Building Better Product Sites for WordPress Plugins & Themes

[00:00:00] Matt Cromwell: Hey, everybody. Today, we wanna talk about something that doesn't get talked about enough, quite honestly, and I think the best way to talk about it is kind of like the, the old analogy of, um, the shoemaker's, uh, children, you know? Uh, we're all web developers in many ways, and have, uh, carved out our businesses by knowing the web really, really well, and, uh, that often means that sometimes our, our own store, our own children don't have really good shoes.

[00:00:35] Uh, the shoemaker's kids don't have good shoes because he's so busy out there running business and things like that. Our storefronts often get dusty, crusty, and sometimes not even a very good user experience, and that can definitely negatively impact your sales. Um, but there's definitely a way to do it.

[00:00:53] There are best practices. There are ways to make sure that you have a great and high-performing website, and today, that's what we're gonna talk about.

[00:01:05] Zack Katz: This is WP Product Talk, the place where every week, we bring you insights in product marketing, business management and growth,

[00:01:13] Matt Cromwell: customer experience, product development, and more. It's your go-to podcast for WordPress product owners by WordPress product owners. And now, enjoy the show

[00:01:32] Hey everybody, I am Matt Cromwell from Roots and Fruit.

[00:01:36] Zack Katz: And I am Zach Katz from Gravity Kit.

[00:01:38] Matt Cromwell: And today we're talking about making incredible product websites. If you are here right now and you love what we do at WP Product Talk, um, we would love your support. The easiest way for you to do that is to do all of the things where you like our stuff or you follow our stuff, or you, um, like hit the subscribe button, for example.

[00:02:02] That's a good one. Look at this, I'm like leveling up with like these cheesy GIF graphics. Um-

[00:02:08] Zack Katz: Oh no. I forget that, Matt, you're a GIF person. Yeah. I, I apologize to everybody who knows how to say GIF.

[00:02:14] Matt Cromwell: GIF persons are great, um, and they- ... they drive subscribers. So, um, yes, like our stuff. Uh, that would be super helpful.

[00:02:23] It's free to you and benefits

[00:02:25] Zack Katz: both of us. If you say GIF, like and subscribe. If you say JIF, like and subscribe.

[00:02:30] Matt Cromwell: Either way.

[00:02:32] Zack Katz: Uh, and a huge thanks to Freemius. Uh, do you know- not know about Freemius? Open a new tab. Don't stop watching. Open a new tab. Uh, check out Freemius.com. They are ex- our exclusive growth partner.

[00:02:44] They help software makers grow, monetize, and succeed. Uh, they're a merchant of record platform, which means they handle everything around selling software, like checkout, payments, subscriptions, licensing and updates, oh my gosh, global tax compliance. Things are really complicated nowadays, and Freemius takes care of all of that so you can focus on building amazing products.

[00:03:06] Matt Cromwell: All righty, so let's jump into the topic of building better product sites, and for this, we've brought a s- very special guest named Imran Siddiq. Imran, welcome, welcome.

[00:03:19] Imran Siddiq: Hey, thanks for having me.

[00:03:21] Matt Cromwell: Would you mind and just tell the world about yourself? Tell everybody who you are, what you do. I mean, you're no stranger to YouTube, but, uh, let everybody know who you are.

[00:03:30] Imran Siddiq: Yeah. I'm Imran Siddiq from the UK, and I'm forever grateful the day that WordPress came on the scene. I love web designing for people, but I've also become very well known for my YouTube channel, Web Squadron, that I started five years ago, and it's where I train people or tutorials on how to build websites, and I do a lot of video marketing for plugin companies as well.

[00:03:53] Matt Cromwell: Love it. If you are watching right now live on, uh, YouTube or LinkedIn, uh, use the comment area, and we will answer your questions or comments or hopes or dreams or aspirations live on the show. We promise not to make fun of you. We'll just answer the question. Or I promise not to. I can't say, speak for Zach.

[00:04:14] He might, actually. Um, we'll see. But, uh, Imran, let's talk about it. Um, I, I was, I, I was checking out your YouTube channel and the way that you talk about building out sites, and I was like, "I think you have a unique perspective, um, on this topic in particular." I'd love if you just kind of like set the scene for us.

[00:04:35] What is it that's on your mind when it comes to product sites, building out, uh, websites for users?

[00:04:43] Imran Siddiq: Yeah, so the comparison I'm gonna make before I go deep into it is that when you're teaching someone to build a website, you normally say to them that you've gotta stand out, and you don't wanna be like everyone else.

[00:04:54] So you're not gonna say, "I'm a web designer." What you're gonna try and show off in your hero banner or the top half of your website is what do you actually do? So do you serve a niche area? Do you solve certain problems for customers? Do you understand how to help them get conversions? And when you now look at a lot of plugin companies that have websites, they tend to miss the point on that, and they focus a lot on, "Here is our plugin.

[00:05:20] Here's what it's called," maybe the cost of it, and then we start to go into lots and lots of features. And I'm forever trying to advise a lot of plugin companies, whether they're doing video marketing ... In fact, before we even get onto the video marketing, I do say to them, "You need to take a step back and look at your actual website," because I look at it, and if I know you, and I follow you as a company on Twitter or wherever, I may understand what your plugin is all about.

[00:05:48] But the brand-new users, the people you're trying to get to use your plugin, I think you're completely missing the point. So just like if you're a web designer or a landscaper or you're an accountant, you're trying to showcase in your hero banner and your headline what is different or what problems do you solve.

