Money Lab

Brainstorming a pool urine detector 404 page and April Fool's event, I share how to design an engaging sales page for a fake product. Inspired by the myth of a pool urine detector dye, I discuss creating a convincing product to deter pool pee-ers. The sales page includes a hero image, how it works, history of the myth, pop culture references, and statistics on the dangers of pool urine. I also explore the importance of design and storytelling in making the page both believable and entertaining.

Creators & Guests

Host
Matt Giovanisci
Founder of SwimUniversity.com

What is Money Lab?

Matt Giovanisci and friends drop the gauntlet of truth about being self-employed, serial entrepreneurs. They're not "teaching" how to build a successful company. Instead, they run business challenges and experiments offering a transparent view of what it takes to make money online.

Matt Giovanisci:

Hey. It's Matt from Money Lab. Today, I am brainstorming a design for my pool urine detector 404 page slash April fools day event. Now I recognize that you are hearing this way after April fools day, but I thought this would be a helpful episode to record if anyone's thinking about designing a sales page for anything. Because it technically, what I'm doing is to for context, I read about this concept.

Matt Giovanisci:

Actually, I didn't read about it. What the hell? I'm just that was a total fucking lie, by the way. I found out about this concept called super pixels, which was developed or coined by Glenn Allsop of or also known as Viperchill. He has a site called detailed dotcom.

Matt Giovanisci:

I think it's detail. I think it's e d. And he has a course called SEO blueprint, And my friend, Sean Ogle, took that course and told me about this concept of super pixels after I forget I had brought up something that I was working on, and he was like, oh, it sounds like the idea of super pixels. And I was like, oh, please tell. And he kinda told me the basic concept of it, and I was like, got it.

Matt Giovanisci:

And so sort of came home from that trip and ran with this idea that I wanted to create a 404 page that would get talked about, that would, you know, perhaps get some links in the process. And now, obviously, for linking to a 404 page is kind of stupid. It's not actually a backlink. So what I thought about doing was I I I did an episode. If you've heard this, if you're, an avid listener, you may have heard me actually come up with this idea in real time on this podcast.

Matt Giovanisci:

But the idea was, what is a 4 zero four page? It's a page that doesn't exist. And as soon as I said that phrase, I I it it triggered a thought that this pool urine detector, this this dye that you add to the pool where if someone pees in the pool, it turns blue around them, that also does not exist. It has been a myth apparently since 1958. So it's been around for a long time, this this quote, unquote myth.

Matt Giovanisci:

Right? Now it is a myth. It can't it can't be done chemically. It's it's a it's an impossible chemical to create. And the reason it's impossible is just because, the amount of urine that would it would take for the dye to turn just would never happen, like your pool would have to be 90% urine or some insane amount.

Matt Giovanisci:

And so the yeah. There's just no chemical that can do this, but parents have been telling their children this story, you know, for a very long time to deter them from peeing in the pool. They were telling, I added this chemical to the pool that turns the pool blue. Now, yes, it is a myth, and I thought, okay. That's cool.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's that that aligns with my brand. Right? We sell pool chemicals. We teach pool chemistry. We are a pool company.

Matt Giovanisci:

And so I go this 404 this 404. This page doesn't exist, neither does this chemical, but we made it. So the idea was, and I've had I've had this core idea for a very long time. I always wanted to create a a bottle, just an empty chemical bottle, with a professional label on it that was called urine detector, and the idea being that a a parent now actually has this bottle, which doesn't exist, and they can pour the bottle of whatever, you know, they put in the bottle. I would just recommend water.

Matt Giovanisci:

They can pour it in front of their kids and just or just keep it in the cabinet and just show them, hey. I added this bottle. So it's basically just a scarecrow device. So for the last few weeks as I had this idea, I I designed a label. I had it printed with sticker mule.

Matt Giovanisci:

I ordered 16 ounce plain white plastic bottles off of Uline. I got a little stipple stipple sticker applicator. It's like this edging thing. It's this edging thing, that I got from Amazon for, like, $50 or something. Help me apply the label straight.

