

Show HN: Recover abandoning visitors with exit offers - jessecred
http://www.picreel.com/

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Gigablah
"Hundreds satisfied customers"

"AVALIABLE ONLY 30 MIN"

"Capture abandoners' before they leave"

Barely a minute on the page and I've already spotted these mistakes. Doesn't
really inspire confidence.

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notduncansmith
I notice a lot of negative sentiment here re: exit popups. Firstly, let me say
that I (as a user) am not a fan. I think it's necessary, however, to consider
the context.

If you have a blog, and you'd like to start converting your readers into email
subscribers, exit popups are not usually a great way to do that. They tend to
turn off a more sophisticated audience, even so far as to discredit the offer
based on their use of such "dark patterns". This is (usually) not where you
want to use an exit popup.

If you have a landing page, however, an exit popup can do good things for you.
In my experience, most landing page conversions happen on the first visit -
either you convert the visitor, or you don't. In this case, you're not very
concerned with credibility by the time a visitor expresses exit intent
(they're already leaving). It's (usually) a good idea to go ahead and go for a
lesser conversion (e.g. an email signup instead of a purchase). The worst that
can happen is the user leaves and never returns (which was probably already
the case).

Hopefully this puts things in perspective. Like I said, I really, _really_
don't like exit popups. I kinda feel like taking a shower after putting one on
a page - however, I've run several experiments on landing pages in various
verticals and (in my findings) they increase sales. It's fine to be critical
of the technique and express your dislike, but if you have any fiscal
responsibility to yourself or a client, it's your job to consider whether they
might be beneficial, regardless of your personal feelings.

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nezza-_-
Tried to click "How it works"... This happened.
[http://i.imgur.com/efvbTCs.png](http://i.imgur.com/efvbTCs.png)

No thank you.

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jmgao
Of all the dark patterns on the web, this is possibly the most bullshit and
annoying one of all. The one time I've been hit by something like this, it was
a false positive (I was switching browsers to use lastpass for paypal), and it
annoyed me enough to change my mind about buying.

~~~
ssharp
Read [http://darkpatterns.org/](http://darkpatterns.org/)

I'm not even sure if I'd call exit intent pop-ins a "dark pattern", let alone
call it the most bullshit and annoying one, considering the examples listed on
the darkpatterns.org site.

I think I'd argue the "sneak into shopping cart" one as being the worst.

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overshard
I don't wish to degrade any new start-up, it's hard to make it out there but
this one wasn't thought out or researched. People hate pop-ups. Really really
hate pop-ups. Making an entire service based on the principle of serving pop-
ups, for lack of a better word in my vocabulary, is idiotic. If you go around
any given room and ask people, "When you are browsing a website do you like
getting pop-ups? Say it's for a special offer for a whole 10% off! How about
then?" I'm pretty sure the answer is going to be no and no.

Just for me personally if I get a pop-up on a website I'm more likely to go
somewhere else, like to Amazon, where they don't give me pop-ups and already
have my account information.

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kmckenzie
What does exit intent technology do?

Does this block the user from leaving all the time or is there some pattern
recognition going on?

Why aren't picreel using the service on their website? I can't click on any of
the clients in the case studies to see what the product is actually like.

~~~
notahacker
They are using it on the site, and it doesn't block users from leaving, it
just throws up on of those overlay screens if the mouse tracking script thinks
you're about to leave. For me, it showed up when my mouse moved up to the top
of the screen and hovered over the URL bar (correct behaviour). But if it also
shows up when people are trying to click on an _internal_ link, which
apparently happened to another HN user, that's unlikely to be good for
conversions. At this sort of price there probably should be a good degree of
flexibility in customising what ads get shown when people appear to be leaving
based on the entry route, pages visited and time on site. But probably no way
of filtering out the people likely to be really irritated, or the people who
would have returned to the site and bought at full price...

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LukeB_UK
If there's one thing more annoying than a popup when you enter a site, it's a
popup when you try to leave. It's one of the things likely to make me never
return to a site.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
This a thousand times. I'll blacklist a domain for that. I'll kill by browser
if I can't close it. I'll never, ever be coerced into even reading a fucking
popup on leaving a site, as a matter of moral principle. Its like a salesman
sticking their foot in the door - I have a gun for that situation.

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bapbap
I've no doubt this methodology can be effective but it's supremely irritating.
Any company that uses methods like this immediately put me off.

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kevinweaver
I'd be interested to see how this does. I'd imagine MAYBE a 1-5% conversion
and 95-99% of your potential customers leaving very annoyed.

~~~
ssharp
The idea behind conversion optimization is to convert more of the Maybe's in
to Yes's. Alienating the No's shouldn't be too much of a concern as long as
you aren't turning your Yes's in to No's.

It's still a balancing act between improving conversions and not annoying
people, but I've never seen an appropriate, well-implemented pop-in like this
NOT increase conversions.

~~~
kevinweaver
Good point. The service doesn't seem like it would do well with established
eCommerce sites where the probability of potential customers returning at a
later date is high. This is definitely more of a last ditch effort for smaller
sites.

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didgeoridoo
So... Pop-ups as a service. No thanks.

~~~
ssharp
A lot of people on HN seem to be adverse to using these modal pop-ins. I'm
curious to find out why people here hate them so much.

In practice, they can be very effective, almost shockingly effective, at
increasing conversions. I know they can seem intrusive, but most commentary I
see on them comes from a critical perspective, where the critic has zero
intention of being a customer. I suspect the pop-ins may not be such a
horrible experience for people who actually are prospective customers.

~~~
derekp7
Imagine this scenario: I'm at a store, looking around, then realized I left my
wallet in the car. So I start to exit the store, when suddenly an employee
stops me. He may even have a special sales flyer -- but I can't get past him
unless I tap him on the shoulder so that he steps aside.

At this point, instead of going to get my wallet, I will get in the car and
find another store. It is the same type of irritation that I feel when, after
making a purchase, a store employee stops me at the door to check my receipt
and compare with the contents of the bag. I've already stood in line for 20
minutes, forked over money, and now they are holding me up for another minute?
No thanks.

~~~
BilalShaikh
I think leaving a store because you forgot your wallet is an edge case that
only an extremely small percentage of bounces would relate to. I agree pop-ups
are annoying, but I think its important to remember that HN users aren't
necessarily the customers every business out there is targeting.