[00:06:06] And I think a lot of plugin companies, they miss the trick on that. And if they were to get back to basics and show us what problems they solve on the website or in their plugin marketing when they're doing YouTube videos or TikToks, they may reach a wider audience because now I'm gonna say, "I have this problem, and they can solve it," rather than, "Oh, this company's come along, and they're telling me about 20 features, but none of those features mean anything to me because they just, they're just words."

[00:06:38] Zack Katz: Uh, what problems do you s-solve, you mentioned, uh, but for whom, right? Like, the question is, uh, who, who, who is your audience for your website? And I think that that's something that comes up a lot for us. Uh, Gravity Kit has, like... Our tool's very generic in the sense that you can do anything that a form...

[00:06:56] Like, you have a form, and there are th- unlimited opportunities for what types of forms people can build. So it's hard to really describe a generic tool when a generic tool can do anything. So one of the things we're working on, uh, which is always hard, is defining what person we're talking to on what page and what their pain points are.

[00:07:17] Imran, how do you think about the at- the audience for a website, or is it even an audience for a specific page on a website?

[00:07:26] Imran Siddiq: Well, what I'll do is if I answer it in relation to yourself, so for instance, I would be saying to you, if we were working together, in terms of your video marketing, I would be saying, "Don't create a 20-minute video that goes through every feature."

[00:07:39] I'd be saying to you, "There's probably 10 features that you know solve particular problems, so create a f- two-minute video for each one of them in terms of your marketing." In terms of your website, I would say your headline, rather than saying you create forms, I would be saying, "Does your plugin enable me to create a form within a minute or two minutes?

[00:08:02] Can I, um, create, for instance, conditional logic? Can I do something that's gonna make my day so much easier?" And if your headline said, "Create a form in 60 seconds," that has suddenly got my attention. And then if there was a follow-on video that actually proved and showed me create a vid- you know, create your form in 60 seconds, you've hooked me.

[00:08:23] You've got me now, because there'll be so many other plugins out there that do forms. As you know, you'll have competitors. But when you start using them, half an hour later, you're still going through the instructions in the documentation and trying to work out what to do and how to connect things. And then suddenly you realize it ain't gonna work until you pay for a third-party tool somewhere else because you've got to make a connection, like Zapier, for instance.

[00:08:49] I've lost count of how many tools out there tell you you can make your website work or speed things up, but they forget to mention you need a Zapier account or something else- Totally ... which you don't wanna do. So I would say in terms of, like, websites, general websites, a landscaper may be able to, um, build out a decking for, um, I don't know, a particular budget.

[00:09:11] And if they make that clear, or maybe a landscaper on their website could say, "I'll tell you how often you need to mow your lawn in summertime." And they may do 20 other services, but if I have a problem with my mowing my lawn because I haven't got time or I think I cut it too short or I'm not cutting it the right length, I'll take interest.

[00:09:33] And if you then have a supporting video to support the headline, and that, I think that's the big trick. So if you were to say on your plugin you can create a form in 60 seconds, and then you've got a video, that video goes out on YouTube, and the link for that takes them back to your landing page, and you've now backed up what you said in the video.

[00:09:54] Yeah. Did I answer your question or did I go off on a tangent there? I'm not sure if I answered that very well then.

[00:09:59] Matt Cromwell: No, I think so. I like it. It, it, it, it totally leans in. I think it brought up lots of things in my mind. What... Before, uh, we started the show, you and I were talking about some of this, and that analogy with the lawnmower, um, with the mowing service.

[00:10:13] If they were to pitch to you instead, like, uh, how much horsepower their mower has and how fast the blades turn and how sharp they sharpen them every third day or whatnot, that, you know, most folks would just kind of like, "Okay, I don't really care." Like-

[00:10:29] Zack Katz: Though- "

[00:10:30] Matt Cromwell: Are you going to mow my lawn?"

[00:10:32] Zack Katz: Though it does matter if, uh, if I'm looking for an environmental lawn service that uses battery-powered mowers and- Mm-hmm

[00:10:39] not gas-powered mowers. So like- Mm-hmm ... sometimes technical details do matter. Mm-hmm. That, and that goes to, um, Jason Cohen, one of our future and past guests, I believe, um, uh, has a new book called Hidden Multipliers, which is really wonderful. Mm-hmm. I recommend everybody go check it out. Uh, it's great. And he talks about the needs stack.

[00:10:58] So yes, you need your lawn cut, but do you talk about why you need your lawn cut? Well, you need your lawn cut because you have an HOA, uh, like a homeowners association that requires a lawn to be cut to a certain length. So Imran, like the, are, am I cutting it to the right length? Well, why are you asking that question?

[00:11:15] Uh- Yeah ... so like if the HOA requires it or if it's an environmental impact thing and I want to be a good environmentalist. So like the needs stack, the higher up you go on the needs stack, you might be answering a question, uh, in your copy f- on your website that addresses something that is a actual root cause of why you want your lawn mown, not, uh, I need a lawnmower.

[00:11:39] Imran Siddiq: S- so c- so can I give you, elaborate on that? 'Cause I do have, like, a, a solution for that as well that I advise, um, plugin companies. Often what happens is they'll have, like, a singular landing page. They'll have a separate page for features and documentation and pricing, but they have a singular landing page.

[00:11:56] And what I say to them is that you might wanna consider having five different landing pages. So you'll have one which kind of covers everything. Then you'll have one which is more for developers, and that's where you now go into the intricacies of the blade and what power it's got and how long the battery will last.

