#this is more true in some parts than others. jolyne for example feels so much like a person to me. part 6 is an extra special case

[astralcities]

where jjba differs from chainsaw man is that jojo is almost fundamentally unconcerned with its characters as people. characters are conduits for morals or metaphors. we all joke that nobody in jojo talks like a person but to be entirely frank almost nobody is treated like one either. chainsaw man is a story about denji learning about love. golden wind is a story about the death of justice and innocence and children...that's why jojo characters are so fascinating because they're barely meant to be characters at all. it's so interesting to see the bare moments where the action and magic is pulled back enough that you see a glimpse of personhood

[maxwell-grant]

Jojo bingo: Father Pucci

And that brings us our second bingo

If Jonathan and Dio are my favorite characters sharing a kind of number one position together, Pucci is in a bloody contest with Jolyne and Jotaro for number two. I would even argue that he's the best JoJo villain. Even with his significantly more nuanced and calmer personality compared to them, he’s just as gloriously over-the-top and ridiculously funny at points as the other main JoJo baddies. He has two of my absolute favorite Stands in the series (Whitesnake alone deserves a separate post for how much it’s personality and powers add to Pucci, who is already complex and fascinating and horrifying even without a Stand that has an entirely separate personality), he’s pro-active and vicious as a main villain to an extent the series hadn't seen since Phantom Blood Dio, he grows in power and scope and personality over the part, he’s psychologically disturbing and fucked up to an extent I'd argue surpasses Kira (y’know, the fetish-based serial killer), he adds a ton to Dio's character and his story culminates in him growing into a bigger, badder and better villain than DIO and, just, Pucci is incredible. There couldn't be a better villain to wrap up the original JoJo saga. One of the greatest villains of all time ever. 

I feel like out of all the main JoJo villains, Pucci is the only one who does pull off being morally grey (Valentine really isn’t, he’s a silver-tongued imperialist torturer and J.Geil-tier disgusting creep who’s just good enough at appropriating heroic imagery that he’s convinced himself and a good chunk of the readership (and the Eyes of Heaven writers apparently) that his deeply selfish and unfathomably monstrous plan is noble and selfless and patriotic. He’s a good and layered villain, but morally grey he isn’t). Having significantly lesser crimes compared to the others, more human reasons and more concrete goals, all of which doesn’t do that much to make him sympathetic, quite the opposite. Pucci is horrifying for a myriad of reasons, some of which have to do with the fact that we’re allowed to understand him and his backstory and his goals, and get in his headspace in a way that’s only really reserved for protagonists. Pucci is one of the best examples of how audience sympathy can be used to make villains more resonating and even more horrifying. Pucci is horrible, awful, even described as “the evil that doesn’t know that it’s evil, the worst evil there is”. And we walk through his journey every step of the way. 

Sometimes this moral greyness gives way to people arguing Pucci wasn’t so bad or that he was the only JoJo villain not motivated by selfishness, which I kinda disagree with. Because while it’s true Pucci doesn’t think of himself as selfish and genuinely believes he’s doing everyone a favor, Pucci’s plan is monstrous, and to pull it off he commits the most unfathomably selfish deed in the entire series. He quite literally breaks the universe and rebuilds it again in order to strip agency from everyone, HIMSELF INCLUDED (even if he does have more power over it than everyone else), so that everyone will accept the fate that’s decided for them and never try to defy fate. This, he argues, is born of “resolution eradicating despair”, which further cements Pucci as a Joestar-gone-wrong, in that he quite literally turns the driving ethos of the series against itself, against the universe and the Joestars. And he wins.

No one has any agency, no one's decisions matter, no one’s at fault for anything. Pucci rewrote the universe so that he’d fundamentally never be responsible for his sister's death, by making it so that she not only never really existed to begin with (since the dead do not carry over with their souls and personalities intact), but even if she did, she would have just learned it’s inevitability ahead of schedule and accepted it and be happy for it, just like everyone else, nothing anyone (certainly not him) could have ever done about it. And this? I find this to be a level of ghastly selfishness somehow scarier than anything DIO did, because it’s so much more human, so much more tragic, and so much more fucked up existentially. 

