You need to pay more respect.
Respect towards the place/platform.
On LinkedIn
1-2 liners work tremendously. People write motivational ideas and arrange the “paragraphs” in a very aired manner.
“I’ve been there. And have done that.
And I’ve learned this.
You can do this too.
No one can stop you.” — how a LinkedIn post can look like
This is the culture of the place.
On Twitter
A 280 character limit. Yes, people make threads/chains but you, as a reader, find it easier to stop reading at anytime (if it didn’t catch your interest), given its segmentation.
The opposite case is an article, which has paragraphs with more than 10 lines — you need to commit to more if you start it. 1 line though? Sure, easier to drop it.
In a sea of 280-words-max posts, we’re attracted (i.e. our eyes go first here) by those that may look like this:
“Age when they founded these companies:
Bill Gates, Microsoft: 19
Daniel Ek, Spotify: 23
Jeff Bezos, Amazon: 30
Oprah Winfrey, Harpo: 32
Reed Hastings, Netflix: 36
Doris Fisher, The Gap: 38
Sam Walton, Walmart: 44
Gordon Bowker, Starbucks: 51
Charles Flint, IBM: 61″
OR
“? 2004– idea
1️⃣ 2005– 1st try, failed
? 2006– married
2️⃣ 2007– 2nd try, failed
3️⃣ 2008– 3rd try, failed
? 2009– kid #1
??? 2010– day job
? 2011– kid #2
4️⃣ 2012– 4th try, YC says no
? 2013– YC says yes, funded
? 2014– hard work begins”
This is the culture of the place.
Listicles
Listicles are working. Buzzfeed was built on top of it and people generally look at listicles — you may not, but if you’re tired and don’t want a lot of brain usage, you might go for one as well.
This is the culture of the place.
The idea?
There’s a common thread amongst the examples I gave. We, as humans, like two things:
1) Easy-to-digest content
2) Step-by-steps
Why? They only need low commitment. A low level of investment from our side. As a consequence, they’re easy to disengage at any moment.
You need to pay respect to the place. And your homepage is a place as well. Too much text and it will mean too much commitment needed, which is not what’s expected in this case. In the case of a homepage, people are quickly assessing whether you’re worthy of their time or not.
Why? Because they know they’re sold to. Subconsciously, at least. So the “place” in the case of a homepage has to be low-commitment.
I know, you’re predisposed to want to tell everything about your SaaS. But do this and you’ll benefit tremendously:
Present your home page the same way you would present to a five year old.
I’ll get the idea (if it’s for me).
P.S: It’s not about “explain to me like a 5 year old” all the time. I’ll cover over the next days ways in which you can look at the homepage of a website!
About Ch Daniel
I run Chagency_, an experiences design agency — we help SaaS CEOs reduce user churn. I write daily on this topic and in similar areas. Here are my best pieces.
If I’ve helped you, follow me here and reach out: LinkedIn | Twitter | Email | Quora | YouTube
I’ve also founded an app (among others) that has got 6 digits in # of users — chdaniel.com/app
If you want a more of a personal connection, here’s how to have that.
Illustration credits: Hylton Warburton
