Just a week ago we’ve launched HoverSignal, a free and simple tool that helps you add social proof to your website. 

At the beginning we’ve created a massive landing page with all that recommended stuff: reviews, examples, video etc. After that, we’ve searched for some beta users by sending messages and emails to people we know, simply showing them the URL and asking what they thought about it. 

The reaction was always the same: “Looks nice, but I don’t get it. How exactly will this tool help my website?”.  After a few minutes of absorbing this feedback we asked everyone: "What’s stopping you from implementing this tool right now?" The answers were quite the same, again: “I don’t know how this will look on my website" or "will the designs match?", or "what exact message is it supposed to be sending?” 

So, we decided to start from scratch and create a virtual fitting room right on the main page. We’ve deleted everything we had on our landing page leaving a single form, showing the users of the website how exactly our product works. 

We forced our landing to be part of the onboarding process, so every visitor can watch our tool in action and understand why they should try it. 

A few days later we’ve shown our new version to the same people and the reaction was much more positive. We’ve also repeated our previous paid ads campaign and the conversion rate went from 2,7% to 4,2%. 

I’m not sure that this approach could be implemented in every industry, but if you have the ability to show your customers how your product really works – do it as soon as possible. Don’t make users read about it. Show.