Copyhackers
copyhackers.com · Company blog · on HN since 2011
Joanna Wiebe's Copyhackers publishes advice on conversion copywriting, landing pages, A/B testing and marketing copy aimed at startups and software makers.
What HN saysCommenters repeatedly recommend it, especially its ebooks, as a good way for technical people to learn to write persuasive copy and improve landing pages.
51HN people shared it
26linked it in comments
37stories submitted
352story points
5 years agolast shared
2011people per year2026
Most-shared posts
- 1Hacking marketing copy17 people · 2 points · first shared 2011 · discussion on HN
- 2Have You Fallen For This Scuzzy Design Trend In Pop-ups?3 people · 2 points · first shared 2014 · discussion on HN
- 3How 1 HN post compelled me to leave Intuit and create a new startup for startups2 people · 252 points · first shared 2011 · 96 comments on HN
- 4Exactly how to write your App Store (iTunes) description2 people · 4 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
- 5Long copy2 people · first shared 2013
- 6Lies that Block Startup Success1 people · 17 points · first shared 2013 · 1 comments on HN
- 7I Spent All Summer Running A/B Tests, and Now I Question the Whole Idea1 people · 9 points · first shared 2014 · 1 comments on HN
- 8Get your customers to rethink their decision to unsubscribe with this 1 word1 people · 6 points · first shared 2011 · 3 comments on HN
- 93 copywriting principles (for 2x revenue)1 people · 4 points · first shared 2018 · discussion on HN
- 10My “Real Life as a Startup Founder” Playlist: 23 Songs for Entrepreneurs1 people · 3 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
- 11The complete guide to copywriting formulas (don't write from scratch)1 people · 3 points · first shared 2021 · discussion on HN
- 123-Step Hack for Startups Bootstrapping Design1 people · 3 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
- 13How Much of Your Copy Is Totally Irrelevant? A Case for Web Personalization1 people · 3 points · first shared 2013 · 5 comments on HN
- 14Stripe Kicks The Crap Out Of Competition But It’s Not Just For Developers1 people · 3 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
- 15Home Page Split Test Reveals Major Shortcoming Of Popular Testing Tools1 people · 3 points · first shared 2012 · discussion on HN
What HN people wrote when they linked it
rsweeney21 · 2020-11-15
I just finished re-writing all the copy for www.facet.net, so copy writing is fresh on my mind.
Here's some feedback:
- It wasn't clear to me what your company does after reading your home page.
- When I saw the "Courses" section it clicked. But I only read that far because you asked for feedback.
- You should lead with what you do or what benefit the customer will receive.
- For example, the main title on your home page should be something like "Learn computer science by playing games" or "Fun, self-guided computer science courses"
I would highly recommend https://copyhackers.com/.
verganileonardo · 2018-01-19
Read everything published on:
- www.conversion-rate-experts.com
- https://copyhackers.com
- Ramit Sethi (i learn a lot by assessing his messages)
Also, the most important thing I learned: do not rely on your intuition the best copy! Run a short open survey with your client and website visitors to learn what they want and how they describe it - then, use their exactly words and phrases and scenarios to describe the product
zrail · 2013-08-20
Copyhackers[1] is a great set of ebooks that teach you how to write better copy. They have an entire book just about headlines, iirc. Highly recommended.
[1]: http://copyhackers.com
ig1 · 2013-06-25
Before you spend money on marketing I'd recommend spending some time improving your landing page and the sales funnel.
The Copy Hackers ebooks are a good place to learn about this stuff: http://copyhackers.com/
I'd also recommend you read this article to learn about the kinds of metrics you should be measuring in your SaaS project:
http://www.forentrepreneurs.com/saas-metrics-2/
napoleond · 2012-11-19
I can't recommend http://copyhackers.com/ highly enough. The blog and mailing list are good, the ebooks are excellent. Joanna has figured out how to teach geeks to write powerful copy.
ryanmarsh · 2011-12-06
Great job! I love your product.
There is something out there that could help you sharpen the copy on your site: http://www.copyhackers.com
tamersalama · 2011-10-20
CopyHackers by fellow HNer bloggergirl is a good resource. I haven't tried it out myself but based on what I've seen, it's worth the money. You can apply HACKERNEWS coupon code when checking out.
