For the first installment of Fed Up Fridays, let’s talk about ugly. I’m talking hideous, people.
What’s up with the ugly sales pages? These things are the Internet equivalent of the powder blue polyester tuxedo. Ew.
Outlandish testimonials from people in Kalamazoo. Laughable stock photos of dollar bills flying out of a monitor, or people staring in happy shock at their computers. The SPECIAL OFFER JUST FOR YOU! when you try to click away. Worst of all, the dreaded yellow highlighted text.
It’s possible that the buyer world at large doesn’t care about these ugly ads. Maybe I’m just overly influenced by aesthetics. I like bright, shiny, colorful things. If you show me a button, I want to click it. But I’m not going to buy anything from you if your sales page is ugly.
The worst sales pages all look like they were made in 1997. No offense if you have one that actually was created in 1997, but you can do better than that. Gorgeous things are possible with a little creativity and a minimum of web design knowledge. Thanks to the wealth of stock photo options alone, there’s no reason your sales page should ever resemble someone else’s – let alone look like it was made with the same template. I’ll bet I could make a pretty good-looking sales page, and I can barely make an HTML link.
Unless you just crawled out from that giant hole in Guatemala, you’ve probably been poking around on the Internet for a while. You’ve inevitably searched online for information or solutions to a problem. Especially if your searches have veered into textbook internet marketing territories like dog training or making money online, you’ve probably been exposed to quite a few ugly sales pages. Chances are you didn’t buy anything, maybe because of how scammy the page looked? If you’re a seasoned web surfer, you might even feel a little let down when you go looking for a solution to your problem and wind up confronted with one of these sleazy pages instead.
Like Keith said in the original “Fed Up” post, different things work for different people. I’m not going to knock anyone for doing something that works for them. Maybe the sales campaigns that I think are lousy are still so prevalent because they work.
If you’ve studied buyer psychology or have run split tests on your own blog, you know that certain elements of these types of sales pages are dead-on. Use the red arrow to influence people to take action. Highlight text or make it bigger to draw the eye to what’s most important. Every advertiser uses little tricks like these to influence the buyer, but the rinse-and-repeat sameness that plagues internet marketing is bound to make them work in reverse.
I’m still pretty new to the game, but I have to assume that sales campaigns like these have become less successful over time. Even if your standard ugly sales page uses solid buyer psychology to market the product, is the potential customer really seeing it?
Years ago, banner ads were really effective. The reader’s eye was naturally drawn to the top of the page, resulting in lots and lots of ad clicks. Over time, people got sick of looking at that crap and thus “banner blindness” was born. People tend to not notice banner ads anymore, and even those that do typically don’t click on them. This is why slapped-together sales pages will eventually go the way of the buffalo. If we keep beating the same dead horses, how long until that big red arrow or the words BUY NOW go ignored?
Lots of bloggers want to make money online – I’m one of them. Internet marketing is a great way to do that, no doubt about it. If you plan to create an information product or sell something with a sales page, take a few extra minutes to make it sparkle. Brand it with your blog’s logo or signature color. Make it look like something that would influence YOU to buy.
Most bloggers aren’t anonymous. You’re probably building your brand around yourself, using your own name or the name of your small business. When you market things, you’re putting your own stamp on them. Using a sleazy sales campaign says you’re just that – sleazy. If you have any respect for yourself or your business, do whatever you can to make your campaigns shine. At the very least, don’t solicit a testimonial from your cousin in Kalamazoo.
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[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Extreme Social and Brandon Yeager, Jillian McCoy. Jillian McCoy said: RT @kbloemendaal: Fed Up Friday: Ugly Sales Pages http://bit.ly/bGuQQF [...]
Jillian, I can't agree with you more. But it seems that these pages must work. Else why would people carry on using them
For me, when I see the type of page you're talking about, I imediatly hit the back or X button. Get me outa here.
I need to draw up a sales page for my new ebook. But when I look for some good examples, all I get are those dreary 1983 pages. Yuk.
Can someone show me a sample of a good, up to date, current sale page that works?
Robert, the best sales page I have seen in a long time is Nick's for his ebook at Sitesketch101: http://www.sitesketch101.com/b3p/
I often wonder the same thing about lots of tactics people use that I don't like, do they provide real results?
Hey, Jill
Looking forward to your next article here.
Great to see you here and good article. If I land on a “standard” screaming at me sales page, I normally leave without even looking at it. Excellent points here, and I know who to have look at my first sales pages!
Awesome first edition of Fed Up Friday Jillian! Keep rockin' it girrrrl
Haha, the laptop with money flying out of it is such a bad stock photograph. That and the 'customer service' people that you see everywhere.
To me, this shows laziness. I'm sure it may be okay for those that haven't seen it often but if the design isn't unique, you have to wonder how unique the content is.
Great page, but damn he's underselling that thing. I'd like to see it in the 20's.
Hey, how about this one? http://bootstrapsessions.com
Not trying to plug the site (OK, maybe just a little) but really, @highlyinspired did a bang up f'ing job. You can still go long copy without a long page…slider.
Does it work? We'll find out.
[...] site, and when I offered her a weekly spot to rant, she jumped in headfirst! Her post today was on ugly sales pages, and is a must read!Social Media Mondays:Mike Stenger was the first to write weekly here on HBT, [...]
Underselling is an “understatement”! I told him that book could have easily been in the 30's or 40's in my opinion. Plus he released it the same week I did mine (not planned) and his pricing affected how I priced mine.
I have seen that one, and I think it is a great looking sales page too! I like the ones that get to the point without long page….
Hi Jillian. I'm happy to see you'll be a regular here for Fed up Fridays. Okay, I know 'happy' and 'rant' have no business being on the same page, but that's how it is.
I HATE sales pages that scream at my eyeballs so I was thinking “Yeah . . . What she said!” as I read your rant. I enjoyed the links to the eyeball-respecting sales pages in the comments . . . now those pages actually make me want to stick around and find out about the product.
The problem? Marketer produces 5 sales pages for him/herself that convert really well. They use them until they make another batch that work really well.
Then they bundle and sell the first batch (using the same sales page) to ten thousand newbies showing how well they work.
Rinse – Repeat.
Hi Jillian,
I agree 100%. Whenever I see one of those pages, I bolt.
I don't even bother to read it, but like you said they must work because that's still what people are doing.
Congrats on the new gig, you are in good company.
Just one thing though I don't think that's a very good picture of Keith up top
Neil
I came across many blogs and find your interesting views. Your thinking style is totally alike me. You are fully right article above is really awesome.
In addition to the design, the words they choose are also often tiring. They need to avoid using too much adjectives and focus on facts instead.
What many believe to be tried and true marketing methods, is nothing more than “throw mud on the wall and if it sticks, we have a sale” method. Is marketing still just a numbers game? Do what you can to get as many eyes viewing your content. Though again that content needs to have value and not just mind numbing tripe.
It would be interesting to see a follow up with links to top 10 terrible sites and 10 great sites, yes?
Jillian, as always, you deliver great writing!
zomg Jillian you know all this time I've been seeing these cheezy sales pages and I thought it was just me. Everybody makes the same tired page over and over and over…you'd think there was like a cloning machine that just kept pumping them out one after another.
I'm so glad to hear it's not just me that things this way and that people still believe originality and creativity stand out from the crowd!!
Thanks so much for this!