Matt Giovanisci:

And then, yeah. So I have a 100 of these bottles, 100 labels, and I'm going to sell them for $10 a piece. So what is that? A $1,000? No.

Matt Giovanisci:

Is that right? No. Wait. Hold on a sec. Dude, why is that so hard for me to do math on?

Matt Giovanisci:

I think it's $1,000. Yeah. So if I sell $10 times 100 is $1,000. Do you I I was like, that sounds kinda low. It is low.

Matt Giovanisci:

So, yeah, it's it's mostly just a fun thing. Now I'm not gonna make a $1,000 because, it cost me money for the bottle. It costs me money for the shipping and all that stuff. I even have, shipping bags. And so the general idea is as a 4 zero four page, this will actually be a sales page for a real product that somebody can buy that doesn't exist.

Matt Giovanisci:

And I know that's gonna be very confusing, and so I wanna make so this part of this brainstorming is to make sure that it is not confusing. Okay? I'm also, boiling some water here. So if you hear something yeah. Boiling some more water to sterilize it so I can do some yeast washing.

Matt Giovanisci:

Oh, so nerdy stuff. Beer nerdy crap. Alright. So what I'm essentially going to do is this is going to be a sales page first and foremost. Okay?

Matt Giovanisci:

So I am designing a page that I I guess will be like swimuniversity.com/pooldashurindetector or something like that, or pool dash urine or something. Actually, I already have that page developed, or I already have that URL picked out because I had to put it on the label as a QR code. So I'm going to have this so this is what this page is going to be. So that that way and this page will always exist, and that will be where people will send links to. Okay?

Matt Giovanisci:

And I need that to be a real page so that if anyone does find this, you know, when I do launch this on April fools day on April 1st, people will have something to link to. And and if they do, I'll get that backlink credit, etcetera. Now I'm gonna duplicate the page at or duplicate the design of the page as my 404 page. So it will exist as my 404 page and as a page in the website. It will have slightly different copy because the 404 page will have a different headline than the main page.

Matt Giovanisci:

So I have kind of already half designed it. So at the very top, and I and what I'm trying to figure out in this brainstorming session is how to tell the story and in what order of the page to that makes the most sense. So I have to pick what's the most important factors that to to display at the top, and then how to go down the list. So at the very, very top, it's your hero image of the actual bottle itself. And I'm trying to decide if, you know, the headline is basically, you know, for the April fools headline, you know, this chemical doesn't exist, so we made it, something like that.

Matt Giovanisci:

And it will have a buy button, and I thought it could have a learn more button. And the learn more button would just auto scroll you down a a few notches. And that learn more button is really just for the people who are not scrolling. Maybe they're on an iPad, maybe they're on a phone and they don't wanna scroll or they don't know they can scroll, whatever. I just figured that's just a auto scroller effect.

Matt Giovanisci:

And the buy now button is just gonna take them to a page where they could buy it for $10, Flat fee, free shipping, the whole deal. Alright? So the next section, which I started designing, and I'm like, I don't really know what to do there, is how it basically go the the headline, and I found this because this is actually a quote from the National Swimming Pool Foundation, which has been which is no longer a thing, but it is now part of, like, pool hot tub alliance or something like that, or PUFTA, which is terrible. Anyway, they said it's the it's the greatest or the most common pool myth of all time. So I said so I wrote, the most common pool myth of all time has been discovered.

Matt Giovanisci:

Something like that. And then I wrote the little sub headline that says, since 1958, you know, parents have been telling their children that this chemical exists or telling this lie of the chemical that doesn't exist. So we made it true by creating an empty bottle with a with a convincing label to stop swimmers from your from peeing in your pool. Here's how it works. So the idea was first, and I'm gonna start writing this down.

Matt Giovanisci:

I'm just at the top and write who you're in, sales page. I don't need design help. I mostly just need story arcs. So step number 1 is hero image and headline with buy button. Alright.

