Website Review - New Hypnosis Website

[Natural]

Hi All,

I hope this is allowed, I have read the posting guidelines and terms and I think so...

I have just finished (well, far from finished, but it's online now ) a new website which will offer hypnosis downloads (and eventually CDs). I think it's fantastic, but I would, wouldn't I? I am a little "blind" to the truth of whether it is "good" or not...

I don't want to influence any feedback by asking for specifics too much, but I would love any and all feedback you can offer - on the layout, graphics, design, friendlieness, even the text and if it explains things properly etc.

Hypnosis MP3s - Hypnosis Audio Downloads

Again, I hope I am allowed to post this thread as I would love some feedback from others who are self help fans and know the self help world and what to expect from a self help / hypnosis website.

Oh, and actually, if I may - we also have a page and offer 3 free albums... we have been told this is a good idea, but we are just worried we are giving too much away and might actually lose sales because of this... are we right to worry or will the value we give away come back to us in time? Here is the page we're worried about:

Free Hypnosis MP3 Downloads

Thanks for your time, thanks in advance, I really appreciate any time you can give to help us out as we don't know what to think either way and haven't been able to get any traffic to see for ourselves yet.

Many thanks,
Dan

[Lucidism]

Very nice, very clean. Reminds me of something Google might design. I like your concept and logo. Nice work!

You may want to experiment with different home page layouts, different sign up buttons, and so on to see their effectiveness.

[Mounds]

I'll admit I'm working on doing the same thing. That is, creating a hypnosis website with MP3 downloads. The net is a big place though and I think there's enough room for everyone

I'm not too great at judging whether or not a website looks good so I won't go there. What I will say is that I think it's a good idea to give something away in a site like this. That's appealing to a person who's never investigated hypnosis before and it shows others what kind of quality they can expect. I wouldn't worry about those three albums being too much.

Good luck!

[iatethewholewheel]

I only looked so far at your page for the 3 free albums (i'm in a rush right now), and I think you are right you may lose money in the long run. At least from my perspective, I would probably feel like I had enough material to work with since I already had 3 free albums, and not feel the need to pay for more material. I use binaural beats regularly and just stick to a modest collection (maybe 7 or 8, but most frequently use 2 or 3 now).

Are these just sound tracks or is there narration/guided hypnosis? That would change things a bit if they are narrated. There would be a higher incentive to keep purchasing new ones.

But I still think giving away 3 is being very generous. Especially considering many people like to take on new projects and don't always stick with them, they may lose interest by the time they used all three free ones, if even that.

A beginner may also be over-whelmed with 3, or not consistently use each one if they had that many (I know when I first meditated with binaural beats I would try all different kinds in hopes of great results...I finally learned I needed to stick with one track for a bit to see the best effects). So the effectiveness of each album may appear to them as reduced (and thus turn them off from buying more) by giving them too many initial options to play around with.

If you gave away one or two free, and then maybe charged even a $0.50-1.50 for the other(s) (introductory type price) that may work out better for you without losing customers. I'd gladly pay a dollar or two to try out a hypnosis mp3, especially if I have enjoyed the free one or two I'd already tried.

Just some thoughts! Good luck!

[Natural]

Wow! Thanks for the great feedback so far! More than I was even expecting!

Originally Posted by Lucidism

Very nice, very clean. Reminds me of something Google might design. I like your concept and logo. Nice work!

You may want to experiment with different home page layouts, different sign up buttons, and so on to see their effectiveness.

Wow! I am so flattered Yet, I still disagree, I think we still have some way to go till were up to "made by Google standards" yet this puts my mind at ease a little that someone else thinks the site looks good as we put a lot of time and work into this look Oh, and yes, definitely want to expiriment and try split testing some things in the future

Originally Posted by Mounds

I'll admit I'm working on doing the same thing. That is, creating a hypnosis website with MP3 downloads. The net is a big place though and I think there's enough room for everyone
Good luck!

Yes, it is international I think so I'm sure enough room for us both Good luck!

Originally Posted by iatethewholewheel

I only looked so far at your page for the 3 free albums (i'm in a rush right now), and I think you are right you may lose money in the long run.

Yes, this is what we fear... on the other hand, our logic is that we want to give so much more value than our already big and experienced competition - so by giving away 3 FULL, professional hypnotherapy albums we would be offering something they didn't... our USP if you like...

Originally Posted by iatethewholewheel

Are these just sound tracks or is there narration/guided hypnosis? That would change things a bit if they are narrated. There would be a higher incentive to keep purchasing new ones.

However, yes, each album would be vastly different, and the 3 free albums are always set - a relaxation album, an album to help you to focus, and a simple confidence based album - beyond this if you want to specifically stop smoking, or lose weight then you would have to buy an album (or do many other specific things / achieve specific goals - we aim to have 50+ albums before too long..)

