'Create Lease' CTA straight to paid wizard: +32.2% purchases
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsChanging the homepage button from "View Free Forms" to "Create Lease" and sending visitors straight to the paid lease wizard lifted purchases by 32.2%.
Revenue per visitor rose 20.4%. EZ Landlord Forms ran this three-arm test, and it was published as a VWO case study.
- Paid purchases: +32.2% for the arm that changed the text and skipped the middle page.
- Revenue per visitor: +20.4% for the same arm.
- The arm with the new text but the old path did not win. Its numbers were not shared, so the effect of the text alone is unclear.
- Free account sign-ups were tracked, but the result for them was not shared.
The change
The CTA text changes and now skips the free-forms page to open the paid wizard.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
The homepage button read "View Free Forms". It led to a middle page where visitors could browse free forms and sign up for a free account.
Variant
The button read "Create Lease" and went straight to the paid lease wizard, with no free-forms page in between. A third arm used the new text but kept the old middle page.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- "Create Lease" names the job visitors came to do. "View Free Forms" pointed them at a side path.
- Dropping the free-forms page removed a step and a distraction for people ready to buy a lease for their state.
- Visitors who only wanted free forms may have converted less, which is why the free sign-up rate matters as a guardrail.
Caveats: The winning arm changed both the button text and the funnel path, so the lift can't be credited to one of them. The test ran for two weeks on about 6,000 visitors across three arms.
Who ran it
EZ Landlord Forms ran this test for online lease form and lease builder service for landlords and published the results (VWO case study). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on EZ Landlord Forms →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we point our main homepage CTA at the paid product and skip the free middle step, then more visitors will buy, because the path is shorter and matches what they came for.
- Primary metric
- Paid purchases per visitor
- Guardrails
- Revenue per visitor
- Free account sign-ups
- Repeat or later purchases from free users
- Who should test it
- Freemium or free-tool SaaS businesses where the free path sits in front of the paid one. If free users are a big source of later upgrades, check the long-term effect before you drop the free step.
Questions
Should a freemium site send visitors to the paid product first?
In this test, sending homepage visitors straight to the paid lease wizard lifted purchases by 32.2%.
Watch free sign-ups too, since that path may feed later sales.
Was it the button text or the shorter path that worked?
It's hard to say. The arm with only the new text did not win, which suggests skipping the middle page mattered, but its numbers were not shared.
How long should a test like this run?
This one ran for two weeks on about 6,000 visitors across three arms.
Smaller sites may need longer to reach a reliable result.