[00:12:15] But then you wanna have a really simple landing page, which is now for Mrs. Smith, who runs a flower shop, and she wants to get a lawnmower, and she just wants really basic things like, "Is this gonna work for me, and has it got a different setting, and how easy is it to move?" And I feel like, again, some plugin companies, they miss that trick.

[00:12:34] They tend to bombard their landing page, and they go on and on and on with lots of items and features. And I would say you can have that, but it's okay to have a slimmed-down version for different audiences. So depending on where you're sharing the links for your website or your plugin, you can now be quite particular.

[00:12:53] I would say for LinkedIn, you might wanna share the detail. But when you're sharing on Facebook, or sometimes even Twitter to an extent, you wanna go with the really simple approach. 'Cause LinkedIn is where the businesses hang out, but a lot of people on Twitter and Facebook, well, they click anything these days that pops up, so you wanna give them that simple input.

[00:13:13] Matt Cromwell: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I, sometimes I approach this question by... I, I mean, I have lots of conversations with product developers, uh, product owners, and I'll sometimes just ask them the question of, "What's the number one reason why people buy your plugin?" And it's amazing to me sometimes how they kind of, their eyes kind of gloss over a little bit.

[00:13:36] Like- Mm ... because it's a form plugin? Like, they, they might, you know. No, but wh- why the, why your plugin? Like, and it's al- sometimes it's also, like- You know, they, they're using your free product already and they like it, but there's a reason why they choose to buy Pro in one way or another. And what is the one reason why they choose to buy Pro?

[00:13:57] Whatever that one reason is, that's what I think should be all about what's on your homepage. Uh, and not necessarily the, the feature, but the job that it solves in one form or another. And I, I like the whole job, jobs to be done, uh, approach to, um, to, to marketing and to messaging and things like that, because it does get to the heart of what you're talking about, Imran, in terms of, um, the, the, the woman at the flower shop, she doesn't really care about all the different features.

[00:14:24] She just is like, "Is this gonna get the job done for me or not?" Um, and focusing that, I think is a, is a good way to filter through and, and land on the type of, uh, of phrasing, I think, in a, in a useful way, even for developers, honestly, because even though they want to know about the APIs underneath and everything, they have to also understand whether or not it's going to serve their clients' needs as well, so.

[00:14:50] Zack Katz: So being a developer and being a nerd, uh, Im- Imran, how do you think about the content structure for what you're just talking about, like the information architecture of this? So we have multiple products at GravityKit. Um, we've, we've... It's, it's a complicated thing to say, "Okay, I wanna organize around somebody's, um, if somebody's a developer or somebody's an agency or somebody's in something else."

[00:15:13] When you have multiple products and you know that you have to describe the solution in a way that makes sense to them, would it be every single product page has multiple subpages that are targeted toward this audience, or do you have a landing page for each audience that talks about how each product works within their expertise?

[00:15:34] Imran Siddiq: I would say that it all, it depends on the how, um, complicated the product is. So I would say if you've got the time and the capability to create alternate pages, I would do that, because I would say there is no one-size-fits-all, and I would say it very much depends on how complicated it is. If it's quite simple, you can probably get away with not having to do that, and you could hide, for instance, a lot of the...

[00:15:59] For instance, you could have just one landing page, and all, a lot of the detail could be lower down the page. It could be in an accordion. It could be way down, and the top half of the, the, the landing page should be what problems does it solve. Problem, outcome, show how it does it, and then you got your call to action button, because that will actually be okay for nearly all audiences.

[00:16:22] But if you really now wanna know a bit more... It's a bit like when you go to a restaurant or somewhere to eat. You're hungry. You just want the food, so you have a menu and you can see the price, and then you make a decision, and you go and buy it. If you now want to look at how many calories it got and carbohydrates and protein, you can go and dig down for that detail.

[00:16:41] But what you don't want, unless you are a keto or a protein, um, manufacturer of food, where you are focusing on the health and fitness market or people that wanna build muscles, then you really wanna drum home how much protein there is. But if you're just providing food, you're just gonna tell them about the product, lovely pictures, what the price is, and then further, further down, if they now wanna look at how it's made up, you could do that.

[00:17:06] So I would say you don't have to have five versions of every product landing page, 'cause that then could end up being a lot of pages. But if you want to do it on one landing page, you could easily do that, too.

[00:17:18] Matt Cromwell: Yeah.

[00:17:19] Zack Katz: We have a really good- I like the menu metaphor because it allows you to s- uh, menus also can be overwhelming if there are too many choices, and having a featured menu items thing that you wanna push similarly on, on a landing page, you wanna make sure that you're promoting the thing that most people like that you also have the most margin on.

[00:17:37] Uh, makes a lot of sense.

[00:17:39] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. We have a good comment here, uh, from LinkedIn, uh, that I wanna highlight. Marcos, uh, says, "Recently I redesigned my plugin landing page after studying the best practices for SaaS landing pages, which I adapted for my plugin. Also, I used AI to get more information regarding my ICP."

[00:18:00] And oh, we have a-- it's, it's getting cut off here. Ideal customer profile. We've run out of space. "Regarding my ICP and what that would look for when visiting my landing page." He, he continues and he says, "In short, uh, before redesigning my landing page, I asked AI to act as my ICP, and this way it gave good insights on how to structure the information oriented for conversion."

[00:18:22] ICP, for folks who don't know, is, uh, ideal customer profile. Uh, that's a, a really smart method to just ask the, the AI, ask the agent to be your ICP and look at the site through that lens. Um, Zach, have you ever done anything like that for Gravity Kit?

