Recently I stumbled across a blog post by Nicole S. Cooper, titled 'A Valuable Lesson Learned About List Building Popups on your Lead Capture Page'. It was interesting to me because it highlights a few salient points about traffic acquisition and the process of leveraging that traffic.
The conventional wisdom is that you need to get the visitors onto a list in order to market to them. This has been adjusted of late to promote content over and above sales, where the marketing becomes a touch more subtle, and the actual selling process is part of a confidence building exercise.
Now, many readers might assume that the quicker the visitor is presented with the option to sign-up, the better. Visitors are notorious for clicking away from sites after only a short stay, so getting them to sign-up as soon as possible is surely a good thing?
As Ms. Cooper found out, however, this isn't the case. The post itself is a great snapshot of the marketing process, and I wholeheartedly recommend it. The long and the short of it is that she had a bounce rate (visitors dropping in and clicking out straight away) of upwards of 30% (3 in 10) when visitors were immediately presented with a sign-up box, but that this dropped by 10% the moment she adjusted the script so that the box appeared after a short delay.
Other variations might include changing the page that the sign-up pop-up appears on, and playing with the position, layout, and presentation - the end message is clear, and as Ms. Cooper herself says:
"metrics and tracking is pivotal in the world of Online Marketing"
So, if this wasn't enough to convince you to take another look at your sign-up box placement, timing, and statistics, head on over to The Mailbox Money Blog and get the scoop from the lady herself!
