmation email after pre-registration that does not land in spam. Our team built the pre-registration flow around these three points, with texts that the client could add to once the page was ready.
Technology stack
- Laravel (custom platform)
- WordPress (pre-launch page)
- Stripe (payments)
- Resend (transactional email)
- Browser push notifications
- Hetzner Cloud (hosting)
Results
- Pre-launch landing page with voting and pre-registration, live on 30 June 2026.
- Custom Laravel platform covering registration, drops, quizzes, draws and winner selection.
- Drops that unlock automatically once funded, with manually scheduled live windows.
- Live drop, drop map, community and hall of fame sections.
- Stripe payments, Resend emails and push notifications on Hetzner hosting.
Frequently asked questions
What does the DropNow platform do?
Users discover prize drops, help unlock them as a community and enter free draws by answering quiz questions.
Which technology is it built on?
A custom Laravel application, with Stripe for payments, Resend for email and hosting on Hetzner Cloud.
How do drops go live?
A drop unlocks once fully funded and goes live in a scheduled window that the operator sets manually.
How long did the project take?
About fifteen weeks, from the landing page in June 2026 to follow-up rounds in September 2026.
Was there a pre-launch phase?
Yes. A landing page collected pre-registrations and wish-drop votes before the platform launched.
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