(People have argued a bit over whether or not this goal fits DIO’s character and there’s room to argue both ways, but even putting aside Eyes of Heaven (which is thankfully non-canon, but it’s take on Heaven DIO was designed with input from Araki himself, which counts for something), the plan outlined in DIO’s Diary was always meant to be fulfilled by a friend and not DIO himself)

And I think this is part of why I’m so strongly in that “Everyone is wrong about them” camp because, people consistently mischaracterize Pucci as only a couple of steps above the average DIO flunky, or someone motivated by a romantic love towards DIO (putting aside the age thing, DIO’s Diary quite literally states that Pucci would have been the wrong person if this was the case), or even non-canon spin-offs that depict Pucci as someone who’d immediately abandon Heaven if DIO was still around to boss him. I fundamentaly disagree with this because Pucci adheres to the same theme of legacy that defines Jolyne. And much like Jolyne, who has to battle for the sake of her lineage and the universe, needs to be better than Jotaro, needs to succeed where Jotaro failed (which she does through rescuing Emporio), Pucci has to be better than DIO. Stone Ocean is the glorious apocalyptic book-end to Phantom Blood, with Jolyne, at the end of the world, forcing herself into becoming the final Ultimate JoJo and wrangling along whatever reality-warping weirdos she can, as she desperately tries to catch up to the new Ultimate Evil who's running away with the plot so fast nobody can catch him until the end. 

Pucci surpasses DIO, in terms of power (he attains a Stand that surpasses all other time-based Stands, including the one that defeated The World), scope and accomplishment (he single-handedly disabilitates DIO’s arch-enemy with relative ease and then kills him by turning his time stopping power against him, as well as the current JoJo and the entire supporting cast that accompanied her, and recreates the world into one where the Joestars cannot do anything against him, and only loses because he, like Dio, goes too far and targets an outsider ally to the Joestars). Pucci isn’t DIO’s 2nd in command or partner or flunky, or DIO-lite, Pucci is superior to DIO, he’s DIO’s ultimate accomplishment, the supreme power he attains over Destiny and the Joestars, within the text. When they do JoJo mega crossovers like Jorge Joestar and Eyes of Heaven, they downplay Pucci’s agency and beef up DIO’s powers to be some multiversal world-challenging menace, just so he won’t be lagging behind Pucci, who already is that in-canon. 

Pucci is horrible because he makes use of every resource at his disposal, everything that the protagonists have, everything that the Joestar bloodline has used over the centuries, Pucci turns against them. Enrico Pucci’s endgame is to rewrite the history and ethos of JJBA itself so he may wrench defeat from the jaws of victory forever, and he succeeds, and I love that this is not at all an exaggeration of what he does. 

Pucci is horrible because everything he does stem from his complete inability to analze himself and admit wrongdoing, to even recognize his cruelty and malice as such, he has such a gargantuan moral and personal blind spot that even his Stand, the rageful melting spectre he bosses around to corrupt and kill people and strip away their memories or give them dangerous powers, is shown to be more introspective and reflective and humorous than the human who wields it, who has to yell at it occasionally to get things done. 

He compartmentalizes everything that comes his way and interprets everything so that he never has to have his worldview challenged, never has to question himself, never has to regret anything that ever happened to him or that he ever did. Everything was fated to be. Everything is a test that everyone, including him, must pass, ergo, he’s on even odds with everyone else. If he fails or fucks up, he’s being tested, ergo, he will eventually succeed. If others fail or fuck up, they’re to be disposed of, such is the order of things. If he succeeds or something goes his way, it was fated to be. If others get the upperhand, he’s being tested by fate, and since fate demands him to survive and complete his mission, he’s got permission to destroy and kill whoever’s holding him back. 

If he does horrible things, well, what’s a few corpses, or a hundred thousand, for the good of the entire world? Would you make their sacrifices meaningless by stopping him? Everything is fated to be, and fate is on his side, not yours. He’s DIO’s God’s chosen. If The Lord wanted him to stop, he’d have chosen someone else, he’d have died by now, but he didn’t, so it falls on him to drag mankind kicking and screaming into the better tomorrow his friend showed him. He barrels through the story with this mindset and even dies screaming it, screaming at Emporio and the vengeful power of the brother he murdered that they just don’t understand anything.

