5 ms·

Two front page Hacker News posts and why one converted 20x higher

49 points by ifficiency 14y ago

ryanio 14y ago
TL;DR: One article converted because they were talking about and pitching their service throughout the whole piece (4 calls to action), while the other was about their experience of hiring family members with no real discussion or pitches about their business (0 calls to action). Duh?
- rpq1480 14y ago
  Yes, totally obvious. Would have been more interesting if any of those results hadn't been completely expected.
  - aresant 14y ago
    Take a look at how many articles on the frontpage today today don't follow those principles. For instance the current #1 post - "Living in a van" - has one mention of Priceonomics in the article, no explanation of the service, and no call to action within the story content. Not saying that this isn't obvious, just saying that despite it being obvious people don't necessarily employ those strategies and are tossing out a huge number of potential new users as a result.
    - rhizome 14y ago
      Users...eh. Signups are not revenue. [cue 'signups can too be revenue!' HN submission]
  - btilly 14y ago
    The fact that something is totally obvious is never a reason to not try to go back to the well with some more obvious blogspam. After enough successful trips they may figure out what their optimal tradeoff is between spaminess and not winding up on the front page.
austenallred 14y ago
There's a principle at work that true marketers use to their advantage. It's quite simple, and is avoided all too often, especially by detail-oriented people who operate a little bit differently than non-detail-oriented people. I assume that HackerNews has a lot of engineers who are by nature detail oriented, and therefore this principle is ignored far too often. The post that converted at the better rate had a link MeetingBurner in the first paragraph (above the fold, as we like to jargon-ize it). People don't really read things online, they scan. some things jump out, and only if you're very intrigued will you actually read the individual words. In fact, very few of you will even get to this line that I'm writing. The chances that you'll read each line decreases exponentially. Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue.
- jbigelow76 14y ago
  I don't disagree with what you state but another important difference between the two is that the "boring biz" version mentioned Noah Kagan of Appsumo (semi)fame. Everybody on HN knows who Kagan is, Appsumo has been discussed in more than a few HN submissions over time. In addition Kagan was just in the HN frontpage and tech blogosphere about how he got canned from FB and lost out on $100 million. I think the "boring biz" article, by mentioning him in the first line, piggy-backed off his fame and credibility within the tech/startup community. In other words somebody did some name dropping (not that there's anything wrong with that). Readers probably thought: "hmm, if Noah Kagan paid this thing some attention, maybe I should too."
- kiba 14y ago
  Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue. I read every single sentence. Everybody else scans.
- ryanbraganza 14y ago
  > People don't really read things online, they scan. some things jump out, and only if you're very intrigued will you actually read the individual words. In fact, very few of you will even get to this line that I'm writing. The chances that you'll read each line decreases exponentially. I only read that first sentence of that paragraph. > Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue. Then I read this and went back through it.
sawyer 14y ago
I can't click on any links in the top 155px pixels of the window because of the cloud header (even when scrolled down, it remains fixed at a higher z-index). OSX, Firefox 15.0.1
benologist 14y ago
Great advice for other startups trying to exploit HN for traffic!
- Camillo 14y ago
  Indeed. Why would conversions even be the point? Yet most other commenters are not even raising an eyebrow at this. Is this still supposed to be a news site, or is it now understood that we're browsing advertisements?
CWIZO 14y ago
While this is some solid advice, the methodology used is rather err stupid. It's like comparing how fast somebody will find a treasure, and then in case A put the treasure in the middle of times square, and in case B put it somewhere in the sewers.
mladenkovacevic 14y ago
Allow me to flip your methodology upside down. So one article converted well because you actually had hyper-linked calls to action and the article was half the length. Well duh.. you didn't need to run an A/B test to crack that nut. So 700 leads compared to 30 - seems like a pretty definitive victory for the first article, right? Not necessarily. Consider the quality of these leads. In one scenario, signing up was served up on a silver platter and as soon as the word "free" was baited, a lot of freeloaders probably bit the hook. Yes, they might enjoy your service and some might even convert to a paid customer when they can afford it... or maybe not. How many of them even need your service? How many just wanted to scope out what the author was actually selling because they are at the budding stages of some get-rich-quick scheme (a likely scenario considering the entrepreneurial, "how-to" content of the article). I think your second article is much more brilliant, and barring the absolute absence of clickable links to your actual product, would actually produce much more qualified leads for you. I like that it talks about working with family, subtly suggesting the respect with which you treat your customers as well. This lends genuine credibility to your business and excites happy/warm feelings in me about working with you and giving you money for your services. The 30 leads that put in the effort to seek your product out after reading all that are far more likely to convert to a paid customer later on than the gang of what could very well be 700 hormonal over-caffeinated teenagers with big business dreams but no cash (gross hyperbole but you get my point). So in conclusion I think yes, calls to action and clear succinct messaging is important - no secret there. But the content is even more important for the long term results. The story you tell should be crafted with the customer in mind that'll ultimately pony up the cash for quality service. I think you should've run with the family narrative, but included a few calls to action.
sethbannon 14y ago
HN is getting more and more meta.
- cryowaffle 14y ago
  HN Comments are getting more and more and more meta.
guelo 14y ago
More interesting is how this guy keeps getting on the front page. I do wonder what his conversions will be on this more meta article.
Ecio78 14y ago
Wouldnt it be possible that the great difference is due to the fact that the first article was published in july and most of the HN people interested in the service already signed up that time?
ScottWhigham 14y ago
This is such a poor choice for an article. It's not even like an A/B test - not even remotely - yet the author portrays it as such. This is really more like "Here's how an article converted that I posted in July on subject 'A' and title 'A' with no call to actions, and here's another article that I posted almost four months later about subject 'B' with title 'B' that had call to actions in it." There's just no meat here - were they both posted on the same day of the week? Were they both posted on/about the same time? Were "world events" about the same when you posted each (or was one overshadowed by a major event that people were focusing on)? I could go on and on... Anyone who draws conclusions from this article is walking a fine line. It leaves you with more questions than answers (and they are "big" questions that invalidate the article's whole point). I see it as just asinine link bait junk and I'm disappointed to see it get so many upvotes.