[00:18:39] Zack Katz: Oh, I do that a lot, and it really doesn't work as well as I wish it would.

[00:18:43] Yeah. Uh, so one of the things that I have in my AI skills repository is, uh, profiles. So I have different profiles for accessibility expert, designer, uh, like all the dev side of things when I wanna make sure that our, our website is accessible and looks good. Um, that's, that's one side. I also have customer profiles, and I pass things through them And they come up with the darndest things and, uh, it really doesn't actually always work.

[00:19:13] So yes, make sure to run it through your ICP, uh, you know, write, write out ICP profiles for the different types of users that you have and the different types of, like, the people that you wanna choose to... Like, that you wanna focus your content on. But do not rely only on AI, because AI currently is still trash for content writing when it comes to marketing content.

[00:19:35] Mm. Blog posts, it's great on, but boy, it is not good at, at- Yeah ... landing page content yet. Yeah. Yeah. I- Even if I say,

[00:19:43] like, "You are the best market, you know, content writer, expert in the world." You know, reference all the best practices for, for like how to write content pages, and it just produces trash.

[00:19:55] Imran Siddiq: Yeah.

[00:19:55] Zack Katz: What do you... Imran, have you had the same experience?

[00:19:58] Imran Siddiq: I was actually recording a video today where I was using an MCP adapter and just showing how you could use it to critique a landing page in terms of how could we improve conversions, and I did not agree with 90%-

[00:20:11] of the advice it gave. I went, "No, this is rubbish." It felt like because it's learned from what it sees on the web, it was learning, in my opinion, from bad practice, and it was kind of just generic, you know, advice, and I really did disagree with it.

[00:20:26] Matt Cromwell: Mm. So

[00:20:26] Imran Siddiq: yes, it can be good, but use your own decision-making and your own experience and knowledge as well.

[00:20:32] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I, in general, I find... I, I say this all the time. All, all of my clients, uh, feel like they hear it from me all the time, um, that there's nobody better to tell you what to do than your customer. Um, I, I say constantly, like, if you can talk with them on a, on a Google Meet or a Zoom or something, do that as often as you possibly can.

[00:20:52] They will blow your mind from their perspective because y- so many things we think are obvious or, or, or should be self-explanatory and, and it's not. It's just simply not. Um, or the other way I say it often is you are not your customer. Um, we so often would be like, "Oh, but if it were me, I would do X, Y, and Z."

[00:21:12] And I'm like, "Yeah, it's not you." Mm. "You're not the one going through your website and buying stuff. Somebody else is, and you should talk to them about your website instead."

[00:21:22] Zack Katz: I'm currently-- We're working on a new big update to our migration plugin that migrates between form plugins. So I was wondering, you know, what other people do in this space, and I found some landing page that is adjacent to what I do.

[00:21:35] It is a Microsoft-based form plugin migrator.

[00:21:41] Matt Cromwell: Hmm.

[00:21:41] Zack Katz: And it used phrases in their H1 to talk about what they were doing, and I... It was another language. It really felt to me, for the first time, even though I knew I, I know all about things. I'm, I know things, and it made no sense to me reading their sentence in, in their H1, and I had to look up a couple phrases, and then finally, "Oh, that's that, and this is this other thing, and that's the migration service they offer."

[00:22:06] It was not for me. It was somebody who had that problem, and that heading would've really addressed their problem. But it also revealed to me, like, oh no, uh, I am not doing enough to make it clear w- uh, the, the services we offer to people who are unfamiliar with what the heck I'm talking about.

[00:22:24] Matt Cromwell: You know, one thing I'm realizing right now in this conversation, I really appreciate the fact, uh, Imran, that you zeroed in primarily on messaging.

[00:22:34] Um, I th- in other conversations we've had about, like, optimizing your website i- in different ways, it very much is often design-oriented, uh, or navigation-oriented, uh, or button, uh, size-oriented, uh, things like that. Why, why did you zero in on messaging so much?

[00:22:56] Imran Siddiq: You can have the most amazing website in the world with all fancy animations or the way it's looked, or it looks really, really polished, you know?

[00:23:05] But if it doesn't make sense, if I can't get it... And when people say, you know, "You must get it within three seconds," it's not the imagery often, 'cause I'm a little bit forgiving about that, 'cause not everyone has a perfect camera or the right images to use, but it's the wording you use on there. And if I feel like you're misleading, misrepresenting, don't make sense, confused me, I don't wanna know.

[00:23:27] Mm-hmm. It's a bit like if someone pulled up with a car and it only had one wheel, but it's meant to be a car. I'd be like, "Well, that's confused me. I don't wanna look at it anymore. I don't wanna study it or waste my time." So, you know, it's like movie trailers. You could be looking forward to a movie, and if when you watch the trailer, that little snippet, if it confuses me and it doesn't grab me or make sense, I move on.

[00:23:52] I don't even wanna watch the movie at the cinema. I'll wait for it to come out later on on streaming services. So I feel Let me go back on myself. You could have really, um, a, an ugly looking website, because we have to understand that there are some people and companies out there that haven't really moved on.

[00:24:12] The website was built 10 years ago. But if it makes sense, and I know that they are selling something that serves my purpose and it's gonna satisfy my requirements, I am forgiving of the way it looks, and I will go and purchase it if they are trustworthy and they're not a scammer or anything like that.