His backstory is so fucked up because we see how he was wronged by fate and circumstance time and time again, how he was just confused and looking for answers, but for all intents and purposes he was a good kid trying to do what was best for everyone. He went to a seminary to find answers, to alleviate his guilt over his (at the time) dead twin brother, to learn about how to find happiness for himself and others. A horrid situation was thrust into his lap by no fault of his own, and he tried to handle it with the least amount of harm to all parties, and he fucked up catastrophically. And that moment, that awful moment, where he finds Pearla’s body and has a moment of self-realization, where he briefly understands he is to blame and, is on the cusp of kickstarting the path that should have lead him to becoming a better person, a morally responsible person, and then

fucking

DIO

who immediately provides Pucci with the escape hatch out of the Painful Moral Growth path, who fills his head with poison and stunts his growth by giving Pucci absolution on the terms that Pucci wanted, not the terms that Pucci needed. What started as seemingly the most benign thing DIO had ever done for anyone (healed a young priest’s malformed foot and left him some parting words) spiraled into the actual end of the universe as said priest, well, no longer needed God, once he figured that DIO could play the part for him, could provide him the answers the church wasn’t giving him, could alleviate his guilt and teach him what brings people together and alleviate his guilt and teach what makes someone happy and alleviate his guilt and alleviate his guilt and alleviate his guilt and alleviate his guilt and

As much as I stand by the idea that Pucci is DIO’s superior and his ultimate legacy, because this is DIO we’re talking about and all evil in-universe springs from him (Araki said as much in the post-scriptum for Vento Aureo that DIO embodies Destiny and Fate), Pucci is also, to an extent, a victim of DIO. This is also part why I fundamentally disagree with the idea that Stone Ocean softened DIO. I don’t agree with the idea that his pursuit of Heaven was out of character either (it was essentially what he’d always been looking for, trying to attain happiness by taking control over his destiny in increasing bids for power and self-transformation), and I don’t agree with the idea that this was out-of-character. I’d argue DIO’s much-vaunted manipulative charisma, while always present, had never once been depicted as horrifyingly thoroughly as it is here, when he truly lives up to the dark messiah image his followers in Part 3 described and when we see how thoroughly he was able to corrupt Pucci, even while doing seemingly nothing but being the priest’s friend at a time of need. Stone Ocean, I’d argue, makes DIO scarier and more godlike in a way no other part (and certainly not those crossovers that did push Dio into actual godhood) did. 

I think Pucci is one of the few religious villains I’ve seen that I like because he’s much more interesting than just a condemnation of particular priests or the church as an institution, and he doesn’t go the obvious route of being an old white bigot (quite the opposite, since those types killed his family to begin with). Rather, he embodies so many kinds of thinking you see within religious circles or mindsets. “He works in mysterious ways”, “He saves all of us in the end”, “only His will matters”, “humans cannot possibly claim to understand His design”, “there is a point to the suffering”, “the suffering will be worth it if you trust Him”, “look out for His signs even if you don’t understand what they are for”, “your suffering on Earth will be nothing compared to how much better your life will be in Heaven”, “trust those that He sends your way to guide you”, “trust not those who fall into the path of evil, the path that is not His”, “your enemies deserve salvation as well even if they don’t know it”, there’s just, so much you could dissect here, in terms of how Pucci speaks to the experience of religious thinking, or even just believing in the existence of God even if you’re not specifically christian or religious (...see why I put up there why I’m a little scared to admit I relate to, or at least kind of get, Pucci? Sometimes I think of Pucci as almost a big Mr.Hyde to the collective experience of everyone who grew up religious and had that shape their worldview whether they wanted or not.).

Pucci, a man every bit driven by the same unsatiable black hole that DIO has (just replace “ambition” with “guilt”), takes all of these, and drives them to an unfathomably horrifying, yet entirely plausible, conclusion. Spearheaded by tangible proof that yes, Fate is real, Heaven is real, and he can make it happen, no, he’s the one assigned by higher powers to make it happen, so long as he just does this and that and gets rid of some vile enemies of his that would rather have all of mankind suffer before letting him win. But, no matter, the sinners always get their due, in the end. 

I hate that Netflix’s release schedule killed the Stone Ocean hype but, no matter, nothing can take away from how great it is and how great Pucci is. Not quite my favorite but one I’d easily argue is the best villain in the series, the perfect apocalyptic pilgrim JoJo needed to bring the end of all things and the birth of countless new ones.

Also, I always read Stone Ocean and applied DIO’s OVA theme to Pucci’s scenes. I love his anime theme, but I will always think of this as Pucci’s theme first and foremost.

[mistaeq]

I'd like to request a part 6 matchup then please 👀 I'm a scorpio, INFP, bisexual, usually quiet, bizarre gen z sense of humor, big savior complex haha oops, I struggle with depression and I love drawing, listening to music and writing ofc. I get anxious in big crowds so I tend to avoid them, or if I can't avoid them then I just hide behind the person I trust. Thx bby ❤️

Matchup

TW // depression is mentioned

Thank you for your request, Memory !! Hope you will enjoy this. Finally back with matchups ~♡

Stone Ocean Matchup

WORD COUNT: 1.5k

My first matchup choice for you is...

