AgilePress

Tag: Conversion

  • The Slider Myth: Why Carousels Kill Conversions (And Speed)

    It is the most common request in web design: “Can we put a slider on the homepage with 5 moving images and text that flies in from the left?”

    Clients love sliders. They feel dynamic. They solve internal politics (“Let’s put the CEO’s message on Slide 1 and the new product on Slide 2”).

    But there is a problem: Users hate them.

    At AgilePress, we have a strict policy: Friends don’t let friends use sliders. Here is why we almost never use Carousels on a homepage, and why you shouldn’t either.

    The 1% Click Rate (The Usability Problem)

    The data is brutal. Study after study (from Nielsen Norman Group to Notre Dame University) shows the same thing:

    • 1% of users click on a slider.
    • 89% of those clicks are on the first slide.
    • Nobody sees Slide 2.

    If you hide your most important offer on the second slide, you are effectively hiding it from 99% of your visitors. Users have developed “Banner Blindness.” When they see a moving box at the top of a page, their brain identifies it as an “Advertisement” and automatically ignores it to look for the actual content below.

    The Performance Killer (The Technical Problem)

    To make an image slide, fade, and fly, you need code. A lot of it.

    The Villain: Slider Revolution

    The most popular plugin for this, Revolution Slider, is a technical monster.

    • It loads massive JavaScript libraries (GreenSock, jQuery, etc.).
    • It forces the browser to recalculate the layout constantly during the animation.
    • It destroys your LCP (Largest Contentful Paint) score in Google Core Web Vitals.

    Using a slider is like putting a backpack full of rocks on your runner before a race. Your site will be slow, and Google will penalize you.

    The Mobile Nightmare

    Have you ever tried to read a slider on a phone?

    • The text becomes tiny.
    • The buttons are impossible to tap.
    • The slide changes just as you are trying to read it.

    70% of traffic is mobile. A horizontal slider on a vertical screen is a terrible use of space.

    The AgilePress Solution: The Static Hero

    If we kill the slider, what do we replace it with?

    The Hero Section. A single, powerful, high-quality image (or video background) with a clear headline and a single Call to Action (CTA).

    • Focus: The user knows exactly what you do in 3 seconds.
    • Speed: We load one optimized image. We use CSS Grid for layout. No heavy JavaScript.
    • Conversion: You force yourself to choose your #1 Value Proposition. You stop diluting your message.

    Less movement = More attention.

    Are all sliders evil? No. Carousels are useful when the user wants to browse content, not when you force it on them.

    Acceptable Use Cases:

    • Product Galleries: On a WooCommerce product page, the user expects to swipe through photos.
    • Testimonials: A small slider showing reviews is fine.
    • Logo Carousels: Displaying client logos.

    How we build them: We never use Revolution Slider. We use lightweight, code-only libraries like Splide.js or Swiper.js.

    • They weigh 10kb (vs 500kb).
    • They are touch-friendly.
    • They don’t block the rendering of the page.

    Conclusion: Stop Moving, Start Selling

    Your website is not a PowerPoint presentation. It is a sales tool.

    Every time you ask for a slider, you are prioritizing “looking cool” over “working well.” At AgilePress, we choose performance. We choose clarity.

    Kill the slider. Save the speed.

  • The Vanity Trap: Why Your WooCommerce Store Needs Less, Not More

    We see it in almost every briefing. A client comes in with a list of requirements: “I want the menu to look like Zara’s. I want the checkout flow of Shopify. And I want the animations I saw on Apple’s landing page.”

    It is natural to want a unique, stunning website. You love your business, and you want your store to reflect that passion.

    But here is the hard truth: Apple has 500 engineers. You have a business to launch.

    At AgilePress, we believe that in E-commerce, boring sells. Standardization converts. And spending 100 hours customizing every pixel of WooCommerce is not an investment; it is a vanity tax that will not bring you a single euro in return.

    Here is why your store needs to be standard, fast, and simple.

    Jakob’s Law: The Science of “Standard”

    There is a fundamental principle in User Experience (UX) design called Jakob’s Law. It states:

    “Users spend most of their time on other sites. This means that users prefer your site to work the same way as all the other sites they already know.”

    When you customize your WooCommerce checkout to make it “unique,” or when you move the cart icon to a “creative” location, you are breaking this law. You are forcing the user to relearn how to shop.

    Friction kills sales.

    WooCommerce, out of the box, follows the standard e-commerce patterns that 99% of internet users already understand. The “Add to Cart” button is where they expect it. The checkout asks for the right fields.

    Don’t try to reinvent the wheel. The round wheel already works perfectly.

    The Hidden Cost of the “100 Hours”

    Let’s talk about Return on Investment (ROI).

    Imagine you have a budget for 100 hours of work. You have two options:

    • Option A (The Vanity Route): We spend those 100 hours writing custom code snippets to hide fields, installing plugins to add “wishlists” that no one uses, and tweaking the CSS so the buttons have a specific gradient.
      • Result: A “unique” website.
      • ROI: €0. No one buys a product because the button has a gradient.
    • Option B (The AgilePress Route): We launch the standard store in 10 hours. We spend the remaining 90 hours on Professional Product Photography, SEO, and Google Ads.
      • Result: A functional website with traffic and customers.
      • ROI: Sales.

    Development does not create demand. Marketing and Product create demand. Every hour you spend “decorating” the code is an hour you are not selling.

    The Product is King (The Website is Just the Shelf)

    Shift your mindset: Your website is not a piece of art. It is a supermarket shelf.

    When you walk into a supermarket to buy cereal, what do you want from the shelf?

    1. It should be clean.
    2. It should be well-lit.
    3. The price should be clear.

    You don’t want the shelf to dance, flash neon lights, or ask you 5 questions before you can pick up the box.

    If your product is good, it doesn’t need a “parallax effect” to sell. It needs a high-resolution photo, a clear description, and a fast “Buy” button. If your product is bad, a €50,000 custom website won’t save it.

    Invest in your content, not the container.

    Minimum Viable Trust (What Actually Matters)

    We are not saying your site should look “cheap” or broken. We are saying it should focus on Trust rather than Decoration.

    These are the only “Must-Haves” for a store to convert:

    1. Speed: It must load instantly (this is why we use lightweight themes and good hosting).
    2. Payment Security: Use recognized gateways like Stripe, PayPal, or Redsys.
    3. Clarity: Readable typography, whitespace, and clear legal policies (Shipping/Returns).
    4. Standardization: A cart that looks like a cart.

    Everything else—popups, spinning wheels, complex filtering systems, social proof notifications—is often just noise that distracts the user from the only goal: Checkout.

    Conclusion: Launch Fast, Sell Sooner

    The market doesn’t wait for your website to be “pixel perfect.”

    Our strategy at AgilePress is the MVP (Minimum Viable Product).

    1. Launch with a clean, standard WooCommerce setup.
    2. Start selling immediately.
    3. Gather data.

    If, after selling 1,000 units, the data tells us that a specific custom feature will increase sales by 10%, then we build it. But we never build based on assumptions or vanity.

    Your business needs revenue, not a design award.