[00:24:31] But I've seen so many other websites where you can quite clearly tell they've really polished it up, but deep, deep down the wording just doesn't land. It doesn't pull me in, and if it doesn't do that, you've switched me off

[00:24:45] Zack Katz: Yeah, and I think one of the three second questions is, is this for me? And if I am somebody who has a family of four, I am not going to be looking to buy a hot rod, uh, necessarily.

[00:24:59] Necessarily, unless you have a, unless you have a certain, uh, like, you know what I mean, though? Like, uh, or if I'm, if I'm looking to buy a hot rod, I'm not looking for a minivan. So- Yeah ... is this car for me quickly, with design, with the heading, um, can quickly answer that question and say like, "Okay, should I invest the time, uh, in, in learning more about this, uh, or is this just not for me?"

[00:25:24] And you don't wanna exclude people. If you go too technical, if you, if you use phrases that people might not know about, then it might signal to them that they are not the target audience, even though they might be who you're trying to target, and you're using things, you're using words that are not properly- Yeah

[00:25:41] optimized for them.

[00:25:42] Matt Cromwell: We also were chatting earlier, um, we had a good chat before. I wish we recorded that, Imran. It was a good chat. Um, the, we were chatting a little bit about WordCamp, um, and different WordCamps, and conferences, and things like that. And we could have a whole episode about WordCamp US and how it went.

[00:26:00] I was not there. Uh, Zach was not there. Um, Im- Imran was there. Um, but we won't. One reason why I say- ... that people should go to WordCamps though is in order to learn how to talk about their product, um, that whole like, is it for me, uh, mentality, uh, if somebody's like, "Oh, well, what does your product do?" If you can't describe it briefly and help that person understand if it's for them or not in a conversation on the spot, there's probably something wrong, right?

[00:26:37] Um, and you probably aren't writing, uh, a website that is convincing at all. I don't know, does that resonate with you, Imran?

[00:26:44] Imran Siddiq: It does, and I actually, um, I released a few videos about three or four weeks ago leading into WordCamp 'cause I wanted to give a bit of advice for anyone that might be at a sponsored booth.

[00:26:55] Because something I realized at WordCamp Europe, and I'm not gonna name the companies, is when I went over to speak to them I felt like all they did was give me lots of technical jargon, and they really- Mm-hmm ... just bombarded me with info.

[00:27:09] Zack Katz: Mm-hmm.

[00:27:09] Imran Siddiq: And they clearly didn't know who I was, um, or maybe they did, but they, they assumed that I knew everything they were talking about.

[00:27:19] And I found at WordCamp US I got the same kind of impression.

[00:27:23] Matt Cromwell: Mm.

[00:27:24] Imran Siddiq: And it felt a little bit like you are misjudging who I am, and you are assuming that I'm gonna understand, and then I'm gonna buy a license. You have to imagine I know nothing. I'm not technical. I've come here because I use WordPress. I might be, um, a one-man band, or I might own a flower shop, and I wanna build out a site.

[00:27:42] So what you need to do is kind of just talk to me simply Because it invites me into the conversation.

[00:27:49] Matt Cromwell: Yeah.

[00:27:50] Imran Siddiq: Because sometimes when someone talks to you in a technical way, you feel either not confident or inferior to have that discussion with them because you don't wanna slip up. They feel like an expert, you don't know the subject matter, and you suddenly feel like, "I just wanna nod my head and maybe take a bit of swag or another sticker and walk off now."

[00:28:10] Yeah. And by the way, I did not collect any stickers from WordCamp US this year. I kind of was like- ... "I don't wanna overdo it this time." Um, but, but that's the impression I do get from some sponsored booths in that- Yeah ... um, try and keep it simple. A- and that often says a lot about how they build out their websites and do their video marketing as well.

[00:28:30] You know, it's just too much information overload, but you're impressing the wrong people. You're impressing the people that might not buy or use your particular plugin.

[00:28:40] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. You

[00:28:40] Imran Siddiq: know, you're, you're meant to be going for Joe Public out there. Hopefully they'll get the free version and hopefully upgrade when they realize they need some extra features.

[00:28:50] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I'll tell you that I feel like when we at Give WP, way back in my day, um, when we first were really hitting the WordCamp scene really hard, when there was, like, 30 WordCamps in the US per year, um, and we went to, uh, probably 20 of them, um, uh, we were training our team on how to talk to folks at the booth, and the first thing that we, uh, w- what we said, actually pretty much the entire thing that we trained them on, was to say, somebody will come and say, "Oh, tell me a little bit about Give WP."

[00:29:26] And what we told them to do is, like, say, "I'd love to tell you about Give WP. Can you tell me a little bit about how you use WordPress?" Yeah. That was our question every single time: "Tell us how you use WordPress." Um, and that phrasing was, was really useful, and it was surprising to me every time how people would, their eyes would light up, and they would love to talk about the way they use WordPress, and it would reveal what kind of business they were, whether they were a developer, whether they were, uh, comfortable in WordPress at all, whether they were a nonprofit.

[00:29:58] They, it would reveal all of those things all in that one question. And then it was a soft landing pad for us to talk about what Give WP did or didn't do for that particular person. That was our entire training. Just ask them how they use WordPress, and everything will go better from there afterwards.

[00:30:15] Imran Siddiq: So something I actually learnt about some people that attended, uh, WordCamp Europe and WordCamp US, and some of have been quite open about saying this on either Twitter or LinkedIn.