Narciso Anasui!

When you first met, in Emporio's hidden room, Anasui asked himself how could such a quiet person like you be in jail. He genuinely couldn't get it. Narciso doesn't like too talkative people, since he moves, acts and listens to others for his own interests only. But your behavior really caught his attention. Someway maybe more than Kujo Jolyne did.

Since the first time he met anyone, that person would ask questions about his life, his mistakes, about the crime he had committed to be there. And he just didn't like it. That is why, the man had asked Emporio - or Weather Report - to be the one to inform people about his past before people asked him directly. But everyone always ended up asking him for more details. How annoying. You didn't, by the way.

Much to his surprise, though, you know how to me loud and chaotic too, above all when you and Foo Fighters laugh together over memes. He took a look at those too, just for the sake of knowing what you like. Might it be just because he knew that you were the one liking them, even if those memes were not his thing, he'll admit he's let out a couple giggles, looking through those along with you and F.F.

After he got to know you, it looked like Jolyne had completely slipped and gone away from his mind. Much to her happiness, to be honest. Narciso's undesired avances were on the verge of making her go completely feral. "It looks like it's your time to get his marriage proposals, Memory..." Kujo chirped, laughing at your shocked expression when she talked about marriage proposals.

Did you say savior complex? Narciso definitely cherishes this side of you. He's in love with the way you're always in the first row, when it comes to helping someone who needs your help. He even got the occasion to save you as well, when you happened to put yourself in trouble because of your will to absolutely help someone.

This exaggerated - but not negative at all - obsession about you made him wanna start to get all worried about everyone as well. Emporio always told you, Anasui never helped anyone, unless it regarded him or was for his own profit. You told him not to force himself over a behavior which didn't belong to him, since just like you do, he might have ended up in plenty of troubles. But he just wanted to conquer your heart.

Nobody would have dared to bet a single coin on it, but Narciso Anasui is an actual cheesy man, when he's infatuated for someone, who happens to be you. He won't even let depression get to you, the pink haired man is so ready to fight against it for you. In every hobby and passion of yours, you'll find him supporting you and complimenting your job.

This guy fucking loves reading. Please, don't be afraid to ask suggestions or opinions to him, when you're writing something and need someone to read it to comment it and maybe give you some tips. He didn't have many hobbies or things to do in prison, so he used to stick to reading books and letting his fantasy fly outside of the GD St. Jail. Plus we all know one if his all time favourite characters is Mickey... he's a hidden child.

He's never gonna bring you into crowded places, and even if he doesn't judge a place as "crowded", he's gonna ask you first anyway. The last thing Narciso wants is making you feel bad for a decision of his. He wouldn't forgive himself for such a thing. The man learnt to pay attention to your expressions of discomfort, and knows when he has to help you.

He doesn't like it, when he has to do it, because it means you're not feeling well, but he won't hide he feels pretty lucky, when you hide behind him, since it means that you really trust him. Don't tell anyone, but Jolyne and Foo Fighter overheard him bragging about this to an annoyed Weather Report, who just wanted to sleep and had to listen to Anasui's half-an-hour-long essay about you, instead.

My second matchup choice for you is...

Hermés Costello!

Hermés has been having a crush on you, a pretty strong one, for a good amount of time by now, but the thought of you probably not liking girls was haunting her, and she had no idea of what to do to not to make it awkward. She looked for Jolyne, to ask her for an opinion... and overheard you right in the act of revealing your bisexuality to your best friend. Lucky! She started to hang around you more, after that day.

The truth is, that Costello usually laughs over the bizarre gen Z type of memes, but just doesn't want to admit it. She's naturally calmer than you, or for example Foo Fighters, so she thinks that laughing over those might make her menacing woman façade disappear. She doesn't know whether it might be easier to conquer you by being serious and mysterious or by laughing with you.

When she finally chose to confess, she did it in the most cliché way ever. She just didn't know how to do it. She left a note with a confession in your prison cell, and waited for a reaction from you. If it was positive, then, good for her, she would have been able to love you. If it was negative, she would have made up an excuse to make you believe the note was just one of Jojo and F.F.'s pranks. Luckily, you accepted.

Good thing you have such a savior complex, because Hermés tends to constantly put herself in an ocean of troubles, and will definitely need someone to save her everytime, along with Jolyne and Foo Fighters. If it wasn't for you questioning where she is everytime, she probably would have died after not even a week. But luckily, she has such a good girlfriend thinking about her when she needs it.

