

Be careful what you ask for. How 2 words dropped CTR 36% - justinchen
http://blog.appsumo.com/be-careful-what-you-ask-for-how-2-words-dropped-ctr-36/

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flyosity
At the end the author makes the conclusion that this "sexy change" was sub-
optimal but the problem was a copywriting issue. A large red button that says
Buy It? How could anyone not guess that wouldn't get clicked much. People
don't want to immediately buy something without reading about it first,
especially when coming from an email.

Also: why a huge red button instead of green or any other color? Red has many
negative connotations (and is also used to signify the end of a process) so it
was probably the worst possible color choice. I bet if it said See It and was
green or blue the CTR would've eclipsed the unstyled email very easily.

The problem wasn't going from an unsexy email to a sexy one, it was the
boneheaded copywriting errors and color choices. He should find a new
designer.

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kadavy
> _why a huge red button instead of green or any other color?_

Red has been known to outperform green:
<http://blog.performable.com/631526233/>

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hellweaver666
That's true... but generally what it comes down to is how much the button
stands out from the background rather than the colour itself.

On a green site, green buttons will get lost, but red buttons will stand out
from their surroundings. It's all about contrast.

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antidaily
_In our recent emails we changed the wording to “See it.”_

What wording? Buy Now? It's not clear.

~~~
pinko
Yeah, it took me a while to figure out what he was saying too. He changed the
"Buy Now" button to "See it" so people would be more likely to explore before
making the decision to buy.

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sebg
I would have liked to see more data. Step 1 - change text email to graphics
every thing else stays the same. Step 2 - Change the wording. Step 3 - Leave
step 2 wording and go back to ext email.

This way you can compare like for like and figure out what is actually causing
the increase/decrease for the CTR.

As it stands, the article didn't include enough data to see if their changes
actually fixed the situation.

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noahkagan
Sebg

True. The overall CTR dropped. The main difference b/n the two emails was
having that button. Stats showed a low # of clicks to that button vs. other
links.

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sebg
Thanks for the reply. I agree with shanonm on this one in that while it looks
like the "main" difference between the two emails was having the button there
were actually a ton of changes made. Because the one thing that can easily be
measured is how many times the button is clicked, that is the first place to
start.

That said, it also looked like that was the only way to see if the changes
worked. So the button itself could have made your percentage change down, but
the rest of the ad make it change dramatically up, so overall the effect is
up. But, if the lesson you learned was button = less CTR and didn't test the
rest of the changes, it might hurt you in the long run.

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athst
Yeah the best thing to do would be to 50/50 test the email to measure the true
impact. But I think the conclusion that "See it" is better than "Buy Now" is
certainly reasonable.

The first thing I thought when I saw the two images was about mobile - it
seems like the first version was a lot more friendly for mobile devices than
the second design. Since more and more people are clicking through promotional
emails like this on their mobile devices, that could also play a role in CTR.

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aihunter
Interesting. Did the clicks convert differently?

I think the sweetspot is a well designed email/site that is consistent with
your brand AND converts well. This wasn't a fair fight between the two
designs!

~~~
noahkagan
The clicks did convert as once we changed the button to "see it" that email
outperformed the previous one.

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rorrr
> _I asked a design buddy to sexify it_

Here's your problem. Instead of doing proper A/B testing, you asked some
clueless designer to "sexify it". Instead of thinking, he/she made it look
like a typical spam email.

Also, most modern email clients block images by default. So your email
probably looks like crap to most recipients.

~~~
thecombjelly
> Instead of doing proper A/B testing

I disagree. It is not easy, if not impossible, to go from ugly to beautiful,
with A/B tests. A/B tests can make judgments on things, but they aren't going
to make it much more beautiful. Making it more beautiful, and doing A/B tests,
seems like the best approach.

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rorrr
Who gives a fuck if your email is beautiful?

The goal is to make money, not to be pretty.

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thecombjelly
But many times, making something look better gives people a better
understanding and more confidence, therefore you get more money.

~~~
rorrr
And many times it makes it less readable.

Beautiful and efficient are orthogonal terms. They are pretty much
independent.

