Daybook
The Challenge
Small service businesses run on duct tape. Invoicing in FreshBooks, time tracking in Toggl, files in Google Drive, client updates over email, scheduling in Calendly. Six tools, six logins, six monthly bills, and none of them talk to each other.
The result: hours lost to admin, a messy client experience, and money left on the table from unbilled time and late invoices. The market had two options: free tools that do one thing, or expensive platforms built for enterprises. Nothing sat in the middle for a freelancer or small team that just wanted to look professional and get paid.
The Approach
We built Daybook as a full-stack SaaS product on Laravel 12 with Livewire 3 for real-time UI components. The frontend uses Tailwind CSS 4 with a custom design system: three accent colors (oxide green, warm clay, muted gold) on cream and charcoal backgrounds, with Fraunces for display type and Inter for body text.
The marketing landing page was designed and built using Kingsbury Creative's full client workflow: discovery brief, competitive analysis (FreshBooks, Wave, HoneyBook, Jobber, Dubsado), wireframe specs with design review, and a detailed build handoff. Product UI mockups are CSS-built components, not images, so they stay crisp at any resolution and match the real product exactly.
GSAP and ScrollTrigger power the landing page animations: a floating card hero composition, scroll-triggered workflow steps replacing a 400vw horizontal scroll with a cleaner vertical sequence, and staggered bento grid reveals. Lenis handles smooth scrolling. The page includes FAQPage schema for search engine answer boxes and links to a separate VitePress documentation site at docs.hellodaybook.com.
Under the hood, Daybook connects to Stripe for payment processing, syncs with QuickBooks for bookkeeping, and includes a mini-CRM with sales pipeline, activity logging, and follow-up management. Every feature is built for the user who bills clients for time or project work.
The Result
Daybook launched as a production-ready SaaS with a real free tier (not a 14-day trial), professional-grade invoicing with Stripe payments, time tracking that converts to invoices in one click, and a branded client portal where clients view projects, files, and pay their bills.
The marketing site scores in the green on Lighthouse, loads with self-hosted fonts and zero external dependencies, and communicates the product's value without resorting to fake metrics or manufactured urgency. The design deliberately avoids every pattern that makes SaaS landing pages look interchangeable: no "Most Popular" badges, no stock photography, no FOMO messaging.
464 passing tests, full security audit, and a documentation site with 22 help articles at docs.hellodaybook.com. The product is live at hellodaybook.com.