Depression? Say no more. Your girlfriend will never leave your side on days when you feel it kicking in more than usual. It's true, you can't do much in prison, but the woman keeps on promising you that once you'll be out of there, she'll bring you to lots of new places to explore, wherever you'd like, to take care of your sadness and bad feelings. Damn, finding love in prison is wild.

She sometimes uses Kiss to duplicate herself and be able to take care of you, above all when you're feeling down and needs something to cheer you up. Two Hermés aren't just perfect for cuddling, but also to have fun, since it's comic to see her twice. Though, you tend to ask her to not to do it often, since going back to a single one after Kiss's effect ends, is sometimes painful for Hermés and you're aware of it.

"Yo, Memory... is that possibly... me?" Costello asked, staring at the drawing you were working on, sitting in your prison cell, the sketchbook on your thighs. You nodded, smiling. You enjoyed sketching her, she was like art to you, and couldn't help loving her body and facial featured. "This is fucking amazing. For real Memory." she sat next to you, and kept on staring at your drawing. "Am I that beautiful in your eyes?"

Oh god. Jolyne and Foo Fighters mock the two of you so much because of your habits. Hermés and you often happen to fall asleep, your head on her shoulder and her head on yours, while you're sharing earphones and listen to your favourite music. Such things aren't really appreciated in the middle of the girls in your prison section, so Emporio allows you and your girlfriend to rest in his hidden room.

Hermés doesn't mind big crowds, but she can't say she enjoys them. She'd rather be in peace, or at least with a bunch of people she enjoys staying with, like you, Jolyne and Foo Fighters. The four of you are like a squad, and perfectly know that they have to keep you away from big crowds. Your girlfriend usually take care of it, but if she's not around, Jojo and F.F. do it for her.

Even without you asking for it, if you can't avoid the crowd, Costello will grab your hand, to make sure you don't get lost or panic because of all the people, and pull you through the confusion of the noisy voices, to a place where the two - or four, depends on whether your friends are there too - of you can spend some quality time without having to worry about protecting you from crowds.

[liesonthefloordramatically]

TELL ME ABOUT WHY LINEAR TIME I S FAKE AND YOU CAN ONLY TRUST YOUR FISTS!!!!

Okay, listen, here’s a much longer and more heartfelt answer than you probably wanted BUT:

So a whole bunch of factors went into “linear time is fake; you can only trust your fists” but the ones related to linear time being fake:

I decided shortly after writing “Once all of this is over” that I wanted to write more about trauma in JJBA because…I don’t feel like I have to explain this (I’ll read anything as a trauma narrative if you let me)

but because I love weird superpower nonsense, I wanted to specifically write about the interactions of superpowers and trauma

this led to me coming up with one fic for every JoJo (I’ve managed to only write the ones for Joseph, Jotaro, and Jolyne [sort of], because I got so frickin’ sidetracked by how much I enjoyed writing Jotaro)

I had a moment where I was like “wow, Jotaro stopping time feels pretty similar to something that I do when I’m having a bad case of the good ol’ PTSD, where I will literally dissociate so hard that I just…stop.”  (It’s hard to describe, but imagine if you just froze in place for 20-60 seconds, including not breathing or blinking, but had no real awareness of it happening until you unfroze.)  I think I’ve also talked about this elsewhere, but the feeling of Time Becoming Weird is very much a PTSD Feel for me–the sense of foreshortened future or that the future doesn’t exist, that time is cyclical, that nothing happens linearly and the past is always omnipresent, etc.

So the only scene I had in mind when starting the fic (it was originally planned as a one-scene fic! what a naive child I was!) was Polnareff asking Jotaro about the timestop and time grinding to a halt for a moment–not because time was literally stopped but because Jotaro was experiencing a PTSD-related stutter through time

which, once I’d written that, I went, okay, but it feels like there’s more of a story to tell here about what it’s like to be someone for whom linear time Doesn’t Work–both because you can literally stop time and because you’re traumatized and your trauma has removed you from time.  So then I came up with the start of chapter two–time looping back on itself over and over.  (An aside: the way Jotaro experiences PTSD and the way I personally experience PTSD are very different, but there are a couple of nuggets in there that are similar to my experience, and the second paragraph of chapter 2 is absolutely one of them.)  And then I started adding more from there–I think the first scene in chapter 4, where Jotaro sees Polnareff in the hospital bed and the narrative immediately jumps back to a parallel scene with Kakyoin, was one of the next things I wrote.

