I've totally redesigned my sales page.

www.TheMagicBullet.com

Anyone care to comment on:

Looks
Sales Logic
Professionalism
Motivation to Act

Thanks a bunch!

-Keith Price
Developer of The Magic Bullet Software
Your Sales Copy Ammunition

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www.TheMagicBullet.com/tips/sigb.asp[/url]

Keith,

I didn't read absolutely every word of your copy (I never do - these letters are always too long for me to cope with).

What I would say is that my initial reaction was: "Yawn. Another panacea to all my marketing problems - yeah, right!"

I scrolled a bit further and found the flash demo. Then I got a bit more interested. However, it is littered with typos and spelling misakes, most notably "beanstocks" instead of "beanstalks". I also thought you should have presented the demo a lot earlier.

A better way to sell the software is to offer a 30 day free trial. As a potential client, I would definitely go for that option, because I think this software could help me write copy for my website and for my clients.

I tried to buy the software, but having advertised it at $147, when I went through to the order page it told me it would be $204 - $197 + $7 shipping. Not only that, but none of the images on the order page downloaded. This does not inspire confidence. Over and above this, your guarantee states that you will send a cheque to buy the software back. If I'm not happy with the software, I definitely don't want a cheque (because I'd pay on credit card and I don't have a USD bank account), and I don't want to have to send physical product back, for what is essentially a collection of digital products.

What I want is a guarantee to refund my purchase via my credit card, and I don't want you to force me to post CDs back to the US (when I didn't need them in the first place). Marlon Sanders does that with one of his products and it's just some weird way of making you feel less like returning the product.

These flaws of the ordering and refund process must be killing sales. Well, you've just lost my sale, and that's the only data I have.

I'm still interested in the software, but I don't want CDs - I want a download and I don't want any bonuses. Can you make me an offer (still backed by guarantee of a refund if I'm not happy?)

Please email me at jane.hendry@virgin.net

Jane,

Excellent comments. Thank you very much. I'll go back and recheck all my spellings. I sure thought I had found them all. Also, very sorry about the order page. I'll look into that, too.

I'll have to think about the guarantee. I'm not sure how my 3rd Party credit card processor handles refunds.

I"m still working on making a trial version practical. I agree its a good approach. My Tour is very thorough, however, and I THINK people can get a good feel for it through that (for now, until the trial is available).

And, you're right about asking for the CD back. It IS designed to discourage refund requests -- mostly to discourage people from buying it with the intent of asking for the refund. I'll have to think that one over. I don't want to lose sales over it. If Marlon is doing the same thing, though, it's probably been tested quite thoroughly as protecting against unfair refunds against losts sales.

Again, thank you for taking the time to review my letter and for your honest impressions and suggestions. I'll email you privately regarding your request.

I just checked on both IE 6 and NS 7. The graphics displayed properly for me in both cases. What browser were you viewing it with?

You are correct about the amount. I just began thte sale and neglected to update the order page with the new price. I'm fixing it right now. Thanks for catching it.

While you can discourage a few dishonest people from asking for undue refunds, remember that these people will never buy your product once they have seen that it will be difficult for them to return it and get a refund.

At the same time, you are losing many potential sales to genuine buyers. I, for example, will not try your product because if it did not perform to my expectations, it will be "oh so much" hassle to return it and get a refund.

I suggest you should offer a digital download (instant gratification) and a no-hassle just-ask-for-it guarantee. You will get many more extra sales and may be a few more refund requests. Your overall sales will be better by a big factor and you don't have much to lose anyway, even if you have to refund a digital delivery.

Arun,

I agree with what you've said here.

Here are my thoughts on the subject. If something is quite obviously a digital product that can be downloaded, then it doesn't make sense to bundle it with physical product UNLESS some people want that. In this case, I would create 2 options - one with physical product and one without, at different price points.

In buying your software without a trial, you're asking your prospects to take a big risk. Therefore you need to make it as easy as possible for them to ask for a refund, so that they genuinely feel there is no risk to them.

Sending a CD and then asking for that to be sent back in the event of dissatisfaction is very off-putting for overseas customers. It means that they have to go to some considerable effort to send the product back, not to mention the postage costs. Also, if they're like me, they don't want to wait for the CD to arrive in the post - they want the product NOW! Otherwise it becomes something they must ponder and think about when making the decision, which means that they'll quite likely go off and forget all about it.

So, do you see the difference in approach? Digital product, absolutely no-risk, order now, use it within 3 minutes, try it out, get a refund if it doesn't suit you VS. wait for weeks for the postman to deliver it, difficult to refund, who is this guy anyway - why should I believe him etc. etc.

But by far and away, the best way to sell software is to allow people to download it and try it for free for 30 days. This way, if they truly will benefit from it, then they will have become addicted to it at the end of the trial, they will wonder how they ever managed without it, and will gladly pay the price. In this scenario you are not at risk from bogus refunds because you don't guarantee the software or any refunds beyond the 30 day trial.

However, I understand that there may be some complexities of programming with this approach - so you have to weigh up whether it's cheaper to make some bogus refunds or pay the additional programming fee and not deal with refunds at all.

Hope this helps,
Jane

In this case, it's a combination. You get an immediate download AND the 3 CDs arrive in the mail. You get the best of both worlds. I'll have to look at the sales letter and make sure this is more obvioius.

Even though your main product works only under Windows 98 or newer, I thought I would pass on a couple of quick comments from the Macintosh side of the house:

1. The home page takes more than 20 seconds to load, even with my DSL connection. I have experienced this frequently with .asp pages; it is my unscientific opinion that Active Server Pages are just inherently slow to serve. (This is with IE 5 for the Mac.)

2. Throughout this time I am staring at (a) the very top testimonial, and (b) a blank outlined box where your animated bullet thingie appears.

The first time I tried this page, the rendering stalled, and I never got beyond the blank box stage. On subsequent tries, the animation eventually loads, but then it is another good 10 seconds -- now we're at 30 seconds total -- before the bullet fires itself.

I'm not sure what the visitor's experience is supposed to be, but this seems to come dangerously close to "back button" time if others have the same experience. If it's just a Mac thing, then disregard. But it would be interesting to know whether a straight, static HTML page would load significantly faster.

3. This is truly a Mac issue: Font size = 2 (used in your body copy) comes out very tiny on Mac screens. Useful to know if you branch into stuff for Mac people.

GLB

GLB,

Hi - I had similar issues (I'm on a PC) - I think it's whilst the flash animation loads. I'm also on ADSL, so I don't think it's a Mac problem.

Keith,

I don't understand why digital products need to be delivered by CD when they can be downloaded. What is the benefit to your prospect of the CD version?

If it is a choice - i.e. some people prefer to get a CD and some prefer to just have the download, then why not give these options instead of forcing the download-only community to pay extra for physical product?

There are 2 reasons.

First, it's a massive product when you include all the bonuses. It includes 2 hours of mp3s as the education portion of the software, plus 2 additional hours on standard audio CDs. It also includes several electronic books and reports and software.

Second, perceived value. Electronic only products are generally perceived as being less valuable than physical products (present company excluded).