Writing a whowins Listing That Earns Clicks

Taking a seat puts your listing in a row that visitors scan in under a second. In that second they see a logo, a name and the start of a line, and they decide whether to click. Everything in this post is about winning that second. Nothing in it changes what the seat costs or who holds it; the mechanic is covered in how a seat changes hands.

What a visitor sees in a row

A row on a board shows the product’s logo, its name, a one-line description and the link. The row also shows the current price and the last payment, but visitors looking for a product read those less than founders do. Your listing has three things to get right: the mark, the name and the line.

The name

Use the product’s real name, as it appears on the product’s own site. Do not pad it with a tagline or a category; the line is for that. A name a visitor can remember and type later is worth more than a clever one.

The one-line description

This is the part most listings get wrong. The line should say what the product does for the visitor of this board, in words that visitor uses. Compare:

• Before: “The all-in-one platform for modern teams to collaborate smarter”
• After: “Shared inbox for support teams that answer email in Slack”

The second line names the buyer, the job and the context. It is not catchy; it is clear, and clear earns the click. Write the line for the board the seat is on. The same product on a different board gets a different line, because the visitor is different. Our post on choosing your first board explains why the board sets the audience.

A few things to leave out of the line: superlatives, the word revolutionary, a count of features, and anything you would not say to a customer in person.

The logo

The logo is rendered small, in a row with other logos. A simple mark with strong contrast reads at that size; a detailed illustration or a wordmark with thin letters turns into a smudge. Upload a square image with the mark filling most of it and no padding you did not intend. If the product has no mark, a single bold letter on a solid background does the job better than a photograph.

The link

The link is where the visit goes, and it is the whole point of the seat. Point it at the page a visitor from this board should land on. For most products that is the home page. For a product with several audiences, the page written for this board’s visitor converts better than the generic one.

Links to chat apps and invite pages are not accepted; the link goes to the product. Outbound links carry the attributes a ranked board should carry, and a visit is counted as a visit whatever the attributes say.

Reading what the clicks tell you

Exit clicks on your listing are counted and shown to you. They do not move the seat; the only thing that moves a seat is a larger payment. What they do is tell you whether the listing works. A seat with many visits to the board and few clicks on your row has a listing problem, not a seat problem. Rewrite the line before you spend more on the seat.

Mistakes that cost visits

• A line that describes the company instead of the product
• A logo with text too small to read at row size
• A link to a sign-up page when the visitor has not seen the product yet
• A name with a tagline bolted on
• A line written for investors rather than users

Each is fixable in a minute, and each is a reason a visitor on a good board scrolls past a good product.

Testing the line with exit clicks

A line is a hypothesis about what the board’s visitor wants to hear, and exit clicks are the test. Hold the seat for a week with one line, note the clicks, then take the seat again with a different line if the first one underperformed what the board’s traffic should send. The seat’s price is the cost of the test; on a quiet row near the flat amount it is a cheap one. Our post on when to take a seat and when to wait covers setting the number for that.

Most listings improve on the second line, because the first one is written for the founder and the second for the visitor.

A listing checklist

1. Name as it appears on your site
2. One line naming the buyer, the job and the context
3. A square mark that reads at small size
4. A link to the page this board’s visitor should land on
5. A second look at the line with the board’s visitor in mind

With the listing right, the seat does its work. The leaders page shows the top rows of every board; look at the listings there, not only the prices, and notice which lines you would click.