This post is part of our Customer Spotlight series. If you have an interesting story to tell and would like to share your experience with WordPress and Elegant Themes on our blog, please contact us!
Fearless Launching was my very first online program. When I launched it for the first time back in Spring 2012, I didn’t have the resources or time to build a beautiful site for it.
It lived in the shadows on my main site AnneSamoilov.com. A simple text sales page that did bring in sales (surprisingly enough!).
My membership area lived on a simple page too for that first round.
Looking back now – I see that I make bare bones sound glamorous! But part of my thinking was always – do what you can and CBB (could be better) and just get out your minimum viable product.
That was it.
However, over time my MVP became my signature offering. So – I’ve made loads of improvements to the content, the structure of the course, and even how it’s delivered to the community. The work has expanded so much… while still maintaining it’s simple quality.
My Half Baked Attempt To Go Pro
By the end of the first year offering the program I started to make additional changes to the sales site. I turned my plain wp page into an Optimize Press based sales site.
Can you say shaded boxes and bullet lists?
I still am no designer, no one to take the brand or the site where I wanted it to…but I did my best in that time.
I continued making small tweaks to this same page throughout 2013…and though 2 more launches went by that did make sales, I could feel my own excitement waning a bit. I knew I needed to update the site – get a clear makeover.
Making The Decision To Change
Image by 6gasix / shutterstock.com
I’ve got a history of dragging my feet when changing anything to do with design and look. In addition to that, I’m always asking, does this really need to be changed?
I already had my sensors up that I wanted the site’s visual style to change… meaning: I wanted a visual style!
I knew that the course deserved attention. I needed to bring the visual quality up in everything I delivered. I knew that my graphic-lacking, no-personal-style sales site would have to go.
Honestly – I didn’t know what I was looking for. And at that point I even thought I was going to pick a theme that got me most of the way there design wise and do the rest myself.
I discovered lots of buzz about Divi and decided to try it out myself.
I started to set up the pages for my sales site… and I could see the skeleton of something greater…but that’s where it ended.
I needed a professional on the job.
When discussing the new sales site, we never intended to use Divi, but we discovered that it really did give us all the functionality we wanted…and my designer/developer was happy. This is a big deal when you’re working with someone.
Even half way through the design process, I knew that Divi was going to stick.
So easy to use, so elegant and honestly – that’s all I ask for. If you give me those things, I’m in for life!
But That’s Not Where The Fun Ended
Customers and friends and colleagues shared their feedback for the new site and I was thrilled that it was going over so well.
I let the excitement for the site fuel me to update my members area. We brought some of the visual style right inside the program…and though we’re not using the same theme in there, we’re using the style we established with the Divi site.
Divi fueled me to start making micro changes to every aspect of the Fearless Launching brand.
Fearless Launching is about putting your big ideas forward into the world. And I really feel like finally with the new site on Divi helped us leapfrog the bigger idea we’re trying to spread. Finally I have a site that not only feels more like me, but now I am looking for ways to bring those elements into the rest of my biz.
Stay tuned for another chapter in this story…
Article thumbnail image by venimo / shutterstock.com
Hi Anne, interesting post. However, I would loved to see more screenshots or at least hear what was so special in Divi that supported your decision for it… do you love the Divi Builder, the premade stuff, the icons… all of them?
That would help other biz owners and site developers to make a decision for Divi (which btw is the most amazing WP theme out there from my POV)…
Phil, I was just thinking about this post again and revisited the comments. I’ll be updating my use of Divi and more specifically what I loved about it’s features…and why I’m still using it! The site is live now because we are open, so you’ll be able to see more. Nothing super duper uber fancy, but it does its job! -Anne
Thanks Anne. I recently switched my entire website over to DIVI and your post was encouraging and inspiring. Peace and Love. JoreJjZ
Thanks Anne and Elegant Themes!
Greatly appreciate the information and motivation to make the change to Divi!
When I saw this article in my inbox, I thought it was a clever way for Elegant Themes to hook me to read it by using my own first name, Anne. So, I guess it worked. LOL… I read the whole thing. Great job, Anne-with-an-E! I have a client who is trying to figure out how to do a launch and I will recommend your program to her. 🙂
the other “Anne” – http://www.awesomewriter.com
Hello Anne, As of this June date, I just received the Elegant Themes newsletter, featuring your article and site. I am anxious to see what it looks like (and, perhaps surprisingly, the content as well), but all I get is a landing capture page. I’ve just put my email there, and hopefully — sooner or later — I will be able to see what the site looks like. Not the most informative “Elegant” newsletter article; but, albeit frustrated, I look forward to one day seeing it.
