What Web Site Marketing Strategies Work? Are PopUps a Good Idea?

The conventional wisdom in marketing, online or off, is that if you see lots of other people doing something it must have merit. For example you see lots of supposed web marketing gurus using popups on their web sites to prompt you to sign up for an ezine, to give them your email address.

You know the popups I’m talking about. They show up when you visit a site or within a few seconds and then hover over the page blocking the content you where trying to read. They even follow you as you scroll down the page until you click them away or sign up. Yes, they can be annoying but do they work.

Take a look at this popup example I tried on my site to see what I’m talking about.

I’ve heard claims that they can increase your ezine signups by factors of 2 to 10, helping you build your list of qualifed prospects and improve your web site marketing. If they did this shouldn’t you use them?

Wait!

What’s the one thing you should do before you incorporate any change into your web site marketing?

You should test each idea to see if it works!

When I tested this popup I found no significant difference in signups and I was told by a few people how ugly it was. Over the period I tested it only 5 people a day signed up via the popup with a net gain of close to zero. E.g. while a few people signed up via the popup a few less signed up using the other signup forms on the page.

Of course my marketing site has been optimized for sign ups and already brings in 75 or more new subscribers a day.

So what should you do, should you use popups?

Popups are like bandaids. They are a quick fix and while they may work better than nothing to build your list of opt-in prospects, the best solution to your web site marketing is to fix the structure and marketing copy you use in your site. What and how to do it is explained in detail in Creating Web Sites that Sell. Use this link >>
-Charlie Cook