... so I hope that this formula of giving simple, yet solid, and well rounded albums gives people an insight into us, creates a bit of a buzz, and at the same time intigues people to try more specific albums - as yes, it is unique, guided verbal hypnosis - just like you would buy a hypnosis CD from Richard Bandler, Paul McKenna etc - just from us, and our fully qualified, full time professional hypnotist

Thanks for all the feedback so far - definitely interested to hear any more thoughts - especially any criticisms / dislikes, or thoughts on our product pages - descriptions, writing layout etc.

Thanks so much! Fantastic!
Dan

[ancksunamun]

I think the site layout is actually quite nice. My only comment would be that your actual sales area is far less prominent than your free offer. You are being very generous with offering 3 CDs (I would say too generous) but you doing so, you also want to make sure the reader can easily be led to where they can BUY more. The links at the bottom are easily missed as being the 'other stuff' sort of links you see on a blog and don't encourage exploring. Also, your other pages have no link back to your purchasing area therefore leaving the reader to easily forget that they are there for anything other than an interesting.

You are doing a great thing offering so much for nothing but follow it up with solid encouragement to purchase. After all, I assume that's what you hope people will do after gaining their confidence with the 3 free CDs.

[Brutha]

People have problems. They might want to stop smoking. They might want to increase their self confidence.
They don't want to do hypnosis as their primary motivation.

You should think more about the problems of your target audience and speak directly about those problems.

The flow of the front page isn't clear. What's the goal of the page? Getting people to fill in the email to get the free albums?
If that's your goal I would give that element of the page more weight.

Testimonials should speak about concrete results.

I'm not sure whether album is a good word. Did you do keyword research and found that it's a good term?

[Natural]

Originally Posted by ancksunamun

I think the site layout is actually quite nice. My only comment would be that your actual sales area is far less prominent than your free offer. ...
The links at the bottom are easily missed as being the 'other stuff' sort of links you see on a blog and don't encourage exploring...
You are doing a great thing offering so much for nothing but follow it up with solid encouragement to purchase...

Oh man, real criticism is hard to swallow, but that must mean it's correct - I think youre right, we do want to sell, so I think we do need to emphasise this more. I will really think about this and brainstorm some things we could do to boost this element.. this essential element of salesmanship Thank you! very insightful!

Originally Posted by Brutha

People have problems. They might want to stop smoking. They might want to increase their self confidence.
They don't want to do hypnosis as their primary motivation.

You should think more about the problems of your target audience and speak directly about those problems.

The flow of the front page isn't clear. What's the goal of the page? Getting people to fill in the email to get the free albums?
If that's your goal I would give that element of the page more weight.

Testimonials should speak about concrete results.

I'm not sure whether album is a good word. Did you do keyword research and found that it's a good term?

Thank you, again, I think you're right. I think we try to go into depth on the individual product sales pages a bit more, asking them questions about their life, their problems and showing the benefits of our albums and how they can offer solutions... I think we could use a bit more of this on the homepage - just to make it more benefit driven - thanks, youre right.

Re; the "album" keyword - it isn't a keyword, but we struggled to find another word that was, and sometimes putting mp3 or cd in doesnt read that well... we do plan to offer CDs in the future though so maybe when we have these we will look at replacing at least some of these instances of "album".

Thanks for all of the feedback so far! I will get back to work, but of course any and all feedback and criticism appreciated.

[Mounds]

I'll expand a bit on what Brutha said. It's a bit tricky but think of it this way.

If I'm a smoker looking to quit, there's a decent chance that I'll search for "quit smoking hypnosis", simply because it's highly publicized. But what about for low self-esteem? Or social anxiety? The sales page could look absolutely stunning but I highly doubt anyone is looking for "self-esteem hypnosis". They're more likely looking for "self-esteem solution", "self-esteem treatment", or "self-esteem boost". Something along those lines.

The way I see it is that the amount of people searching for hypnosis is fairly limited. The amount of people who are searching for solutions to problems is enormous. If you're selling hypnosis, you are selling to a rather concentrated and small market. If you are selling solutions to problems, you're potential market get's 1000x bigger.

Even though hypnosis really is a powerful tool, it is better to assume that most people aren't going to consider it an option. Even when I was a smoker looking to quit, I never once thought about using a hypnotic MP3. I immediately turned to more conventional means, like the patch. Hypnosis was a non-option.

Point is, the people searching for hypnosis are going to find you. They'll also find the other guys. At that point, it becomes a matter of preference. The people who could use hypnosis but aren't searching for it will never find you. Think of ways that you can get those people thinking about hypnosis. How can you get those people to your page?

Does that make sense?

[Brutha]

Re; the "album" keyword - it isn't a keyword, but we struggled to find another word that was,

Do your keyword research.
Without having done research myself I think session might work well.

Split test different words with Google Website Optimizer.