How to Ease Your Customer’s Natural Resistence

There’s no getting around the fact that our goal as business owners is to get our customer to take an action that involves some risk.

We ask them to spend their valuable time with us, invite us into their email inbox, or part with their hard-earned cash. Some level of resistance is inherent in any business transaction. But we can overcome that in our designs by keeping this rule of thumb in mind:

Focus on the positive.

Take steps to minimize and soften the risk we are asking the customer to take, by accentuating the positive aspects of the transaction.

It is wrong to trick people into taking an action when they don’t knowingly accept all of the implications. Or when those implications are hidden away in the fine print. For example, there are well-known services that allow consumers to check their credit score “for free”.

The catch? It’s only a 7-day free trial, after which you’re automatically (and often unknowingly) enrolled in a $20/month subscription unless you call them up to cancel. This company’s public website and television commercials misrepresent the deal and fail to set clear expectations.

Making a false promise like that is not what I mean when I say focus on the positive. Let’s look at some ways we can keep the focus on the positive and keep our integrity intact while we’re at it.

The signup page for HitTail does a great job of being 100% transparent about what they’re asking from the customer, while keeping the focus on the positive every step of the way.

Click to enlarge and see notes.

The first thing we see is the big headline, “Only Seconds Away From Your Free Trial“. It could have said something like, “Fill Out This Form to Sign Up”. But instead, this headline does two things:

• It tells us how quickly (“Only Seconds Away…”) we’ll be on our way to using the app.
• It reminds us this is free trial so our money isn’t at risk.

Also notice how big and bold this headline is. It really grabs the customer’s attention and sets a positive, comforting tone as they prepare to enter their personal and billing information.

Moving into the form, there are a few things that draw attention and keep the focus on the positive:

Midway through the form, just before the customer is asked to enter their credit card information, there is an information box, reminding the customer “Your card will not be charged today”. It even goes on to inform the customer the exact date that they will be charged, but only “If you love HitTail”. Otherwise, you can cancel.

Why is that so powerful? On the surface, it serves as a friendly reminder that the customer’s money isn’t at risk. But on a deeper level, it conveys honesty and integrity. The $19.95 price tag and the date on which this will be charged are not hidden away in fine print somewhere. They’re shown prominently right smack in the middle of the signup form, with an attention-drawing box around them. Personally, I feel good about doing business with a company who is up-front in this way.

Two more touches of positive reinforcement on the HitTail signup page are:

• Customer testimonial quotes, adding an element of social proof, which serves as a reminder to the customer that they’re on their way to joining other happy customers.
• The action button is appropriately labeled “Start My Free Trial”, setting expectations in a positive way.

Remember, asking for money, contact info, or time is part of doing business and the customer’s natural instinct is to push back. But we can design our pages to turn that resistance into positive momentum toward a conversion.

This post is based on an excerpt from my upcoming book, Design For Conversions. Join the newsletter and I’ll send you a free chapter and an early-bird coupon once those become available.