[00:30:27] So these are the sponsored booths. A lot of them had volunteers manning the booths, and the volunteers were given free tickets to attend, but they knew nothing about the plugin. And I spoke to a few people at WordCamp US, I'm not gonna mention, but many times when I was speaking to the person there, they openly said, "I know nothing about the plugin.

[00:30:48] I'm just here to look after it and monitor or, you know,"

[00:30:53] Zack Katz: That's

[00:30:54] Imran Siddiq: outrageous. "uh, run surveys or anything." That's outrageous. Okay. And I, and it really disappointed me with, do I now have to go around every single person before I find someone who knows about this? Wait. So this is something I've learnt about Europe, and

[00:31:07] Matt Cromwell: quite- Please send this video-

[00:31:08] Imran Siddiq: a lot in the US as well

[00:31:09] Matt Cromwell: Yeah, please send this video to those brands secretly later, and Zach and I saying, "That's ridiculous."

[00:31:17] Zack Katz: Hold

[00:31:17] Matt Cromwell: on a second. Why would you do that?

[00:31:18] Zack Katz: I, uh, feel free to drop names, because this is ridiculous. I- if you're paying, what, $10,000 for a booth at a WordCamp, you should be making sure that it's, it's, that the people there- And then

[00:31:28] Matt Cromwell: paying for that volunteer to f- to travel and be there and spend their time, and-

[00:31:32] Zack Katz: And only to, only to burn, uh, the leads that you have coming to talk about your product by saying, "I don't know anything," and not properly trained.

[00:31:40] That is a... If you're l- if you're listening to this, uh, podcast, uh, please don't do that,

[00:31:44] Matt Cromwell: uh- Yeah ...

[00:31:45] Zack Katz: product

[00:31:45] Matt Cromwell: owner And then they will turn around and also say there's no ROI on WordCamps. Well, not that way. Jeez. Uh-

[00:31:51] Imran Siddiq: It, it was shocking. It was shocking. And, and they've openly shared it on LinkedIn about how it was a great opportunity for learning and meeting- No

[00:32:00] and networking with people. But it was like, no, that's not how you do it. No,

[00:32:05] Matt Cromwell: no. Definitely not. Well, I would love to, uh, hear a little bit more. Um, we have, uh, a little bit more time here. Um, we talked a lot about messaging. Um, uh, what would you say is the next big bucket that you're really looking for, for a high-performing website?

[00:32:23] Imran Siddiq: What I'm looking for are demos. Hmm. So when it comes to plugins, um, they might have a link that takes you off to another website, but it's quite easy to have, like, an animated GIF. I say GIF, by the way, not GIF. But you could have, you could have a GIF on there-

[00:32:39] Zack Katz: Because

[00:32:39] Imran Siddiq: you're a good person, yeah. Or you could have a short video that explains something, or if you do have a demo that takes me over.

[00:32:46] And the reason I'm saying demos is that sometimes websites can get very wordy and, you know, we have lots of comparison tables against competitors or the difference between free and pro or whatever, and it goes over your head. But if they had demos that just allowed us to maybe see it in action. But I do want to give a bit of a caveat.

[00:33:07] There are many times where I go to a plugin company, they have a demo website, but the demo is loaded with 87 options, and you suddenly feel like you've got to read lots of documentation before you can even understand how to use the WordPress playground with the plugin. And I would say if they could somehow create tailored demos.

[00:33:28] So if I now want to experience, for instance, like the form plugin, how would I go and do conditional formatting? If there was a tailored demo that allowed me just to see that in action or even an animated GIF, but not one that was rushed. You know, make me, take me through a good pace so I can understand it.

[00:33:46] Yeah. That would make a huge amount of difference i- in terms of messaging, but also getting me on board as to what does this plugin do and is it gonna work for me, and, and do I like it? Do I feel like I'll enjoy that experience when I'm using it live?

[00:34:02] Matt Cromwell: Yeah.

[00:34:02] Zack Katz: One of the things we've been focusing on at Gravity Kit is improving our demo experience, and we recently have completely rebuilt our demo experience and, uh Part of what I discovered during this process is that our onboarding to the plugin is also lacking, and that it assumes you know how to use it.

[00:34:23] And we have great documentation, sure, but that's not built into the plugin, and we don't onboard people with, you know, well so that they understand how to use it once they buy the plugin. So the goal with the demo site that we were building out is, okay, people s- people express interest. They, they sign up for a demo.

[00:34:38] They wanna know. So we help them get s- the basics set up, right? So they build out a basic demo. What's, what do they do then? They, then they buy the product and install it and redo it all on their website? So our next step is, part of the reason we're working on the migration plugin and improving that, is making sure that, hey, this demo, you can now mi- move that, all the stuff that you've been, that you've now built out, take that with you and y- just install it as you've built it.

[00:35:04] You don't need to know anything else. Like, you've already done the work in the demo. Take it with you. When you buy the product, it's already set up for you. Um, so making sure that the demo isn't an, uh, a dead-end road. It's the, it's the first step in them building it on their own website so that, like, they don't have, uh, any additional roadblocks during the process.

[00:35:25] Imran Siddiq: I think that's a fantastic idea because I think if someone has spent 10, 15 minutes building out what they would potentially use, and then they have to rebuild it again- Right ... it, it's just, it's not frustrating, but it, but it would really sell the product more to let them know, right, once you get it, you've now got what you tested out built out.

[00:35:44] Um, I think that's fantastic.

[00:35:46] Zack Katz: Love it. And then also, like, how easy-- We're trying to make it be easier to use AI, of course, to, to build out all our stuff. Like, getting some presets that makes, makes sense, that are pre-filled in- Yeah ... from the page that they came from, so that we already know if they're a developer or an agency or whatever.