Her post: http://www.copyhackers.com/2011/10/18/how-1-hn-post-compelled-me-to-le…
CopyHackers: http://www.copyhackers.com
prateekdayal · 2011-12-19
Thanks for the detailed feedback.
> 1. Not too sure about the title "Kiss Your Complicated Help Desk Software Goodbye!" as well as the statement below it. Big words, which can easily be replaced by smaller words and more images of the product.
I used to think that way too but experimenting with some tips in the CopyHacker book - http://www.copyhackers.com/. Will post back results here in sometime.
> 2. Not a fan of Serif and fantasy fonts either. Try some Sans-Serif fonts instead. Will make the copy more legible.
Did you feel that way for headings or body copy?
3. The boxes which show product features look like blobs of text. use images. Keep the feature boxes less and instead give a link to a separate "Features" page.
We will work on a features page as well. I wanted to pick some icons/images but the problem was finding icons/images for some features like No-ugly case IDs or Realtime Email Importing. Any suggestions you have on that or examples from other sites would be very useful.
4. The "play" button image on the video looks odd. Doesn't gel with anything else on the page.
Cool. I'll try to find a better one.
5. More testimonials and put shorter ones on homepage. Shorter ones tend to have more punch. Make a separate page for testimonials where can allocate the bigger ones.
Thanks. Will work on a separate customers page and incorporate the feedback there.
> Really dig your product by the way. All the best.
Thanks. Very encouraging for us :)
Jugurtha · 2021-12-02
I've heard good things about "Copy Hackers": https://copyhackers.com
jv22222 · 2018-08-27
1) Go to: https://copyhackers.com/
2) Hover over "New here"
3) Click copywriting ebooks.
saluki · 2018-01-19
Reading the recommended books and resources in the other responses are a great place to start.
To really learn I recommend starting a small product or ebook and learn copywriting and sales on your own product. You will gain a wealth of knowledge.
Here are a few more recommendations:
https://copyhackers.com/2013/04/how-to-sell-without-selling-your-soul/
http://www.microconf.com/past-videos/
startupsfortherestofus.com
tgb · 2016-12-07
This one might be the best: https://copyhackers.com/2014/01/fallen-scuzzy-design-trend-pop-ups/ (Note the content of the article, then move your mouse up to try to go to close the tab. Irony!)
aresant · 2013-12-11
I love the story here.
While the PR is strong Leo should put on his conversion hat to generate actual downloads and turn this from a story into a success.
1) On the landing page, http://www.treesforcars.com, he needs as strong of a brief headline as they have in the article eg:
"Trees for Cars is a mobile application that aims to save the environment by helping users carpool to their destination."
2) Ditto on the app store description which, instead of the description, starts with a 3-liner clarifying Leo coded this himself.
More pictures / longer description on the description will also help.
Great primer @ Copyhackers on writing effective App Store copy http://copyhackers.com/2012/06/how-to-write-an-app-store-description-f…
robwilliams88 · 2013-12-06
Thanks!!
Here's what I've used:
http://copyhackers.com
http://unicornfree.com/
Also, I've dissected landing pages from people like Ramit Sethi, Amy Hoy, Brennan Dunn, and Joanne Weibe.
Hope that helps!
rubinelli · 2013-05-29
"Best" varies wildly from market to market, but if I had to pick, I'd start with folks whose job is creating and improving landing pages:
http://landerapp.com/
http://unbounce.com/
http://www.crazyegg.com/
https://mixpanel.com/
https://www.kissmetrics.com/
http://copyhackers.com/
This short list already covers a lot of different styles. Some may even look a bit dated, but you can be sure they are converting very well, because that's what they are optimizing for.
nathanbarry · 2012-12-27
Thanks, but I'm just getting started on learning copywriting. Maybe in a year or two. For now check out CopyHackers: http://copyhackers.com
underdown · 2012-09-28
I heartily recommend Joanne Weibe's ebook here:
http://copyhackers.com/product/handbook-how-to-write-a-long-form-sales…
$48 is a little hefty but its also frequently on sale on some of the appsumo/mightydeals type sites.
_pius · 2012-06-23
This is vastly better. My next advice would be:
* work on the copy with a native English speaker and, ideally, with someone like this: http://copyhackers.com/
* revisit the name and add a logo
Good luck.
