Imagine yourself in a small local hip & lounge coffee shop. You are devouring the latest book by [your favorite author]. The atmosphere: a harmony between B.B. King and the hustle and bustle of students stressed by the end of their semester…
You’re in the middle of your book when all of a sudden, someone blocks your view with a flyer! You think: “Holy shit, what the hell is this bullshit!” You look up and it is with amazement that you see: [insert author’s name here]!
There he is, looking at you.
It’s too good to be true! He offers you to join his private book club where you will be entitled to all of this author’s exclusive content, as well as direct access to his email box.
You’ll be able to send him anything, and he’ll reply!
Without hesitation, you say: “I didn’t even know this existed! Where do I sign!”
Are pop-ups your friends, or your enemies?
I think you can see where I’m going with this. That’s right! All this was just a little metaphor talking about the famous pop-up windows everywhere on the web. There are many reasons behind these windows. Whether it’s to promote a special offer or to encourage people to join a mailing list, no one can deny that these windows are extremely effective.
While opinions on its use are mixed, everyone seems to agree on one thing: they are very unpleasant.
Before I continue, I’d like to clarify that I’m not talking about traditional pop-ups where a new web window appears on top of the main window, rather I’m talking about forms that appear within the page. You can see an example here.
Why is the Pop-up the Vilain?
People who are against the use of a pop-up (modal window) argue that it puts a barrier between the user and the most important thing on your website: your content. (Hey! That’s why they come to your site in the first place).
After all, good design is about removing any obstacle in the user’s path!
I semi-agree with all of this, you’ll see why in a moment. But it makes sense to describe the pop-up as, say, the equivalent of Dr. Evil (Austin Power? Anyone?): unpleasant, but easy to counter.
Why is the Pop-up the hero?
It all depends on the business model of your website!
Is the ultimate goal of your site to educate as many people as possible? Is it to generate additional revenue for your business? Is it to create an audience of dedicated fans?
You must understand that the goal of the person behind a site is ALWAYS different from the visitor’s and that this duality is bound to create some flare-ups on occasion.
Sometimes the interests converge, sometimes not.
What the visitor wants is to consume the information as easily as possible. However, sometimes the visitor doesn’t know yet that he wants more, like in the initial example where the author takes advantage of the reader’s attention to offer him access to exclusive content. The person was completely unaware of the fact that they had the opportunity.
With this in mind, the pop-up serves as a discovery tool.
Want to educate as many people as possible? Growing your email list as well as your social media awareness is then a necessary evil to increase your retention and ultimately increase the number of people who find you.
A pop-up will double the speed at which you can accomplish these things.
Selling a product? The best way is to harvest people’s addresses and send them a series of automated emails that quietly explain who you are, what you do, and why they should care (called drip marketing).
Again, the pop-up is necessary: to get the word out about your products and/or to collect addresses.
Want to develop a dedicated audience? A blog is a rather one-way relationship. Collecting people’s email addresses allows for two-way communication. I can already hear the objections: “Yes, but what about comments? “Yes, but Twitter?”
Nothing is better for initiating a relationship on the Internet than an email exchange. Yes, a little Tweet here and there can help, but when it’s time to have a meaningful exchange, email is king.
To get better, you need to make Skype a webinar or a hangout.
If you’re serious, you need a pop-up. Clear and simple.
Not convinced?
You can bury your head in the sand…
… or you could test it. Because that’s what a pro would do.
But I don’t want to be a cyber dumpster!
The other thing I hear very often is, “if I put a pop-up on my site, people will get frustrated, they will leave and never come back.”
True.
Some people will decide to blow you off. Sometimes they’ll even tell their friends on Twitter (oh gosh! No!)
But ask yourself these questions:
- Did you spend 2 or 3 hours of your time writing a quality article that serves a need well?
- Is your content worth the 3-second delay (with a relevant offer) to access it?
- Is it in the person’s best interest to sign up for your mailing list?
Sure, if your content is as bland as bad sushi, people aren’t going to like your pop-up. But you know what? If that is your case, people aren’t going to like you – period.
Restaurants close their doors for a reason: their food is bad.
If you offer 5-star content to your readers and someone has the nerve to come to your website and be insulted by a little pop-up after you spent all Saturday writing a relevant solution to their problem – kick them out.
A little fact before we go on.
I had this very discussion with one of my newsletter subscribers. He was telling me how bad it was for the UX, how it increased the bounce rate, and ultimately how it negatively impacted SEO.
One of the best practices, when you want to grow your mailing list, is to record in your database where the person signed up on your site. That is, what form did the individual use?
Is it the form on the left? In the footer? On the home page?
Another good idea is to record the URL of the page on which the person registered. That way, you know what kind of content is driving people to sign up.
I went to my Mailchimp profile (the platform I use, but there’s also AWeber), and it was with great irony that I realized that the person had signed up for my list via – you guessed it – my pop-up.
I think we’re making a big deal out of nothing. A little pop-up is not the end of the world. As long as you set a tracking cookie so you don’t show it every time the person comes back!
Related Articles
- Are you collecting emails from your website visitors?
- How To Create An Autoresponder With GetResponse?
- GetResponse: A Complete Email Marketing Tool
- 10 Tips To Build Your Email List From Scratch
- 9 Tips To Create Successful Newsletters
How to put a pop-up on your website?
If you want to put a pop-up on your website, I highly recommend using Popup Domination. It’s only $47 and you can:
- Do A/B testing ;
- Make exit pop-ups
- Advanced analytics to see which page converts better ;
- Frequency Control ;
- You can reveal content only to people who sign up.
It’s super easy to use. You can use it as a WordPress plug-in or install it yourself on your server.
And you, do you like pop-ups?
It’s a stupid question to ask, of course, you don’t like pop-ups! But what do you think about their uses? Are you for them? Against? And for what reasons? Have you already tested it?
I’m very interested in your answers so leave a comment and share with the rest of the community.