Matt Giovanisci:

So now just sort of brainstorming a few things, I have I have different elements of the page and I just need to put them in sequential order that makes sense. So one of those things is how it works. Now I actually ended up getting a bottle, a prototype of this bottle made very quickly. So as soon as the labels I had a I had a sample bottle, and as soon as the labels came in, I labeled that one bottle and overnighted it to my buddy in Florida, and I sent him a shot list of different vertical and horizontal videos that I needed to make the sales video, to make our short form videos, and he got me a bunch of images as well. So I have images of, like, his kids.

Matt Giovanisci:

I have an I literally have an image of him pouring the bottle in the pool in front of his kids. Perfect. Okay? So I thought I could do a how this works. You know, take an empty bottle, fill it with water.

Matt Giovanisci:

It's like like, you know, I I I don't even have 3 steps. It's like really just 2 steps. Like, fill an empty bottle with water, you know, you know, adding blue food coloring is optional, you know, took for a more realistic thing, and then pour in front of your kids. And then and then the third thing is, like, urine free pool. The other piece of the puzzle is the other piece of the puzzle is I'm just gonna write that down.

Matt Giovanisci:

K? How it works, images, right? I have a how to video, I will have that. How to video slash sales video because it'll be both. Because how to, it's not really there's not really much how to to it.

Matt Giovanisci:

You know what I mean? It's like fill it with water, dump it in front of your kids. 2 steps. Then we have The other piece of the puzzle we have is I have references, like pop culture references. I have 2 of them.

Matt Giovanisci:

I may be able to find a third one if I could, but I have videos of both of these. So I'm gonna write that down too. So the pop culture references that I have of this chemical existing is this is and this is absolutely crazy to me. The first one and the most popular one is the movie Grown Ups. In the movie Grown Ups, all the grown ups, I guess, quote unquote pee in the pool and it turns blue around them.

Matt Giovanisci:

So that is a famous scene if you've seen grown ups. I've never seen grown ups, but I know that that scene exists. Now, the first time I ever heard of this chemical was and I could not believe I still remember this to this day, is in an episode of Pete and Pete or the adventures of Pete and Pete, which was a Nickelodeon show. And I ended up finding the actual episode where they add this chemical on YouTube. So it exists on YouTube.

Matt Giovanisci:

And it it I'm like, I cannot believe I remembered it, and I cannot believe that I found it. So it it exists. I have it. So I have now two references. I may wanna I think I wanna put them on this page somewhere.

Matt Giovanisci:

I just don't know in which order I think it makes the most sense. You know, perhaps it's just links and it's not like a call out to them. Perhaps it's like, you know, you may have seen this, you know, it's something like as seen on as seen on TV section. Oh, I kinda like that. I'm just gonna write that, as seen on TV section.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's pretty cool because then I can kinda play off that that thing. Okay. I'm I'm not I'm digging that. And then there's the last piece of the puzzle I think I have is statistics. So and I I can probably pull out 3 decent statistics, And this is where I'm not sure at which stage to add this.

Matt Giovanisci:

So it's almost like you have hero image headline, how the thing works, right? And then probably a video, and the video should contain some of those statistics, then maybe statistics, and then maybe pop culture references. So I'm just gonna write down statistics, and I wanna write down what those statistics are because I think that that's important. Or statistics slash facts or warnings. So the idea being that, like, okay, why is peeing in a pool, you know, besides being gross, let me just write this down.

Matt Giovanisci:

You know, I'll just say, peeing in a pool is not just gross, It's also dangerous. And then the facts are, uses up chlorine, causes chloramines, lungs, lung issues, and maybe there's something else. I don't know what the third one is. I could probably come up with something. So I almost feel like the fact so, like, the facts, everyone knows that it's gross.

Matt Giovanisci:

We all we all we no one wants anyone to pee in the pool. Right? We get that. I and I think that that's why it's not worth putting that at the very top of the page or at least above any other thing. I think everything else is a little bit more fun.

Matt Giovanisci:

I wonder if I can mix the how to video with the pop culture references or how it work or, you know, pop culture references is interesting. That could technically be Oh, I like the history of the myth. History of myth. Alright. So that's the section.

