
Tear apart my consulting page - gk1
Marketing sucks. It&#x27;s ambiguous, it lags, its results are questionable, it suffers from too much bullshit, and it&#x27;s full of quasi-professionals.<p>I created a single-page site[0] to promote my consulting biz, and tried to cut through all the nonsense. But I want you to rip it apart so I can improve it.<p>[0] http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.gkogan.co<p>What&#x27;s your first impression? Would you recommend me to a friend? Does it wreak of BS? Is the value proposition clear, or confusing? What questions come to mind? Let me know!
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raquo
Looks good in general, here are some potential improvements:

* You can safely drop "I'm a conversion optimization consultant." The sentence that follows is more powerful and easier to understand.

* "How I can help." – titles should not end in periods. This one as well as "Happy clients." can optionally end with a colon. There are a couple places in the text where punctuation is also incorrect, you should re-check it against English rules.

* "Conversion Optimization" should be to the left of "Funnel Tracking & Analysis" because it's simpler, IMHO.

* The bullets under "Funnel Tracking & Analysis" don't really say much about how it brings money, just what it is.

* On Chrome in OS X with standard settings, "Funnel Tracking & Analysis" is split into two lines. Layout looks a bit broken because of that.

* "How can I help?" assumes that the client knows the answer to that question. Don't intimidate them, either drop or rephrase this.

* Why no email? You can add it using javascript, and the vast majority of spam bots won't see it (google how to do that properly).

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gk1
Awesome, thank you for taking the time to write that, Nikita! All things going
on to-do list.

About the "Funnel Tracking & Analysis" title... I'd love to simplify that to
just "Funnel Analysis." Would that lose too much meaning?

~~~
raquo
You welcome! I think "Funnel Analysis" is better. Tracking is kinda implied in
the whole conversion / funnel optimization thing, and presumably the value is
in analysis & optimization, not tracking per se, so that's what should be in
the title.

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rufusjones
My first impression was {CRINGE}, to be blunt.

You seem talented-- and you asked people to tear you apart-- so let's see if
you mean it. Let me give you about $1,000 in free work.

1\. The first thing you need to understand is what you're up against. No one
has ever explained the obstacles a consulting company is up against better
than the first 52 words in McGraw-Hill's "Man in the chair" ad.

This 1958 ad has repeatedly won in "Best business ad ever" votes. It's here:
[http://bit.ly/165CAuy](http://bit.ly/165CAuy)

Print that out and put it where you can see it.

2\. I had to break out the machete to cut through the jargon. Other than
"Bottom line: You'll get more customers and lower your cost per acquisition."
this takes work to read. The man in the chair won't read it.

Make it simpler. You're assuming customers know what a funnel is? On what
basis?

3\. I can't click on anything relating to and see who you are? An "About" Page
(or section would be nice, but I need a LinkedIn page at minimum.

4\. Same goes for the two people giving you references. I want to click on the
photos and go to the LinkedIn pages so I can see who they are.

And I absolutely have to be able to view the but the company website-- not
just to see if THEY'RE any good, but to see if YOU are. Your work is there,
right? I can see it and be overwhelmed by the quality of your work, can't I?

5\. You put the link to your Twitter page and blog (where prospects can read
your insights for free) at the BOTTOM of the page? Seriously?

6\. I hate Flash, but even Jakob Nielsen has colors other than black and
white. A logo would be nice, too.

7\. I don't need to have your address and cell number, but can I know what
country you're in? A state and city would be even better.

8\. People argue about this, but since I have 11 of my 12 points from this,
I'll say it: If I don't have any idea of how much you cost, I'll probably
pass.

You don't have to put a rate sheet on the page, but it would be nice to know
if you charge $5, $50, 5500, $5,000 or $50,000, so I don't waste both of our
times.

~~~
gk1
Amazing. This is why I asked to be torn up! Thanks for doing that -- lots of
useful points there.