Needless to say, I very quickly realized that this fic was going to be way longer than the 2k I originally imagined it to be (wwwwwwwww), and I decided that since it was going to be longer, I could do some cool, fun, weird narrative stuff with it–specifically, in this case, doubling down on the narrative structure reflecting Jotaro’s experience of time.

(If you are reading carefully, you may notice that there are A LOT of scenes and narration mirroring each other in the two halves of the fic–this is very much intentional, as I sat down and actually physically charted out the whole fic once I had a draft done.  If I did it right, basically every narrative thread that comes up in the first two chapters is looped back to again in the last two chapters.)

and then, of course, re: only being able to trust your fists:

So I’ve already talked about Jotaro’s relationship to linear time (which I really should have tagged as a & relationship and yet I didn’t because even I’m not that nerdy) but the other big chunk of the fic is obviously Jotaro’s relationship to Star Platinum.

I obviously have my own weird niche interpretation of their relationship, which was heavily influenced by: Jotaro apparently not using the timestop for ten years (referenced in the first episode of DIU), Jotaro’s suspicion toward Star Platinum at the start of SDC, the MASSIVE ARROWS pointing to Stands being spirit possession (or, at least, Jotaro understanding them as spirit possession), etc.

but I also very much see Jotaro as someone who–especially after SDC–is unwilling to rely on anyone other than himself (and, by extension, unwilling to trust anything but his own body), so I imagined that fundamental distrust extending to his own Stand

and then the question became: how do you coexist with something that’s an inseparable part of you but that you also cannot trust?

This is probably pretty obvious, but I imagine Star Platinum being very similar to PTSD–both in the obvious “these superpowers look like PTSD” way (hypervigilance! linear time becoming fake!) but also in the sense that I think having PTSD can very much be like coexisting with this thing that is trying to help you (the point of PTSD is that it’s your brain trying to help you avoid being in the same situation again!) but that is actually messing up your life really badly because it came crashing into you when your life hadn’t been built with space to accommodate its presence.

So I really wanted to play with the idea of Star Platinum as this alien yet friendly presence–but friendly doesn’t necessarily mean good for you, and friendly doesn’t mean that you don’t resent its intrusion.  An invader is an invader, regardless of whether its intentions are good.

There are obviously very clear parallels in spirit possession narratives (where people struggle with the possessing spirit before eventually finding an equilibrium) and certain types of trauma narratives (where you have this horrible, toxic thing that you’re carrying around with you, and the only way you’re going to be able to go on is if you build space in your life to accommodate it and find a new equilibrium), so I leaned hard into that.

“you can only trust your fists” also refers specifically to the super somatic way Jotaro experiences PTSD–if you look at the way it’s described throughout the fic, it tends to be very visceral bodily sensations rather than feelings or emotions.  This is partially because I do genuinely think that’s how Jotaro would experience PTSD (I could write a whole essay on Jotaro’s relationship to his own body but consider example A: his plan in almost every situation is “get real close and then punch”), but also because I very, very rarely see PTSD written as a somatic experience rather than an emotional one.  And PTSD can be a somatic experience!  For some people, it’s something that you carry in your body, that affects the way you inhabit, move through, and engage with space.

I didn’t actually have a title for the fic for quite a while–it was “Jotaro fic 2″ in my GDocs for a long, long time (we’re talking months).  I saw something that said “academia is fake; you can only trust your fists” like…four years ago??? And immediately was like, “Oh, this is real and true,” and then just adapted that for various other situations.  I think “linear time is fake; you can only trust you fists” specifically was spawned in a conversation (with Rowan, possibly?), but it’s something that I started saying because it’s relatable nonsense, my favorite kind of nonsense.  And then there was a point at which I was explaining the fic to someone via keywords (I have keywords and key concepts for every fic I write, often before I have a story), and I jokingly said, “It’s basically ‘linear time is fake; you can only trust your fists.’”  And I thought that was so funny that I immediately changed my draft title to that, and then I stared at it too much and it just…stuck.

On one hand, I’m like…90% sure that there are people who have seen the title on AO3 and gone “oh definitely not this pile of hot nonsense” and skipped over it immediately, but on the other hand…no regrets.  

anyway, LINEAR TIME IS FAKE; YOU CAN ONLY TRUST YOUR FISTS

[its-shopify]

Pre-order sales give an opportunity to shoppers to bag a product that’s yet to be launched before it’s available to the public. It gives online shoppers a sense of exclusivity and a sense of excitement that is beyond measure.