Matt Giovanisci:

Because with the history section, I can I I'm all I'm almost I almost think I have it? The fuck was that? Is that me? So you would do I think I wonder if the how it works the how it works thing is it you're gonna get 3 really nice images because they're gonna be photos. Although, I could do it as graphics, but I kinda feel like if I do it as graphics, you won't think it's real.

Matt Giovanisci:

So I have to so the so one of the things I'm trying to overcome very quickly is that this thing is real. The bottle itself is real. So I think by having a visual graphical representation of, like, the how to steps, which we would sometimes see, I think having the actual physical bottle, like me literally filling it up in the sink and me, yeah, and me, or, like, have and then having it, like, my friend pour it in the pool, and then have, like, the last scene be, like, a a photo of his kids, like, jumping in the pool, or I do have, like, an image of his I I told him to do this. I have, like, an image of his son standing in the middle of the pool, and I was like, just have him stand there looking guilty in the pool, and then I'll just, like, in superimpose a blue dye around him for effect. Can't believe he's he's like, yeah.

Matt Giovanisci:

Sure. Whatever. Be interesting. So I think I think the statistics and warnings and facts, that whole section is, like, just such a bummer. Because it's like, yeah, we know, but I almost feel like you could do you do the hero image, you do how it works, 3 steps, you do history of the myth section, you do the video the sales I wonder okay.

Matt Giovanisci:

I got it. I got it. I got it. I got it. So the sales video, that's not a section.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's watch now. Watch video button. So instead of the learn more button that I mentioned, it'll be a watch video button, and then it'll be a pop up. That's how I do that. Okay.

Matt Giovanisci:

So how to video section, because I was always worried about the video just taking up too much space. Alright. So then yeah, history history of the myth can just be, I do have a story of where it began or, like, the a reference of it, and then I can show a side by side of the 2 clips on YouTube. So that'll be, yeah, that would be cool. Alright.

Matt Giovanisci:

And then statistics. And the statistics could be similar to the yeah. The statistics could be like a 3 okay. Now I'm thinking of design. So, I'm just gonna rip this off and start designing this, kind of like wireframing it real quick.

Matt Giovanisci:

I know that's not really useful in a podcast setting, but bear with. Bear with. Alright. So I got I'm just I just stuck that whiteboard up somewhere else so I know what to work on. Okay.

Matt Giovanisci:

So sorry if I'm sounding far away, but I'm alright. Let me just let me just hold the hold the microphone. Hold the phone. What's in micro? Okay.

Matt Giovanisci:

So we have, you know, headline, bottle. Got it. Squeakly line, which is the separator, and then we have headline, and then we have 3 steps. And those steps, I'm gonna get very specific here on those steps, are fill bottle, 2, add 3, swim safely or urine free. Cool.

Matt Giovanisci:

Kinda funny. And then do another squiggly line, and we said it was gonna be History of the myth, 2 kind of sentences. 2 videos, Squeaky line. Got it. Alright.

Matt Giovanisci:

I'm digging this so far. I'm just gonna rip this off because I've already designed so much. With so much paper. Alrighty. And then the last step, okay, is the statistics.

Matt Giovanisci:

So then we have, you know, peeing in a pool is gross and dangerous. And then we'll have a graphic. I don't know what yet. Headline details. And then we'll have, yeah, I already like this.

Matt Giovanisci:

Graphic headline, details, and then the 3rd graphic, headline, details. Cool. Alright. So then I just need to, you know, uses chlorine, chloramines, and then I don't know what the third one is, and there may not be one. And then down there is the footer.

Matt Giovanisci:

Or and then we can have one more buy. Okay. So the other place I think I need a buy button is the history of the myth, maybe? Yeah. Yeah.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's that's great. Okay. So to recap this little brainstorm at Sesh, something that I I think I can knock this out relatively fast. I was hoping, you know, it's I right now, it's 6:30 on a Wednesday. I have a meeting tomorrow.

Matt Giovanisci:

I I do have some time to work on it tonight. I already kinda crafted the the the headline area, so I have that. Well, I have it done in Figma. I don't have it done in code yet. But once I think once I do it in Figma, it should be I should be able to code it relatively fast.

