Alice

This scenario arose from one of our new clients, which I would like to share with you. They migrated from their previous newsletter system to JAC, Appletree’s version, and consequently were issued with new code (website background instructions) for their new newsletter’s sign-up form to be placed on their website.

One of the main reasons for a sign-up form is to gain, what we call in the trade, ‘organic’ membership through your website. These are people who arrive on your website, like what they see, and want to find out more about this company through a regular newsletter. They offer their information willingly, and in some cases confirm their permission, to receive more information. (‘Inorganic’ membership is derived from purchased mailing lists, details from your email and filing system and from business cards obtained through networking, and is generally not considered permission based.)

These sign-up forms are a very common sight on websites, but it is the positioning of these forms to maximise the best reaction from your potential subscribers that counts.

Originally these clients had their newsletter sign-up form on a separate page, accessed by a link from their front page. This is usual for very large, complicated forms with many fields for the subscriber to fill in (totally unnecessary, all that is really required is the name and email address). This arrangement means the form is hidden away, all neat and tidy, but is not in a position to prompt a psychological reaction from your website’s visitor to sign up to your newsletter.

To encourage reactional sign ups, even whimsical ones, the form needs to be placed very prominently at the top of the first page (and all the other pages) of your website. If it is small and requires the minimum of information (see above), there is no reason why this cannot be possible. There is much debate about whether it should be positioned on the left or the right, depending on how the eye travels across the page and how the information should spring out to attract the reader, but the most important factor is that it should be ‘above the fold’ of the page, the area that is always seen and doesn’t need to be scrolled down to reach.

And of course, more subscriptions can be induced through an incentive, such as offering freebies: a free report, a free e-book, ten top tips that provide extremely valuable information the recipient cannot live without – think of something that would greatly appeal to your customer, and let their natural greed to obtain it take over by exchanging their contact details with you (so the information is not actually free after all, it just appears to be because no money has changed hands.)