Converting at 1.7%, but PLEASE help me out

[Ian Clifford]

Hi, I'd appreciate any and all comments on my sales page but I can't put the link in as I don't have enough posts!

If you would be good enough to click through my signature, that takes you to my blog and the sales page is for the MySpace eBook on the right side - very obvious!

My biggest concern is that musicians and wannabe artists don't like the IM long sales page format with the heavy pitch.

I know I could do with more testimonials, but it's early days.

I don't want to make any other points as I want really fresh input. Other than to say I am thinking about split testing against a video sales page!

Very very much appreciated.

Ian

[Daniel Scott]

Ian,

The first problem is your popup. On my computer I couldn't seem to scroll down to close it. In my experience, if you DO use these things, make sure they're not too long vertically - like yours currently is.

I wouldn't be surprised if that alone was really hurting conversions.

The first thing is that I think your opening - headline, subhead, first paragraph etc - needs work, not only with emotion but also the focus.

MySpace is the vehicle here, but it has little to do with the desired result. When I got to your page I was thinking it was talking about Myspace.

How about a headline like:

"Music Industry Veteran Reveals How He Uses MySpace to Get His Music In Front of Thousands of Screaming Fans and "Big Wig" Record Company Producers... And How You Can Do the Same!"

That headline needs a lot of pruning, but hopefully it illustrates the point that it now talks about the desired benefit - making it big in the music industry - not crap about MySpace which nobody cares about, although the MySpace part is still there.

The rest of your copy is pretty good. It's not great, but I believe it will do its job. If you wanted to get fancy there are some sentences that don't quite work, phrases that are a bit dry, all that sort of thing - but it's a good start.

One thing I think you need to address is your "scanability". At the moment your page is huge blocks of text... more subheads and the occasional one-sentence paragraph would help break it up, visually, aiding scanners.

There are a lot of "little" tweaks to the copy that could be made by a pro, which would probably increase response a fair bit, but if you fix the headline/subhead/intro and make it more "scannable", I think you will be well on the way to an improved response.

-Dan

[Ian Clifford]

Great - many thanks. I really appreciate it.

Ian

[Loren Woirhaye]

1. it's not clear if you have something to sell

2. Your free guide on the right is vague - because
unless the visitor is very green to thinking about
a music career he or she has probably read the basic
stuff alread. You need to SELL the goodie to
get opt-ins. You can use a scare tactic like
"How To Avoid The 7 Deadly Marketing Errors 90%
of Recording Arists Make"

3. Your handwriting on the post-in note is illegible.

4. you use the word "buy" to try to sell your ebook.
You are better off letting the cover get interest than
using "buy" in youyr headline.

5. The ecover of your MySpace guide is illegible and
hard to see what it sas even at the top. Get a different
cover or blow it up much bigger. Look at the business
book covers on Amazon - most are legible from 10 feet
away or further. Why Ebook cover designers think spindly
tiny text and big pictures sell I have no idea - real
book publishers know you have to make the words big on
the cover so people can read 'em.

There's a lot of other stuff too - basically you need
to really look at the visitor experience with a lot more
care and steer that experience so it is easy for people
to do what you want them to do.

On your actual sales page your typography is hard to read,
and your paragraphs too long. I think your bullets are too
close together.

You should have a human face above the fold on this page -
yours would be good. Put a face on YOU. use a caption
under the photo. There are a lot of little tweaks you could
do to make this page friendlier.

As far as the copy I would call it barely adequate; needs
a lot of work.

[Ian Clifford]

Thanks Loren

I'm working on it!

Ian

[Revolves]

I'm not a copywriting expert, but I'll give some advice as a layperson.

Glaring at the headline, I see no clarity in what you're offering. The subheading is also quite vague. I can't seem to associate "MySpace Star" with my music career within a few seconds. So, unless your visitors are presold with the very idea, I don't think they will realise what you're selling.

As Loren said, the typography isn't that inviting. The sub-heading and the main text seem to have the same font. The main text font is slightly larger than usual, and looks too squeezed up vertically. This might be due to the large font size.

Again, agreeing with Daniel, the page isn't scanner friendly. I personally won't read that much just to know what you're offering, let alone deciding whether its right for me. Use sub-headlines cleverly. They should hook the visitor into reading what you have to say. And the bullets could be better spaced.

Apart from that, congrats on getting 1.7% conversion rate. Yes, it can be improved. But you at least have something to begin with.

Regards,
Revolves.