Sorry to hear that Don! The program is only open a few times per year. I’ve also used the divi theme on this site for another product – so you can get an idea of what it looks like – same sort of branding… http://go.annesamoilov.com/walkthrough
-Anne
i love DIVI… here my work http://www.dhdesigner.info
Thank you for the story, l had used divi theme and l cannot adapt it to my own philosophy of web design
Great story Anne. I love what you have been able to do with Divi. I finally got around to using it for one of my clients and it is amazingly easy to use and customize (www.eliterentalinfo.com). I just started revamping our church website with it because it is so much fun. It’s great to see another entrepreneur moving forward with your dreams! Its great and inspirational and even more so that it involves sharing your success with other. That’s the true entrepreneurial spirit. Good luck on all your future endeavors!!!
Thanks Geno! The full site will be back up soon – in between launches and changes we pull it all back down, but I’m so glad you’ve seen the site and what we’ve been able to do! I love Divi and have since seen a few others using it – and it makes me love the theme even more! So easy to work with!
When I visited there was kind of an insistant popup requiring the entry of an email address before continuing. I would think that would discourage about 90% of new visitors from seeing what was next. Is that a temporary thing?
Steve,
Thanks for your comment. I think you mean the pop up on AnneSamoilov.com. I put that up about a year ago and it immediately improved sign ups, but I do play around with the settings… I think I’m due to make the pop up happen later…which is my personal preference too!
Thanks for sharing though, because I like to hear specifically how it affected your experience of the site.
-Anne 🙂
Actually, the popup is on Fearless Launching.
The popup says “The next session of Fearless Launching opens soon! Enter your name and email address below to find out all the details.” and you can’t get past that point without entering your email address.
Bizarre…now there is just a landing page because the launch is closed. I think you mean this landing page doesn’t allow you to see the actual site. So sorry – and we’ll be back up soon!
hey, grate and hardworking story…
thanks for it…
beside your great story, I just want to tell you the the website has a low loading time. you should check with your developer to improve the website loading time.
Best regards
Thanks for your feedback! I fixed the size of the image on that leadpages landing page which probably made the page load slow! I’m learning still! So – really thank you for your comment!
-Anne
Agreed.
Fearless Launch took over a minute to load and the main site never loaded for me.
FearlessLaunch looked great though!
-Kraymer
Thanks for sharing. I used divi for my site http://www.creativeclickmedia.com also. I love seeing all the beautiful designs people have been able to create using this simple yet powerful theme. It is amazing just how many different things are being done with it. I really like your design and wish you the best of luck with your business!
HI Adam,
What popup tool are you using. I like how it looks and behaves.
Thanks!
Hi Adam. I noticed your Services menu header doesn’t go anywhere. How did you do that? I’m a bit of a novice, so I’m sorry if this is an easy question 🙂
I just saw this comment, and realize i’m a tad late. It’s very easy actually: All you have to do is create a custom link in the menu section, and instead of a URL simply add a # symbol. Then, add subpages. and VOILA! the effect has been created. Doing this can help make a websites navigation much easier, as you probably already realize. Anyway, I hope you see this response and I apologize again for not seeing this sooner.
Adam, I just noticed you live in Toms River. That’s where I’m from (I graduated from Toms River North. I hope your business is doing well! I’m just getting ready to update my company site at gcpublishing.com with Divi, too. Although, I’m probably going to wait until the newest version is released.
Jim, things are good here. I am also very excited about divi 2.0. I can hardly wait for the update!
Is that front page that captures email address with the ‘Tell Me More’ button a plugin or some magical portion of Divi I have missed!?
Nope – the landing page now is a leadpages page, but I’m working on a home page that will look similar using the Divi theme! Happy to share more screenshots and the site will be open again soon for a special enrollment, so you can peek at some of the other changes I made. 🙂
Lovely story and site. Thanks for sharing. Elegant Themes especially now with Divi has been the way for many of us to emerge and shine online.
Thanks so much for sharing your story Anne. I too can get caught up in the details and will almost talk myself out of doing something, if I think it will be too time consuming. I was really excited about the new Divi theme because I knew it was finally going to allow me to put my own personal stamp on my site. I am in the process of re-branding and reformatting now, but I will be ready to launch my new site, along with its new membership area by May 1st. Just in time for my 6 year business anniversary. Thanks to Elegant Themes!
Love it Lisa! Divi was fun to play with and easy for my developer to put my own personal stamp on it!
I’m embracing the whole visual part of my brand now – thank goodness!