49 points by ifficiency 14y ago

TL;DR: One article converted because they were talking about and pitching their service throughout the whole piece (4 calls to action), while the other was about their experience of hiring family members with no real discussion or pitches about their business (0 calls to action). Duh?

rpq1480 14y ago
Yes, totally obvious. Would have been more interesting if any of those results hadn't been completely expected.
- aresant 14y ago
  Take a look at how many articles on the frontpage today today don't follow those principles. For instance the current #1 post - "Living in a van" - has one mention of Priceonomics in the article, no explanation of the service, and no call to action within the story content. Not saying that this isn't obvious, just saying that despite it being obvious people don't necessarily employ those strategies and are tossing out a huge number of potential new users as a result.
  - rhizome 14y ago
    Users...eh. Signups are not revenue. [cue 'signups can too be revenue!' HN submission]
- btilly 14y ago
  The fact that something is totally obvious is never a reason to not try to go back to the well with some more obvious blogspam. After enough successful trips they may figure out what their optimal tradeoff is between spaminess and not winding up on the front page.

austenallred 14y ago

There's a principle at work that true marketers use to their advantage. It's quite simple, and is avoided all too often, especially by detail-oriented people who operate a little bit differently than non-detail-oriented people. I assume that HackerNews has a lot of engineers who are by nature detail oriented, and therefore this principle is ignored far too often. The post that converted at the better rate had a link MeetingBurner in the first paragraph (above the fold, as we like to jargon-ize it). People don't really read things online, they scan. some things jump out, and only if you're very intrigued will you actually read the individual words. In fact, very few of you will even get to this line that I'm writing. The chances that you'll read each line decreases exponentially. Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue.

