Basecamp home page redesign by Jason Fried of 37signals A few weeks ago we decided to take a stab at redesigning the Basecamp home page. We liked the current design, but we wanted to see if we could do better. Specifically we were interested in more visuals, less text, and a generally simpler and less dense presentation. Started with a sketch As we usually do, we start with a very low-fi sketch of the big idea behind the design. From this sketch we ended up with something that looked like this: We messed around with the words, subheads, and other copy. So we decided to replace the phrases with icons representing the major features/benefits of Basecamp. After a few rounds of tweaks, we ended up with this: After we were pretty happy with the top, we moved down the page and redesigned the rest. A/B test Once the page was ready, we decided to run an A/B test against the current (now the old) design. The new design sent 14% more people to the signup page. Back to back For reference, here was the old design: And here’s the new design:
Landing Page Best Practices: Remove Distractions, Be Bold & Tell a Story TweetTweet Last Friday, Oli from Unbounce & Peep teamed up for the second episode of Page Fights where they tore apart contestants landing pages & give them actionable advice & best practices on how to make their landing pages better. The winner of Page Fights gets 1 free year of Unbounce’s Pro 99 account, a half hour private consultation with Peep & free early membership into the ConversionXL self study course. In this second episode, they reviewed 5 different landing pages with the page owners & went into more detail than Peep normally does in our regular website reviews, so hopefully you’ll find more value in it. In case you don’t have time to watch the full 39:00 minute video, I’ve included the main takeaways as well as included links to helpful landing page best practice content from here & around the web. Finalist 1 – Paul Jarvis, Write & Sell Your Damn Book What’s interesting about this page is that it uses powerful copywriting to draw visitors into the page. Oli’s Feedback: Takeaways
10 techniques for an effective 'call to action' Design: The estimated time to read this article is 7 minutes Jeff from Brighton recently wrote to me asking: Occasionally I hear you talk about the importance of having a call to action on the show but you never go into much depth. I recognise the importance of having a call to action but how do I encourage users to complete them? Having an effective call to action is an essential part of any website. A call to action provides… Focus to your siteA way to measure your sites successDirection to your users How then do you create an effective call to action? 1. Before a user is willing to complete a call to action they have to recognise the need. You also need to communicate the benefits of responding. Take for example the VoIP service Skype. Make calls from your computer — free to other people on Skype and cheap to phones and mobiles around the world. They clearly explain what the user will get by downloading Skype. 2. Incentives could include discounts, entry into a competition or a free gift.
5 Essential tools to attract a relevant audience to your blog It is not difficult to drive traffic to your site but what’s the point if visitors don’t stay around and read your blog post, sign up to your email list or buy your product or service? We’re all familiar with the following saying: Well, maybe you’re not familiar with that saying because I just made it up. But it does make sense! Let’s look at five great social media tools to ensure you attract a to your blog posts. The people that follow you on Twitter are some of the most likely targets for your blog post but you need to have a strategy for reaching them. SocialBro is a social media management tool. At 8am only 31% of my followers are actively tweeting but over 77% are active at 3pm in the afternoon. I’m based in Europe but focus on the US so it makes sense that more of my followers are online in my afternoon which is the morning in the US. When you are searching through Google for content you often see the authors picture displayed in the search results:
7 More Useful Tips To Help Your Site Convert Advertisement Last week we presented 8 Useful Tips To Help Your Website Convert – we discussed various rules and guidelines from marketing, such as subliminal suggestion, prevention of choice paralysis, AIDA-principle, attention guide and the Gutenberg rule. The main idea was to help designers and developers create a design that would help the site to grow and become a success the financial point of view. As we see more and more businesses move their services online, and even more that begin their life on the Web, a greater need arises for websites that are designed and built to sell. This article presents further principles and rules that will help your site convert. 1. There is no reason to stop developing your website once you’ve come up with a design that you’re happy with and that you think best sells your product. You can tweak your website using what’s called A/B testing (also known as split testing). Google Website Optimizer 2. A typical feature description on Apple’s website. 3.
10 writing tips from renowned authors Just because you're writing blogs or website content doesn't mean you can't learn a few things from the great writers of yesteryear. In looking at the tips below, you might be surprised at how relevant and timely their advice can be. Here are 10 ways to improve your writing, online or otherwise: 1. Write, write, write. "Quantity produces quality. You know what they say, "If you want to be a writer, write!" 2. "When you do a thing, do it with all your might. If there's one thing that separates good writers from great writers, it's passion. 3. "Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass." It's one of the oldest pieces of writing advice there is and for good reason. 4. "Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech, which you are used to seeing in print." The first phrase that comes to your mind isn't always the best—in fact, if it's the first phrase that comes to your mind, it might be the worst one to use. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10.
Design To Sell: 8 Useful Tips To Help Your Website Convert Advertisement As we see more and more businesses move their services online, and even more that begin their life on the Web, a greater need arises for websites that are designed and built to sell. A great-looking website may achieve the goal of shaping and delivering a strong brand, but its good looks alone aren’t enough to sell the products or services on offer. For that, you need to introduce the element of marketing. You may want to take a look at the following related articles: 1. Research shows that objects and images you see around you can prime you for certain behaviors. LegacyLocker features a photo of a happy family on its landing page, presumably to evoke in visitors a warm feeling for its product and a desire to care for their loved ones. When choosing images for your website, think carefully about the message you’re trying to send. 2. There is a phenomenon in marketing known as “choice paralysis.” The Highrise pricing list shows a set of monthly payment plans. 3. 4. 6. 7. 8.
4 attention-grabbing ways to open a blog post It doesn't matter how good your blog posts are. If their introductions don't grab your readers' attention, you wasted your time writing a post no one will likely read. Your opening statement should leap off the page and engage readers. It's the first thing readers see—other than your title—and should give them a clear idea of what to expect from the rest of the article. After all, what's the point of tweeting a post if no one gets past the first couple sentences? To ensure people read your posts, here are a few tips to get that opener to work for you—not against you. 1. Have you ever found yourself completely caught up in an article? See what I just did there? Questions immediately engage readers and get them thinking. 2. "Ninety percent of all statistics on the Web are outdated," says Abraham Lincoln of Springfield, Ill. This funny little "fact" works as a solid opener because it has a few things we look for in fact statements. 3. 4.
30+ principles to a better landing page design | Landing Page Optimization After hundreds of landing page optimization projects, we wanted to share few of the lessons we learned when creating a successful landing page. We hope that you will find this article helpful. Also, please consider subscribing to our RSS feed or leaving a comment. There are four basic components to a successful web page design: Research; Design; Copy and Testing and Modification. 1. 2. The topic of customer research is beyond what we cover in this post. 3. 4. The value proposition will help establish trust and gives a sense of congruency throughout the page. 5. 6. 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13.
Why Content Goes Viral: the Theory and Proof The author's posts are entirely his or her own (excluding the unlikely event of hypnosis) and may not always reflect the views of Moz. Not all great content goes viral, but (with the exception of awesomely terrible videos) content that does go viral is great. No one can guarantee that any piece of content will take the web by storm, but we can make sure that a piece of content has what it takes. Long-time citizens of the web can often tell from a first-reading or viewing that a piece is going to explode, but why? Opinions about what it takes to be viral are easy to come by, but let’s look at the facts with data to prove it. Write long, in-depth posts In a scientific, statistical look at what makes content most shareable online, two University of Pennsylvania professors looked at the New York Times’ most emailed list to see if they could determine what cause people to share article. The first finding is that longer articles tend to be shared far more often. Inspire anger, awe, or anxiety