We’ve all seen and experienced it before. Think about the latest iPhone launch or when a new game on the PlayStation is about to hit the market. Or for that matter, when Tesla announces an upcoming launch.

But for customers, placing a pre-order means spending money on a product that they’re unsure of and won’t get their hands on right away. They obviously have doubts, fears, and concerns.

And that pre-purchase anxiety can take away your sales. But there’s a way around it!

Things to include on your pre-order sales page

1. Add as much information about the product

Your pre-order campaign has one key purpose – to make visitors buy a product that’s not even there yet. And that’s no easy feat!

35% of visitors don’t buy products because they didn’t find what they wanted. 10% said there was too little information. But half of these visitors are those that couldn’t even find the basic product information on the pre-order sales page.

Source

To be able to address these inquisitive shoppers, your pre-order sales page needs to have the following information about the upcoming product/ collection:

Product features

Tell customers the product’s unique features and the benefits – how it’ll change the customers’ life. Make sure you list it all down in an easy-to-understand manner to make the information consumable.

Product visuals

The expression, ‘Seeing is believing’ is true when it comes to pre-ordering products. The human brain transmits visual information faster than text. Images can help you showcase the key features that make your product worth buying. It can also reinforce branding. Hence, make sure you include plenty of visuals on the page.

Here’s how Apple does it:

Behind the scenes

Don’t we all just love the behind the scene footage at the end of movies? We barely move from our seats to the exit doors in the theatre halls. How about you applied the same engagement tactic to your pre-order sales page?

The product is new. Customers know nothing about it. But you can make the shopping experience more engaging by sharing some behind the scenes. A Stanford research shows stories are 2200% easier to remember than facts and figures.

You can make your pre-order sales page product story exciting by telling customers:

Why you developed the product

The challenges you faced when developing it

The changes it will make to customers’ lives

The making of the product

Product videos

73% of shoppers watch product videos to make purchase decisions. Why? Because product videos can help answer many questions that customers might have, can show the product in motion/action or in use, and show information in an easy-to-understand manner.

Customers are too busy to read information. Facts and figures might bore them and they might lose interest in the product. But videos capture attention differently.

97% of marketers say video helps their customers understand their products better.

What’s more? Product videos can also help you hold the pre-order sales page visitors longer, reducing the bounce rate.

Product in use

Showing products in context can give shoppers a better idea about the product. For example, if you’re selling an underwater torch, show an image or a video of the torch being used underwater.

This will also give a sense of the potential uses of the product and what owning the product can do for the customer.

Dimensions

Mention the dimensions of the product clearly and prominently. If there are multiple dimensions, it’s all the more important to have the size options displayed clearly so that the customer doesn’t end up ordering a wrong size.

You can do this in two ways. One, you can include information similar to size guides. Two, you can actually place the product next to a person to show the comparison.

Of course, this entirely depends on the products you’re selling on your pre-order sales page.

Product price

The price of the product is one of the first things that shoppers look at before proceeding to make a purchase. Make sure you share the product price clearly.

Consider factors such as taxes, shipping costs, packaging costs, and any other added costs. Mention all related costs clearly so that the customer isn’t in for a surprise when they’re completing checkout.

If you’re offering discounts as part of your pre-order sales marketing strategy, you can creatively mention it alongside the price. Here’s an example of the same:

We understand sharing a lot of information and yet making the page look uncluttered is challenging.

But the more you share, the more confident the visitor feels about making the purchase of a product they wouldn’t instantly get in their hands.

2. Clearly state your product exchange policy

As the pre-order product could be completely new, you might not have any reviews and ratings to share. This might be a huge drawback. When buying new products, customers always have a doubt, ‘What if I don’t like the product after purchasing it?’

They’ll want to know the exchange policy.

Matter of fact, 68% of customers check exchange policies before making a purchase. But if the exchange policy is not clearly thought through, managing exchanges could eat up a lot of your time and resources, and also compromise the shopping experience you want to offer.

To communicate the exchange policy clearly, you must include the following:

Clearly mention whether the product can or cannot be exchanged

Against what can the product be exchanged? Eg. same product, similar product, etc

Mention the number of days post purchase within which it can be exchanged

The condition of the product in which it can be exchanged. Eg. intact packaging, price tag, etc

Whether the exchange will cost an extra amount to the customer. Eg., shipping cost

How an exchange can be initiated

3. Include a crystal clear return policy

It’s possible that some customers are not happy with the product and want to return the product altogether, in exchange for nothing. Similar to the exchange policy, you should have your return policy in place and clearly mentioned on your pre-order sales page.