[00:36:02] That, that the demo demonstrates the, the, the admin page in the demo has, like, a walkthrough for them specifically, and everything's targeted to them. It sh- like, or AI has, like, an AI build it prompt that, that is pre-filled in with something that they might want. Like, reducing friction and allowing people to experience things without paying, I think is gonna be more important now than ever with the AI revolution.

[00:36:27] We wanna make sure that they know that the fit is really good and that it's gonna be

[00:36:32] Matt Cromwell: f- Yeah ...

[00:36:33] Zack Katz: easy for them to set up. What about, what do you think, Matt?

[00:36:35] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I'm j- I'm, I'm just still, like, in my mind, I'm trying to think of the whole package, and I'm realizing I really like how this conversation has gone in terms of If you nail the messaging and you showcase your product really, really well, that sounds like 90-plus percent of the job, right?

[00:36:59] Uh, of course, you know, we could talk a lot about pricing tables and, and making your pricing and your plans really obvious and attractive. We could talk about making sure that the checkout i- has really smart geographic defaults and is really seamless, and you have the right types of payment stuff. Like, all that's the technical things that, that if you don't...

[00:37:21] If you fail on those things, doesn't matter how well you sell, you're gonna lose sales because you don't know how to do a checkout. But let's assume that you figure those things out. Y- it, it sounds to me like 90% of the job is really just the right messaging, showcasing your product well. Uh, does that res- does that sound right, Imran?

[00:37:45] Imran Siddiq: Yeah, it's all about being transparent at the end of the day. If your plugin is easier, show the workflow. If it's faster, show me the before and after so I can now see this is what I'm gonna get.

[00:37:56] Zack Katz: Mm.

[00:37:56] Imran Siddiq: If you're saying that your plugin replaces four other plugins, tell me what those four other plugins are.

[00:38:02] So many websites do this. They tell us this replaces lots of plugins, but I don't know what they're talking about- Yeah ... and if they're being honest. And if your setup takes one minute, give me the one-minute short video that shows me it really does take one minute, and don't rush through it. Do it at a leisurely pace as if I was manually doing it now, and I can see, yeah, this is true.

[00:38:23] So the messaging, the demo, all these things. When you do get to the pricing, hopefully by that point I've already scrolled down. Yeah. I'm, and I'm already 50% there to making a decision. And then your pricing, don't have too many services. Don't overcomplicate it with one site, five sites, lifetime, how many users.

[00:38:45] Don't overdo it and make me get confused and push me away. But if you, but, you know, if you explain everything very clearly, by the time you get to pricing... Usually when I go to check pricing on any product, I'm already partially there with I may go and get it, you know? Um, so yeah. I think messaging, you know, if you start to think about all of these things, it can make a huge, huge difference.

[00:39:09] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. 100%. And

[00:39:11] Zack Katz: if you're an agency, I think part of, uh, if you're building a, a product or a, if you're building a page and you're an agency and you're trying to say, uh, "This is the type of customer that we are targeting," having the pricing start at $25,000 and up sends a message that this is not for you. So, like, in ter- you can make choices that de- d- that declare throughout the page who this is for and who it's not for.

[00:39:38] Yeah. And then that just further clarifies, um, you know, uh, that helps you sell when, when people know that it's for them specifically.

[00:39:47] Matt Cromwell: Yeah. I remember Jason Coleman a few years back did a really cool... Jason Coleman from Paid Memberships Pro. He did a really cool, uh, experiment with how prominently he would show his free plugin on the pricing page, uh, yes or no.

[00:40:03] Uh, it's a, it's a question a lot of folks have, like if, if I put free on pricing, then people are just gonna choose free and not buy anything. He found the opposite. Because he had a free plugin available, um, people were actually, uh, over a span of time converting at a higher, uh, rate. And I- my theory about that, um, I don't think he went into it in really finite detail 'cause he's looking at it over a period of time.

[00:40:32] I think what he did is he got more qualified buyers because they did download free from the pricing page. Uh, they're like, "Oh, I can start for free? Let me do that first." And then they're like, "Oh, I actually really like this, and now I'm going to buy." Uh, whereas if you don't know that there's a free plan, you're on pricing and you're like, "Oh, maybe, maybe not."

[00:40:51] Uh, three weeks later it's still a maybe not. Um, and, and so just giving people that, that easy in, uh, seemed to be a really good conversion point for him. Um.

[00:41:02] Zack Katz: One of the things we also mustn't forget is that people are at different stages of the buying decision-making process, and people are not always ready to purchase.

[00:41:12] They're not ready to click the button. This is an exploratory phase. You don't want them to forget about you.

[00:41:18] Imran Siddiq: Mm-hmm.

[00:41:18] Zack Katz: So what are you doing when they're on your pri- product page and they're not ready to buy? You need to make sure to have some other calls to action, like signing up for your newsletter, like a free thing that they could use in the meantime.

[00:41:29] Uh, not everybody's at the bottom of the funnel. Uh, many are at the middle or many are at the top. You need to make sure that you have something for everybody, even if they're not, uh, ready to buy.

[00:41:41] Imran Siddiq: So a few things I wanna say about that in terms of pricing is that I don't work with any plugin company, no matter what they're willing to pay me, if you don't have a free version.

[00:41:51] Matt Cromwell: Really?

[00:41:52] Imran Siddiq: You must have a free version.

