Whether you are talking about the submit page of your site where potential new subscribers can enter their email address and desired user name, or the processing page of your site where credit card information is requested and billing information is required — the join page conversion content is by the most important aspect of your entire site architecture. Every other part of your tour, in one way or another, is created to lead visitors to your join page and the difference between profitability or failure often comes down to little more than being able to convert visitors into customers at the point of sale. Like a first date with fans, any chance of your site scoring is completely dependent on the outcome of their initial interactions with your join pages.
Join-page content differs widely from one site to the next and what works on another site may or may not work on your site, which is why successful site owners are fanatical about testing, tweaking and retesting many variations of their join page until they find the specific style and strategy that works best —often resorting to multiple join page versions that are each dynamically served to the specific customers they are intended to convert on a geographic or demographic basis.
Adding Exit Chat, WebsiteSecure.org and other ways of demonstrating to customers that our online properties are trustworthy ethical adult video sites interested in providing value to our customers has proven to be very helpful to our ratios and our profit margins. —Mark of Blazing Bucks
“We have done a tremendous amount of AB testing with a number of different strategies for our join page design and content. After all, the join page is the single most important page on any website,” said Clement of VideosZ.com. “What we have found is that there is no substitute for a simple, clear and easy to understand join page. The simpler and more obvious the pricing is, the better. Language translation, currency conversion, geo-targeted pricing and a very simple structure provide much better conversion ratios, lower chargeback ratios and greater member retention because the potential customer understands exactly what they get, what it will cost and why it is worth their investment. In the modern age, customers are not new to the internet and they don’t like being fooled with - so give them exactly what you promise and make it obvious you are providing real value as part of the sales pitch in as simple a way as possible.”
Another site owner, who asked not to be identified, said that he noticed an immediate ratio improvement following a join page test that eliminated cents from all pricing. “First we had a page where it was $24.99 and $2.99 for trials, then we simplified that down to $25 and $3. We noticed the ratios improved even though the price went up a penny. Then we went with $25 and $3, removing the cents columns completely and saw another small improvement. That’s why I always test and rarely follow what people ‘think’ will happen when they don’t have the actual data to back up their flawed beliefs.”
Another interesting point of view came from webmasters with experience managing several different leading brands online in various niches. “The basics of join page structure should be pretty simple for anyone with a commercial website, however the most common mistake we find when consulting with new clients is the misguided attempt to maximize conversion ratios rather than maximizing the return on investment,” said Erwin de Boer of Manica Media. “Your join page should always put the focus on the buying options that have the highest return, not on the cheapest package available. The goal is to get the biggest return of revenue from your customers, not only the highest conversion ratios. Thousands of customers at $2 per month each have significant overhead costs, hundreds of customers at $30 each will provide more revenue and a much lower management expense. By testing your page, modifying your price points and tweaking the page content you should be able to skew your results toward higher value purchases without negatively impacting your signup ratios to any significant extent.”
Making the more profitable option the most likely choice is a delicate mixture of human psychology, artistic visual cues and subtle interface design along with targeted text that focuses the attention of the viewer where the site owner wants it most.
“Join pages should be the strongest and most specific sales pitch on a site,” said Jim of Payserve.com “Once the tour content has enticed the customer to the Join page, it’s time for your last and best chance to close the deal. A simplified bullet-point list reminding them of the extras that you include, the single best visual samples to show off your signature style —and be sure to keep everything above the fold. However, avoid clutter and keep the page lightweight so it can load instantaneously. Milliseconds make a huge difference when it comes to impulse purchase decisions, so it is imperative that your join page be the fastest loading part of your site.”
Load times were something discussed often by experienced webmasters when asked about proper Join page content creation. “At Homegrown we have done split testing on every variation of every join page we have created,” said spike of HomegrownVideo.com. “What works on one site, or in one niche, may be very different — so testing and retesting is essential to join page success. One thing that is universally true is that your load times should be as fast as possible. no matter the niche, the product or anything else —a slow load time is catastrophic for any site join page.”
Astute join page creators who check out the content used by competitors may notice that many of the fastest loading pages reuse images and lightweight design elements already found on other pages of the site. Having that data already cached in the visitor’s browser reduces their load times and allows the join page experience to be a confident free-flowing sales pitch made without hesitation. Just as even the slightest stutter from a salesman trying to sell you something can ring hollow and lose your interest, join pages that stagger as they load or feel inactive for even a brief moment at the point of sale can have a greatly reduce your revenue. Likewise, having join page content perfectly optimized for one browser, or hosting that is exceptionally quick in only one region of the world amounts to many dollars being left on the table when compared to a universally tested cloud hosted join page of your competitor.
“Blazing Bucks has benefited a great deal from consulting with leading industry players and testing marketing tools designed specifically for point of sale usage,” said Mark of BlazingBucks.com. “Adding Exit chat, Websitesecure.org and other ways of demonstrating to customers that our online properties are trustworthy ethical adult video sites interested in providing value to our customers has proven to be very helpful to our ratios and our profit margins. We are always researching new ways to fine tune our join pages, and one thing i would mention is that maintaining leak-free designs is vitally important for anyone cashing in on affiliate marketing efforts. Our sites track every penny and always pay out accordingly for affiliates that send traffic to BlazingBucks sites.”
While no one would dispute that the number of affiliates available, or that the percentage of worthwhile affiliates available, has rapidly dwindled in recent years compared to the peak of adult affiliate marketing — the affiliates who do remain in the industry are the ones who actually inspect their sponsors thoroughly and diligently provide traffic capable of converting. Attracting competent affiliates is a lot easier to do with a well-designed join page that they know will bring them revenue than it is with free drinks at a trade show and a slow-loading cluttered mess of a join page that will waste as many uniques as it converts.
The key to a successful join page is building one that suits the specific desires of your site visitors, reliably providing them with everything they need to signup up in as seamless a manner as possible, while overcoming the specific challenges faced by your own content niche. For example, dating sites have long been known for free-signup transparent tours that show visitors many profiles of potential suitors and essentially turn the entire site tour into one lengthy multipage Join form. However. the past transgressions of some sites using fake profiles has made ethical companies take note and adjust their Join content accordingly.
“Dating sites present unique challenges for site owners because of the rampant problem of other sites misusing fake content profiles on sites in the dating niche” said Mo from Datingfactory.us. “In our case free joins essentially turn our entire tour into one massive transparent join page. We only use real profiles of real people, that’s the key, because nowadays users can quickly tell who is real and who is fake. A good gEo localization also is very important, as we can pinpoint the locations to give another element of reality. The sign up process itself should be very short and immediate, but everything else is always dependent on providing real value for customers considering signing up. Without value, content and design really don’t end up meaning much to the modern consumer.”
Put simply, your join page is like taking your potential customer on a first date. If you fail to quickly demonstrate value or show that you are responsive to their needs, that becomes the end to your relationship. Longwinded meandering stories won’t hold their attention and complicated details about yourself won’t garner any affection.
Having that first date analogy in mind should lead you to build faster, more concise and clearly explained join page content capable of converting visitors into members while maximizing the value of each signup your site scores.
