A prospect – we’ll call him Joe – is vaguely interested in some thingamajig.
He goes to a website to learn more.
Website loads up.
Right at the very top of the page is a pushy headline, some gaudy flashing arrows, and a big fat BUY NOW button.
At this point Joe’s only been on the site for a handful of seconds.
He doesn’t trust this site yet. He still doesn’t even really know what’s really being sold. Or if he needs it. Or who he’d buy it from if he did.
So Joe says, “Hell nah. I ain’t pressing that button.”
There’s a really nasty psychological thing that happens at this exact moment. And a lot of marketers don’t understand it:
Having decided to not press the button, Joe has just voluntarily OPTED OUT of the sale.
He’s not curious or “on the fence” like he was a second ago. Now he’s an active “No”.
The real bummer is Joe may have been a perfect customer.
But he was rushed into a yes-or-no corner too quickly and simply wanted out.
I saw 2 case studies this week discussing this phenomenon.
In one of them, page conversions went up 20% by moving the call to action from the top of the page to the bottom.
In the other case study, they did the exact same thing and conversions went up a whopping 304% (!)
How can we put this into practice?
As a Twitter pal told me this week, “You’ve got to sell the scroll” first.
Customers are usually not in a mad rush. They will read lengthy sales pages that scroll for days…
But only if they’re interested & hooked first.
Rules of thumb:
- The top of your sales pages need strong headlines & subheadlines. A meaningful image is okay too.
- Then give it all space to breathe. Don’t cram every “important” thing up in the top of your site. Too many things to focus on = lack of focus = lost sale.
- Sell the scroll & don’t rush things. The sale will happen when the customer has the data they need.
- When in doubt, respect your prospect’s time & thought process.
Good luck with it!
Questions or comments? I’m here for you…