Include the following information to avoid any kind of ambiguity:

Can the product be returned and the cases in which it can be returned

The number of days within which it can be returned

Will there be any costs cut if the product is returned

The condition in which a product can be returned. Eg., damage, broken, etc

How a return can be initiated

The time the return would take to complete

The exact process. Eg., will the customer have to repack and ship it back

Remember, the simpler your return policy is, the more faith a shopper has in your brand for future purchases.

Let’s understand how important a well-though return policy is with the case of JOLYN, a swimwear brand. The brand used to take a week to two weeks to complete a product return. This caused a huge amount of load and stress on the customer service team flooded with emails and calls from customers. It caused frustration to both the customer service teams and customers.

The brand then reduced its returns processing time. The result: an increased number of customers chose store credit and didn’t ask for refunds!

Return of products isn’t always a loss to the brand. If done well, it’s an opportunity for more sales.

4. Make sure you have a refund policy

Depending on the refund policy you create for your Shopify store, you should clearly share the details. Customers, especially those paying for pre-order products will always be apprehensive – ‘Will I get a refund if I don’t like the product and don’t want it to be exchanged?’

The efficiency of your refund policy is also a key aspect of your customer service. If you process and manage refunds quickly and seamlessly, your customers will have a good experience and will feel more confident to order again.

Here’s an example of the PlayStation store’s refund policy page to give you a little direction:

Either link to a dedicated refund policy page from your pre-order sales page or simply mention it on the page itself.

5. Give customers multiple payment options

Pre-orders can have two to three different types of payment categories:

Pay full amount now

Pay part amount now

Pay full amount later

The three different types of payment options are self-explanatory. However, they each have their own pros and cons.

If you ask for full payment during pre-ordering, new customers might not trust you enough to pay in advance before seeing the product.

Similarly, if you allow customers to pay the full amount later, they might change their minds and end up not making the payment.

So make sure you know who your target audience is and offer what is feasible, and trusting to the both of you.

The next step is to enable the actual payment. You must offer customers as many possible payment options, eg., credit card, net banking, Apple Pay, etc. You could authorize the details of your customers’ credit or debit card that can be automatically charged once the product is shipped.

Cash on delivery (COD) and pay full later might not be ideal in the case of pre-orders because it would mean the sale isn’t confirmed.

Another important factor to consider when setting up the payment options is the return and exchange policies. If you’re going to have to refund a part or the full amount paid by the customer, you should have the necessary systems in place.

6. Don’t forget the ‘Notify Me’ option

So far so good. Shoppers are convinced about products and are placing orders. What next?

Well, now for the shoppers who don’t want to place a pre-order, but want to be notified when the product is available for purchase.

Adding a “notify me” button is important to turn these pre-order sales page visitors into subscribers, who have a high intent of making a purchase. But this button needs to let the shopper subscribe via a channel of their preference – email, SMS, web push notifications or even Facebook Messenger messages.

But the game doesn’t end there. Once the visitor does subscribe to a pre-order notification, you need to ensure they’re notified at the right time. This is where automation comes in!

Appikon’s Pre-Order Today Shopify app enables you to automatically add a ‘notify me’ button on your pre-order sales page, alongside the pre-order button. It also takes care of sending out the multi-channel notifications when the stocks come in.

7. Implement a Shopify live chat

Customers may have many questions before placing an order for a product available on pre-order. And they expect brands to help them with their queries before they make a purchase decision.

A study shows that more than two-thirds of customers expect brands to be proactive with their customer service. In this case, your availability to answer their concerns and queries when they’re considering buying from you.

You can do this by implementing a Shopify live chat app on your pre-order sales page. With a live chat solution like TextChat, you can set up a welcome pop-up message as well to initiate the conversation with the visitors, helping them understand the upcoming product better. The app notifies you of customer live chat queries on SMS, with a quick join link that you can use to reply to them from your mobile browser, delivering a quick turnaround time.

By doing so, you can help shoppers make an informed purchase decision. So much so that you can actually increase your sales up to 45% through prompt conversations.

Getting visitors to convert into pre-order sales

These seven key points wrap things up for this article on how you could address your customers’ concerns regarding pre-orders.

However, these are not exhaustive. You may want to include more information relevant to your product as well as look at Shopify apps that can help ease or automate a part of your pre-order sales strategy.

Learn how visitors interact with your pre-order sales page and optimize accordingly to drive results!