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Comment by jv22222 | Hacker News Reader

IMHO - On the signup popup form. If you want to close it without entering an email address you have to click a link that says - "No thanks, I hate saving money" - it seems to go against the friendliness of the rest of the branding.

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I agree. I suck at marketing, so had someone come up with that, but I actually hate it myself, so will try to think of something else. I genuinely want to build something useful that will bring people to the site because it helps them rather that annoy them!

How about "No thanks, maybe later" or something like that :)

Even "No thanks" is fine!

IMHO forcing visitors to be "polite" to a site is just as sneaky as using "I hate saving money". It's all meant to make a visitor feel guilty about clicking it. Just add a simple old close button and don't play marketing mind-games with your users, please.

I agree, I will toss out the marketing book that recommended that, and try being human instead!

Thanks, but I removed the popup instead :-)

How about not having a modal dialog that prevents me from seeing / using the site entirely?

Are the signups you get really worth driving away most first-time visitors?

No, so I turned it off.

I agree with your intuition. The likelihood that the person actually hates saving money is approximately zero. What they are actually saying is that you haven't earned their trust enough yet to cough up their email address. So when you force the question with a timed modal, they have three options: sending their email address to a site they don't trust, clicking a link that's simply a lie or just closing the tab and never coming back. Why on earth would they pick anything but the last option?

Well there was that movie Brewster Millions ;)

Thank you for that very thorough explanation. I had not thought about it that way. So thank you for the mind-opener of the day :-)

After I commented I read through some of the other replies and realize at this point it probably feels like folks are piling on this one relatively small issue. Sorry for that, but I do think it's a good sign that you're asking for (and getting haha) real feedback.

I do wish you the best!

Thanks, I do try to create something useful, but I will make it less intrusive and spell out from A - Z what the purpose of the site is, and what it is not, so that I hopefully will not start world war 3

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