Every website has them (or should - it's one of the most common ways a visitor will interact with your website). But, so often, people don't fill out online forms. There can be a number of reasons why a site visitor doesn't fill out a form.
- They visited your site to get contact information only
- They visited your site to find your address or directions
- They found the information they wanted :-)
- You didn't have the information they were looking for :-(
Did they make it to your form?
Before we blame the form, you need to know if your visitors are even making it to your form.
Do you? Just because you have a form, or 5, or 20 forms on your site does not mean people will either fill one out or that they even got there in the first place! Knowing this information is vital before deciding on a course of action to boost form completion.
CTAs - do you have them? CTAs (Calls to Action) are links to your form, and more than an entry in your main menu. You should have extra links/buttons throughout your website's pages encouraging visitors to take action - fill in a form, download a white paper, sign up for a newsletter. If visitors are unsure what to do they won't do it. Don't make them play 20 questions, give them clear direction.
Is there a complelling reason to click? This is an overall site issue. No one is going to contact you (so, read, no one's going to click you menu item or CTA( if they don't feel the need to contact you! If you don't grab their attention, and hold it, then reel them in, they aren't going to feel the need to get more info. Perhaps the lack of form filling is centered around the poor quality of your content, the lack of it, poor navigation, poor layout, it's quite a list of reasons your site could be duffering from.
They did? Maybe your form sucks...
So, your visitors made it to your form. Excellent!! (Of course you'd only know this if you were watching your traffic - that's one of the 2 free reports we give all our clients each month.)
But.....
No one filled in your form. Why? There are a number of reasons why a visitor doesn't fill in your form, and there are a number of strategies you can use to encourage more people to fill out a form on your website:
- Simplify the form: Make sure the form is simple, easy to understand, and user-friendly. Avoid asking for too much information or presenting the visitor with too many fields as it can be overwhelming and off-putting.
- Offer incentives: Consider offering an incentive for filling out the form, such as a discount, a free e-book, or access to exclusive content. This can be a great way to entice people to take action. This is especially true of forms used for the purpose of collecting names and emails, such as newsletter signups.
- Use clear and compelling language: Clearly detail the benefits of filling out the form. Highlight the value proposition of your product or service and how it can help the user solve their problems or meet their needs.
- Optimize your website: Make sure your website is optimized for search engines and that the form is easy to find. Use clear calls to action and place the form in a prominent location on your website.
- Use social proof: Use social proof, such as customer testimonials or ratings, to show that other people have filled out the form and found value in doing so. This can help build trust and encourage others to take action.
- A/B test: Experiment with different versions of the form to see which one performs better. Try different colors, button texts, or form lengths to optimize the form for conversions.
Now what should you do?
You've spent money getting your website, paying for hosting, maybe paying for SEO. Finally you're getting traffic to your website. You've done most of the work (or paid for it), isn't it a waste if no one actually interacts with your site?
So, where do you go from here?
We'll assume you're actually getting traffic (if you're not, that's a whole other conversation). You need to analyze what they're doing on your site. What other pages are they visiting? How long are they staying on which pages? What pages are they exiting from? Without this information you can't make any decision regarding how to fix it.
That's why we send clients this information every month; so they CAN be informed. If you'd like to know more about how visitors ar einteracting with your site, ask us for a free review of your site.
Don't throw anymore potential clients down the drain, contact us today!