Most of those are quick fixes (adding rates, adding location, etc), but
obviously I have some work to do on the language (your #2). I'm trying to
balance between being specific about what I do and writing in very simple
language. I'll keep looking for that golden middle ground.

~~~
rufusjones
Thanks for the kind words.

Language is relative-- it depends on who you want to sell to. For marketing
professionals, you use one set of words. For CEOs, you use another. For
engineers who think marketing and selling is a lot less important than
technology, you use yet another.

The choices you make to appeal to each group will turn off the others to some
degree, so it gets back to "Who, in your opinion, is that man in the chair?"

Because you say "Startup" at the top, it suggests you're looking for companies
with less than 10 people, pretty much all of whom code, who have decided that
they need to make money selling but aren't ready to hire fulltime marketing
people.

I could drill down quite a lot more on the issues, but I charge for stuff like
that. Three other things could be quick fixes but could go a lot deeper:

1\. The color(s) you add to a site determine the emotional reaction people
have to you.

2\. People will look at your references and assume that, if THEIR company
isn't in more or less comparable to those two, they don't need you yet. Who
references are can be just as important as what they say.

3\. Rates are less important that "How long does this take?" If I know a
project takes 8-16 hours, I don't have to know your bill rate to say "I can
probably afford Greg." If you say it takes 13 weeks, that's something else.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
Fantastic. Ignore what I said, think more about rufusjones advice. The idea of
using time as a proxy for cost is brilliant and the idea of using references
not for what they say but who they are is also stonking.

btw - I cannot track down a Rufus jones online who seems to be doing what you
do - have you a online home?

~~~
porker
> btw - I cannot track down a Rufus jones online who seems to be doing what
> you do - have you a online home?

I second that - giving advice like you've done, you're doing yourself out of
work by not posting contact details.

Figuring out who the 'man in the chair' is is the hardest thing I've ever had
to do for my consulting business. Still trying.

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ohsnap
I am reading this from the perspective of an early stage startup: Biggest need
for a start up is (typically) proving their business model and understanding
how far it can go in terms of market size. Speak to that directly. Explain how
you can much more quickly validate or invalidate their current approach.

Am not so interested in optimization than having someone that understands my
business and can push us to get the right message to the right customer. You
recommendation from Steve expresses that well, I'd suggest to emphasize that
more in your copy.

~~~
gk1
Thanks for that! I wonder whether start-ups in your position are more hesitant
to pay for consulting, since they're still (relatively) new.

Would you hire a consultant at the stage you're in to help you
validate/invalidate your approach? Not trying to pitch you, just want to get
your point of view.

~~~
ohsnap
Sure, startups will pay for consulting. Most valuable thing at a startup is
time. If you can convince a company that you can validate their current
approach faster than they can by themselves it's a great value proposition.

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lifeisstillgood
Fewer fields in the contact form - I mean why have a textbox? I am contacting
you about conversion optimisation surely? Just grab my email or even better
have a mailto: so I can say hi

remove full stops from h2

add full stops to li (personal annoyances)

What if my startup has no funnel? What if I have no traffic to optimise? these
seem lie bigger issues for l

~~~
gk1
Thank you, Paul!

The headline fullstops are really catching a lot of flak. ;) They're gone now.

> What if my startup has no funnel?

Do you mean if the conversion process does not have a funnel, or if they're
just not tracking it yet?

> What if I have no traffic to optimise?

Good question. As I see it, going from 0 traffic to 1,000 is a whole different
beast than going from 1,000 to 10,000. The former often requires not just
optimization but marketing from the ground up, branding, product development,
and so on... All of which can easily turn into a full-time job for one or more
people.

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codezero
Looks good to me. The only thing I'd add or change is probably not even huge,
but rather than testimonials some concrete and brief case studies with the
kinds of numbers that your work affected would be more compelling.

~~~
gk1
That's a good suggestion. Going straight to the to-do list.

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chatmasta

      > Marketing sucks.

So why are you going into the business of it?

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gk1
I meant that the _process_ of marketing _usually_ sucks. I want to make it
easier for people, and that's why I'm offering marketing consulting.