[00:41:53] Matt Cromwell: Hold on

[00:41:53] Imran Siddiq: a

[00:41:54] Matt Cromwell: second. And then...

[00:41:55] Imran Siddiq: Ho- honestly, honestly, so they have to have a free version, and they can have a premium version, that's okay, but what I want to do is promote that anyone out there can use that tool or plugin for free, even if it's a limited time. It might be for a month or two before- Mm

[00:42:10] you have to upgrade, but there's gotta be a period where they can get dirty with that plugin. I'm also a very big believer that try and get your prices on your landing page. So don't just show it on a pricing page. Be open and share it on the landing page. So if you're now hooking me in with how good your plugin is, just let me know that this is what the prices will be, and I also feel like plugin companies need to make it clearer.

[00:42:36] Because on pricing pages, we seem to always have these cards, and you have lots of comparison tables between the features. Sometimes just tell me that if you're gonna have a booking plugin and you've got, um, multiple staff and multiple locations, then you need to go for the premium. But if it's just you providing a service in one location, then the free is okay for you as well.

[00:43:02] 'Cause I feel like when you're transparent and honest about that, like you just said, people can make an informed decision, and also they're at different stages of their business, or, you know, can they afford a premium version? But if they like the free version, and it works and delivers, and they can see it making a difference, they're more likely to go and upgrade.

[00:43:22] But it is something that I am quite, um, I, uh, steadfast on in terms of, um, there's gotta be some form of a free version available before I work with you.

[00:43:35] Zack Katz: Interesting.

[00:43:35] Matt Cromwell: That's really fascinating. I will say, um, we need to move into best advice. Every show we end, uh, by leaving our best advice, kind of like a WordCamp, uh, talk, you know, where you're going through the hallway track and somebody's like, "Hey, I really need your best advice on how to optimize my website."

[00:43:53] You have, like, one minute or less to do that. Um, and I'm gonna lead with best advice is always have enough time to finish your podcast. Um- ... I unfortunately have a hard stop and have to run. This was a, a great and amazing conversation that I wish I could stay to the very end. Imran, thank you so much, and, um, I'll see you all next time, and, uh, Zach will, uh, take us out.

[00:44:17] Thanks, Zach.

[00:44:19] Zack Katz: Bye now. Um, well now that we're just the GIF people in the room, this is already a better conversation.

[00:44:26] Imran Siddiq: Absolutely. No gypsy.

[00:44:31] Zack Katz: Uh, so Imran, what's your best advice for people when they're considering reworking or building their product pages?

[00:44:38] Imran Siddiq: I would say just take a step back and let it be ugly.

[00:44:42] One of the, um, things I used to say to people, whether they were doing analytics or writing books or designing websites, is think less, do more. Don't think about it. Don't think about the perfect sentence or how your structure looks, or getting everything dotted and everything ticked off. Just make it.

[00:45:00] Even if you do it, you rush through it, just make it. Get to the end, and then take a step back, and now you're gonna see what you like and don't like. Because you'll never understand your website better until you understand what you don't like about it. So it's okay to be ugly. You know, it's okay to just make it messy, take a step back, and now refine and tweak it.

[00:45:23] And that is when it will suddenly become better than you ever imagined. And that's with everything in life, whether you're baking, exercising, probably not driving 'cause you need to drive safely. But with most of life, just get it done. Get to the end.

[00:45:39] Zack Katz: An apple pie is better than no apple pie.

[00:45:43] Imran Siddiq: Very true.

[00:45:45] Zack Katz: I like that advice.

[00:45:46] Um, and I worked with somebody years ago who, like, the- their first step, they weren't gonna actually write the content. They were going to do a wire frame with heading, heading, heading, and making sure that that w- that that conversation about that product page made sense with only the headings, only the video placeholders, not even what the video was.

[00:46:07] Just like, does it tell a story comprehensively about what you're offering to people? Um, my best advice is figure out who you're talking to, and that is really hard to do. It's not like... It's easier said than done. I've been really enjoying, like I said, The Hidden Multipliers book, uh, by Jason Cohen. It talks about defining Carol, uh, and the, uh, Jason uses the phrase, the name Carol to represent your ideal customer profile, and that even if you define, uh, a single ideal customer profile, like when you're shopping for a car, uh, you might have, like, you might check off 10 out of 20, uh, things that somebody wants from a car, but all 10 of those are things they need from a car.

[00:46:48] So even if somebody, if you're defining t- and you're targeting an audience of one, that audience of one actually spreads out to be many more people. So even if it feels like you're narrowing it down, you're actually really well addressing that one person, but that also encompasses the whole world of, of people like them.

[00:47:06] Uh, so defining and writing for one person rather than trying to address everything is my advice. Well, that's a wrap. Imran, thank you so much for joining us. Uh, and where can people find you online?

[00:47:19] Imran Siddiq: Uh, just do a search for Web Squadron. Um, you'll find my website, but also just search for it in YouTube and you'll find me there.

[00:47:26] Zack Katz: Awesome, and make sure to subscribe to Web Squ- Web Squadron on YouTube. Uh, do it. Do it now. Uh, if you're enjoying these shows, uh, please do us a favor and hit subscribe on YouTube. Uh, it's free, easy, and helps support our work. And special thanks again to s- Freemius, our sponsor. And next week we'll be chatting with Jonathan Hall from BerryPress about accidentally becoming a developer.

[00:47:51] Put it on your calendar, and we can't wait to see you next time. Thanks for joining us.

[00:47:57] Imran Siddiq: Bye.