Matt Giovanisci:

And I think I'm gonna start you know, there's what's interesting is, like, I have never used Figma or even Adobe XD to design websites before I coded them. And I now I'm thinking I should have been doing that all along because I'm like, oh, I'll just code it. I'm much faster. But it's I I can do more interesting things in Figma and then go, you know what? This is worth this is worth coding this in x or coding this in HTML or whatever.

Matt Giovanisci:

So and plus, I can mess around with different colors without having to change code and reupload and re, you know so, yeah, I I I like the idea of doing it in Figma first in this particular case. Okay. So then yeah. Cool. I am digging this.

Matt Giovanisci:

I could I'm already, like, thinking of what the color should be. This is blue here. Take pictures of these and bring them downstairs. Alright. To recap, we have the headline, which for the main page, I'll probably just call it something like, you know yeah.

Matt Giovanisci:

Something like a nice big headline and a little bit of subtext, buy button, watch video button. Great. Actually, I'm gonna put that into the design here. Bye. Watch.

Matt Giovanisci:

Okay. Then we have the greatest myth of all time. Oh, that is not what it that is not what it should say up there. It that should be the history of the myth. It should be, like, the greatest myth of all time has been just, you know, the greatest myth of all time.

Matt Giovanisci:

Well, no. No. No. That that that that has a that has some continuity to it. So the the most common myth of all time common pool myth of all time has been discovered, blah blah blah, here's how it works.

Matt Giovanisci:

You know? Or it could say, here's you know, and that could be, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I'm I'm gonna do a small text, how it works, history, you know, like, the myth has been just that big headline and then some subtext, and then the 3 steps, and then history of the myth, some subtext, 2 the 2 videos side by side, buy button. Final step, big headline, big headline, probably no subtext, because then the graphic, it'll be another a third headline in h in h, 3, and then some subtext for each, you know so the statistics slash danger slash chemistry behind it will be the most filled out. It'll have the most text because, you know, each thing I wanna go into detail about, okay, how does it use less?

Matt Giovanisci:

Like, what like, one of the things is that creates chloramines. So when or trichloramines. When the, night I think it's night the nitrogen or the nitrates in your urine mix I have to I have to go back and remind myself what it is. Mixes with chlorine. It creates trichloramines, which get volatized and can enter your lungs and can cause respiratory issues, which is why a lot of swimmers develop asthma because a lot of them pee in the pool.

Matt Giovanisci:

Michael Phelps has admitted to peeing in the pool. It's a common thing. So it's really the mixture with chlorine. And so having that with graphical elements, so that one I can do, you know, like, visuals and not like, you know, like graphic design instead of, images there. Because the images, I'll just I'll save for how it actually works because then that makes it feel real.

Matt Giovanisci:

Okay. Quick brainstorming session. Wonder if that was helpful or not, but it's I like sometimes sitting down and going through the story arc of what this page could be. I don't think it needs to be too long. I think that's just enough.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's all the pieces I had. And I'm trying to think if there's anything else. You know, when it comes to other people linking to this page, I will still have our heading. So our our header will still be there, which has links to all of our main pages, and our footer will still be there, which also has links to all of the main pages. So I I don't think that that will be I mean, as far as, like, Link Juice is concerned, I don't think I need to add anything else to this page.

Matt Giovanisci:

I could yeah. I don't think I need to link out to anything else within the content. All of the links will be taken care of in the header and footer for the link juice, I should say. Okay. Alright.

Matt Giovanisci:

That's it for this episode. You're gonna see this page, and then you're gonna hear if if you follow me online, I'm I'm definitely gonna be promoting this page on Twitter and and the likes. You know, this is one of those instances I really wish I had the MoneyLabs email list still, because I could just say, hey. Look what I did. But, in this case, I will be tweeting about this, obviously, sooner than later.

Matt Giovanisci:

You are gonna be hearing this almost a month later. So maybe even more than a month later, but perhaps this is still helpful. And, yeah, just just thinking through sales page design. Alright. That's it.

Matt Giovanisci:

Shoot me an email, matt@moneylab.ko. Bye.