Sean Fioritto was the first person I met at BaconBizConf while waiting outside the doors on morning #1. Confident, smart, and altogether friendly guy. I was impressed the level of demonstrated grit he showed when he volunteered his site for a teardown. He was over there just scratching notes away while they punished him. We could all use that kind of grit. More of us would launch great products if we did.
Pat Pohler had a teardown too. He should share his lessons learned as well... {Pat Signal}
It's so weird for me to hear from people who were at BaconBizConf and thought the teardowns were "brutal" or "punishing."
None of us panelists ever said "This is terrible" or anything of that sort, or insulted anyone/anything, or discouraged any of the volunteers, etc. We said "This doesn't work" "That won't work" "That's weak" etc.… and then gave lots of supportive suggestions to make it better. The worst possible thing anyone said is when Patrick said [paraphrasing] "Please don't take this personally, but if your target market is designers, you need to have more of a… design."
Genuinely asking "Why would I be interested in this?" is not only not brutal, it's not even a criticism.
I guess more people need to experience actual brutal criticism in order to see how our teardown was anything but!
The new is definitely an improvement, but both load fairly slowly - I would try improve this next, or at least allow staged loading so visitors have something to start looking at quickly while the rest loads.
Would be interesting to see the current version tested against one without all the "Photoshop bashing" too. I'm not sure if that was a suggestion from the talk or another idea you wanted to try, but I feel it would be far more effective if you condensed the many long bullet points down to "Sick of static Photoshop mockups that don't respond like real websites? Feel like you're doing everything twice?"
(Maybe the bullet points belong in a blog or FAQ section with the title: "why not just use Photoshop?")
TBH I actually like your first landing page copy (other than it missing an above-the-fold "what's in this book" statement) and the second one also feels like a work in progress, so it'd be interesting to see how they both perform.
Not yet. I have some posts in the works for web designers so I'll see how they convert compared to the old page. I'm ignoring all stats while this article is on HN. This isn't exactly the target audience for my book.
Just a book. Software soon. I wanted to start with something small that I could do relatively quickly, so I'm writing a book. Then I will convert readers of my book into customers for my software.
Thank you for sharing this. I've been working and listening hard and anything that clears up conversion tactics (especially when just handed to me) is gold.
I haven't read the article yet, but clicking on the before/after links got me to say: "Aha, it's a book!" in the first second after opening the 2nd link.
So even if it's only this (which I'm sure it's not), huge improvement in the clarity of the message.
Do you have data on the conversion rates before/after redesigning the landing page?
The funny thing is I agree, but I don't think I'll do it. The old version is just so bad I feel like I'd be throwing away money. I'm not internet famous so traffic is hard for me to come by. Can I justify a split test?
So the question becomes do I trust the experts? I do. Therefore this landing page is my new baseline -- I'll split test from here.
Given that it's a lead gen page, you could get some solid split-test data off $100 or so of spend on the advertising platform of your choice. However, I don't know if that's something you could afford. If it is, I'd definitely recommend it, but I can certainly see why you'd be inclined to trust the experts.
FWIW, looking over the "after" page myself, I'd agree that it's a much more solid longish-form sales page. You'll probably be fine using that as your baseline!
While the redesign looks better, I'm somewhat turned off because it follows the same design strategies as used by low-quality info products:
* Cheesy book shot. At least it's not a fake "book generator" box. If this will be delivered as a PDF, why not use the Acrobat logo below a thumbnail preview of the actual cover/first page? To me, seeing real content lends credibility.
* Thin column of text with bullet points.
* Periodic bolded keywords.
* The only things it's missing are a "P.S." section and a breakdown of the cost savings over the alternatives.
I have no doubt that the reason these things are standard is that they work. However, for me the site has the same look and feel I've seen in many low-quality info product kind of sites. As a result, I'm immediately more skeptical than I otherwise would be.
well, then I guess you won't be a customer. Guess what.. this doesn't matter, the loss is probably all yours (if the actual content is something you can benefit from).
Don't forget, this book is being written to get profit and recognition (I think ;) and loosing a couple of "this looks too cheap for me" dudes is an OK price to pay to significantly increase the readership. And I'm pretty sure patio11 and brennan know quite a bit about this.
So, so long as "it works" I think he's going in the right direction.
> well, then I guess you won't be a customer. Guess what.. this
> doesn't matter, the loss is probably all yours
Was this meant to be snarky, or am I misreading it? I completely agree, and it seems like you're arguing against a position I never took.
> ... is an OK price to pay to significantly increase the readership
As you no doubt noticed, I said these design decisions were likely made because they work. You are agreeing with my statement.
> And I'm pretty sure patio11 and brennan know quite a bit about this.
Did I claim otherwise? I shared the reasons why I had somewhat of a negative initial impression of the site. My impressions have nothing to do with the experience or credentials of those who were involved with the redesign.
Well, My book will not be low-quality. And it will be evident after I've written some high-quality sample content and guest blog posts. So the landing page is just the final step in the funnel.
That said I don't mean for it to look low-quality. That could just be a side-effect of my lack of design skills. :-)
Pat Pohler had a teardown too. He should share his lessons learned as well... {Pat Signal}