JoshTriplett · 2011-10-19
AFAICT the credit card processing all happens through PayPal. However, I don't particularly want to provide all the other billing information on a non-SSL page either.
I tried manually going to https://www.copyhackers.com/ , but that tries to serve an SSL certificate for webcopygirl.com (which looks like a parked domain).
Configuration problems, or lack of SSL certificate? If the latter, do you already know about StartCom (https://www.startssl.com/)? They provide domain-validated certificates for free.
Rakathos · 2013-07-12
My entire site design and copy have been a source of downright embarrassment. In fact, this week's "challenge goal" is a brand new home page, landing page and sales page design.
The copy itself is going to need to change to reflect the pivot from inventory to ERP, so happily "Inventory management without the suck" is going away.
> The "not interested" inversion of "contact us" is also pretty weird and announces that you expect people to not be interested.
Curiously, I thought this myself when I put it up. To this day, I can't fathom why I thought that was a good choice of words (or why I never changed it).
> Then as you scroll it's just a wall of text all the way to the end.
I had been experimenting with the "hybrid copy"[1] sales page that Joanna Wiebe of Copyhackers has been a proponent of. It's worked incredibly well for my actual landing pages, where a user knows what the product is about when they click whatever link or ad brought them there. However, I took it way too far by doing "hybrid copy" on the home page.
The new design I'm working on is going to be the classic home page with a brief overview of the product and a CTA linking to the "hybrid copy" features/tour page.
Edit: I neglected to mention that the "hybrid page" experiment resulted in a noticeable increase in new trials.
[1] http://copyhackers.com/2013/04/long-copy/
peteforde · 2012-09-24
http://copyhackers.com/
Sorry for the delay!
rmcastil · 2015-02-16
Here's the source regarding being able to make money on elance: http://copyhackers.com/2014/12/how-to-earn-on-elance/
patrickmay · 2013-05-07
I agree. Interestingly, there is a link in the article to another article that shows several examples.
ETA link: http://copyhackers.com/2013/02/your-most-overlooked-home-page-opportun…
mryan · 2012-04-23
Yes, I think this will help a lot. Maybe make the blue bars less prominent, while increasing the prominence of the 'learn more' buttons? At the moment, the learn more buttons don't 'jump out' at me when I view the page. As the blue bars are the only really colourful things on the page, they look like they should be CTAs.
The Copyhackers book has an interesting section on buttons (preview here:
http://www.copyhackers.com/web-writing-ebook-sample/). I'm not involved with Copyhackers, but I read the book this weekend and found it very interesting.
jeffmould · 2015-07-19
To answer your question, for me it really depends on the site and the product/service. I usually will dig around on the site to make sure it is what I am looking for and then click a get started button if I like what I see. As someone else pointed out if the individual viewing the page is your target audience and they are hesitant to click a "get started" button, the page and/or site failed in conveying the value of the product/service.
There is a lot of psychology that goes into the wording of buttons, and while you may tell yourself "oh that would never work for me", the truth is that subconsciously it probably does work and you just don't realize it sometimes.
I have always found these two articles informative (actually the whole CopyHackers site is a pretty good resource in general):
http://copyhackers.com/2012/11/how-to-find-and-eliminate-friction-word…
http://copyhackers.com/optimize-your-business-online-training/calls-to…
struppi · 2013-06-13
I like the overall design of the app, but I don't think the stock images fit well in there. It's just generic people, nothing I can relate to your app.
A little bit more text to explain what your product does would have helped me. I had to watch half of the video to really get it. I still don't know how your product is better than traditional monitoring, though. Unfortunately the tour does not really help me here (but I am a devops-noob): For example, what does this mean: "Snooze tries to fill the gap between cron mailing you and setting up and Icinga stack to monitor all the scheduled tasks in your network." I had to google "Icinga" to even understand what you mean. And the scenario you use before is very technical - Might be hard to read for a non-programmer.
If you did not know it yet, have a look at this post (and the linked info graphic): http://copyhackers.com/2013/04/long-copy/ - I would take this route for adding more text to the home page, if I were you.
Don't get me wrong, overall I like what you did here. I think this product would be useful for me if I ran a SAAS application. But you have not totally convinced me yet...