This is a guest post by Jesus Ramirez from MarketingUnfolded.com.
Sometimes as we design our sign-up forms we forget about the most important piece of the whole sequence… the prospect.
We forget that they are people too, with fears, and pre-conceived notions and we often overlook the steps we can take to ovoid their un-easiness.
By simply looking at your sign-up form we can make 3 quick and easy changes to increase your conversion rates, they are:
1. Removing Unnecessary Fields
In most cases (at least in internet marketing) the email address field is the most important. But do you really need a physical address? Or a phone number?
If the answer is “no”, then definitely remove these, they are only creating confusion and anxiety in the sign up process. You need to have a short and unintimidating sign-up form.
You should also do a split test and see how you perform with just asking for an email and leaving out the name.
By keeping all the unnecessary fields you are giving your prospects more excuses to leave.
In my website I choose to just stick with email, if I need any other information for other offers then I will ask for them as I need them.
2. Tell Your Prospects Why You Need The Extra Information
If you must absolutely have more than a name and email, you must have a truly valid reason on why you are asking for the extra information.
Make sure that you explain it to your prospect in the sign-up form.
Remember people are very hesitant on giving away their personal phone number because they don’t want to get telemarketers trying to sell them something while they are having their dinner or doing some important work.
They don’t want to give you their address because they don’t want more junk mail than they already have.
To overcome these fears you must explain why you need the extra information. Remember it might be obvious to you, but it won’t be to your prospect, so tell them!
Remember most of your prospects just want to know why you need a particular piece of information before they give it to you.
3. Add Your Privacy Policy To Your Sign-Up Form
If you have a privacy policy and you are not linking to it from your sign-up form you may be losing a lot of leads! Remember most people just want to be assured that you are a legitimate person that won’t spam them or bother them.
By linking to your privacy policy from your sign-up form you put your prospects at ease and they feel more comfortable giving you their information.
Most people will never click on the privacy link, but the 1% that do, will be directed to your privacy page where their worries will be put to rest, and you can close them on that page by adding a sign-up form.
This is something that Copyblogger does, and it seems to work very well for them.
The Bottom Line
When you’re designing your sign-up form it’s very easy to get caught thinking of only what you want and what you need.
A better approach is to design your sign-up form in the needs of your prospect. Accept that they are skeptical, and that the value you provide might not be readily obvious to them.
You need to take these steps, and any other steps that you can, to make sure they can easily, and comfortably give you their information. Remove all the obstacles and confusion, remember…
It’s all about putting them first.
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Hi Jesus,
Normally I sign up on sites that give useful and valuable information, but when they ask too many things aside from my email ad, then I just skip out. I agree that a site must have a privacy link stating the things like your e-mail will not be sold or shared to other parties, and they have to guarantee that they will not spam your email inbox as well.
Agreed Felicia,
I also skip out on forms that ask for way too much.
Easy indeed. But I think the appearance of the sign-up form can also affect conversion rate. Best to do a split testing different layouts and design too.
Just my two cents though. No solid data to back it up. 🙂
Noel,
split testing is always a good idea!
From a consumer perspective, I personally will never give my phone number or real address to any site online (except if I’m ordering a product from a reputable company like Walmart, Amazon, etc).
My feeling is that if they’re going to contact me by email they do not need to contact me by phone–so why give out my number?
So you’re right–I think you’ll get a far lower conversion rate for sign-ups if you demand more than a first name and an email!
Or else, you’ll end up with a bunch of fake address and phone numbers anyway, which is pretty much useless.
Email list building is very essential for maintaining good relationship with your visitors. While you send regular updates, your visitors can turn into potential customers. However, placing the form at the right place on the website is an important step to follow.
This is a great post and all 3 points mentioned here are very apt. While your visitors do not have time to fill in more fields, it is a good idea to remove unnecessary fields. In addition, offering freebies or valuable ebooks can attract your visitors to fill up your contact form.
Hendrik,
Adding a free gift does increase your opt-in rate. Totally agree!
Thanks for the tips, especially the one about the privacy policy. I link to one of my privacy policy page on my site, but never thought about having a link on the sign-up form itself!
Hey Bonnie,
I hope this helps your conversions!
Good Luck!
Very interesting approach. I have a name and email requirement but think I will try the email alone and see what happens. I don’t really need prospect names and my email newsletter is to attract prospects to my business, it is to display my expertise in my field so an email will definitely be adequate. Never thought to do this, thanks for the tip!
Brian
Hey Brian,
Glad my post helped!
And you never lose anything by testing!
Good luck.
I agree with you Jesus that the simpler the better. People don’t want to waste time signing up and filling in these long forms. It’s better to keep it simple and quick for them.
Agreed Dylan, People are too busy to be wasting time with useless fields!
Hi Jesus 🙂
I appreciate you sharing your thoughts. And yes, list building is a big topic for open discussion. But in order to build a big list, we must learn how to convert visitors into subscribers first!
I tried building my own list once long ago and it was a big miss. But I’ve learned so much from that mistake. And I will definitely try it again soon.
Thanks again for your post, have a nice day!
Duy.
Hey Duy,
A lot of time you learn best from your mistakes. I think you could have a great post on your hands. You can teach other what NOT to do.
Good luck!
Some great conversion increasing ideas here. some thinks I have even over looked such as having a privacy policy on the sign-up form. Anyhow thanks again Jesus for the tips.
– Robert
I’m like those who are going to sign up when I see a site that asked much info sometimes I change my real name and just put my email add. Also if the sign up form is asking for address and landline most of the time I don’t continue with it and just leave the website because it makes me unease.