jbigelow76 14y ago
I don't disagree with what you state but another important difference between the two is that the "boring biz" version mentioned Noah Kagan of Appsumo (semi)fame. Everybody on HN knows who Kagan is, Appsumo has been discussed in more than a few HN submissions over time. In addition Kagan was just in the HN frontpage and tech blogosphere about how he got canned from FB and lost out on $100 million. I think the "boring biz" article, by mentioning him in the first line, piggy-backed off his fame and credibility within the tech/startup community. In other words somebody did some name dropping (not that there's anything wrong with that). Readers probably thought: "hmm, if Noah Kagan paid this thing some attention, maybe I should too."
kiba 14y ago
Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue. I read every single sentence. Everybody else scans.
ryanbraganza 14y ago
> People don't really read things online, they scan. some things jump out, and only if you're very intrigued will you actually read the individual words. In fact, very few of you will even get to this line that I'm writing. The chances that you'll read each line decreases exponentially. I only read that first sentence of that paragraph. > Note that I've made all of my main points in the first sentences of what I've written. Did you even read everything, or did you just scan through and pick up on a few words? The attention paid to each line decreases exponentially as you continue. Then I read this and went back through it.

sawyer 14y ago

I can't click on any links in the top 155px pixels of the window because of the cloud header (even when scrolled down, it remains fixed at a higher z-index). OSX, Firefox 15.0.1

benologist 14y ago

Great advice for other startups trying to exploit HN for traffic!

Camillo 14y ago
Indeed. Why would conversions even be the point? Yet most other commenters are not even raising an eyebrow at this. Is this still supposed to be a news site, or is it now understood that we're browsing advertisements?

CWIZO 14y ago

While this is some solid advice, the methodology used is rather err stupid. It's like comparing how fast somebody will find a treasure, and then in case A put the treasure in the middle of times square, and in case B put it somewhere in the sewers.

mladenkovacevic 14y ago

Allow me to flip your methodology upside down. So one article converted well because you actually had hyper-linked calls to action and the article was half the length. Well duh.. you didn't need to run an A/B test to crack that nut. So 700 leads compared to 30 - seems like a pretty definitive victory for the first article, right? Not necessarily. Consider the quality of these leads. In one scenario, signing up was served up on a silver platter and as soon as the word "free" was baited, a lot of freeloaders probably bit the hook. Yes, they might enjoy your service and some might even convert to a paid customer when they can afford it... or maybe not. How many of them even need your service? How many just wanted to scope out what the author was actually selling because they are at the budding stages of some get-rich-quick scheme (a likely scenario considering the entrepreneurial, "how-to" content of the article). I think your second article is much more brilliant, and barring the absolute absence of clickable links to your actual product, would actually produce much more qualified leads for you. I like that it talks about working with family, subtly suggesting the respect with which you treat your customers as well. This lends genuine credibility to your business and excites happy/warm feelings in me about working with you and giving you money for your services. The 30 leads that put in the effort to seek your product out after reading all that are far more likely to convert to a paid customer later on than the gang of what could very well be 700 hormonal over-caffeinated teenagers with big business dreams but no cash (gross hyperbole but you get my point). So in conclusion I think yes, calls to action and clear succinct messaging is important - no secret there. But the content is even more important for the long term results. The story you tell should be crafted with the customer in mind that'll ultimately pony up the cash for quality service. I think you should've run with the family narrative, but included a few calls to action.

sethbannon 14y ago

HN is getting more and more meta.

cryowaffle 14y ago
HN Comments are getting more and more and more meta.

guelo 14y ago

More interesting is how this guy keeps getting on the front page. I do wonder what his conversions will be on this more meta article.

Ecio78 14y ago

Wouldnt it be possible that the great difference is due to the fact that the first article was published in july and most of the HN people interested in the service already signed up that time?

ScottWhigham 14y ago

This is such a poor choice for an article. It's not even like an A/B test - not even remotely - yet the author portrays it as such. This is really more like "Here's how an article converted that I posted in July on subject 'A' and title 'A' with no call to actions, and here's another article that I posted almost four months later about subject 'B' with title 'B' that had call to actions in it." There's just no meat here - were they both posted on the same day of the week? Were they both posted on/about the same time? Were "world events" about the same when you posted each (or was one overshadowed by a major event that people were focusing on)? I could go on and on... Anyone who draws conclusions from this article is walking a fine line. It leaves you with more questions than answers (and they are "big" questions that invalidate the article's whole point). I see it as just asinine link bait junk and I'm disappointed to see it get so many upvotes.