Your website’s contact page may seem to be the most ordinary section, but every business owner should deal with it with utmost caution.
One of the prime objectives of every website is to expand its base of audience.
And that only happens when people contact you. Consequently, you must strive to make their process of contacting you as easy and smooth as possible.
When people fill out the contact page of a business, they are often categorized as warm leads, i.e. people who have expressed an interest in your business. And, everything that you do to push these leads into your funnel will prove to be advantageous for your business.
So, how do you optimize your boring contact page into an enormous lead magnet?
In this article, we have whittled out a list of some great hacks that can help you transform your contact page to secure 2x submissions. Let’s have a look.
1. Remove Unnecessary form Fields
If you scan through your website’s contact form, chances are that you might come across some unnecessary fields. In order to enhance the form conversion rate, you need to reconsider how your form is structured.
Remember, even if your website requires a complex form with a considerably higher number of fields, it is still possible to make the form filling process relatively easy.
Here are some things that you must contemplate before organizing a contact form to secure higher submissions:
- Request important information only: If you are working on a lead generation form, you may not require information on the respondent’s address, telephone number, birthday details, etc. In fact, one study has revealed that requesting a telephone number brings down the conversion by as much as 48%. So, outline the information that is absolutely necessary and eliminate all unwanted fields.
- Don’t confuse your respondents: It is vital to clearly specify the exact type of information that you require from your respondents. If some fields require elaborate information, you must add explanatory text or hints to help the respondent in the process.
- Clearly mark the necessary and optional fields: Many times, contact forms are separated by fields that are required and non-required. This clear demarcation helps users progress through forms with ease, thus improving the conversion rate.
- These techniques help to make the forms easy to fill out. Apart from these, a few other ways that can help to increase the conversion rate are:
- Prefilling: If you already have the user’s data in your Customer Resource Management software, use a prefill function to speed up the process.
- Multi-page forms: If your form is quite extensive and involves filling out multiple sections, it is advisable to break it up into separate pages.
- Save & Resume: This function allows the users to finish filling out lengthy and complicated forms in more than a single sitting. You can save progress and resume from right there the next time.
2. Focus on the Form’s Value to Your Audience
Asking someone to fill out a form can be a demanding task. You are asking people who don’t even know you for such sensitive information which may make them leery. Thus, it is important to propose to your audience something of value in return for their information and time.
Here are a few ways in which you can reassure the users that their information is secure while communicating a value upfront.
- Outline your cause: If your website is looking at amassing funds for a charity, make sure to clearly state the purpose and importance of your respondent’s donations. As it is generally seen, people are much more likely to relate to a cause if they believe in it.
- Keep it simple: Many times, the contact forms for filing a job application are extremely long and tedious. In order to keep the applicants interested, you must provide a simple form that reflects your company’s mission and vision.
- Give the respondents something useful: An exchange of information is always considered beneficial for everyone. So, giving your users some kind of helpful content, such as infographics, or access to eBooks, etc. can be a great way to go.
3. Minimize Friction in and Around the Form
A lot of times, it is seen that the contact form isn’t really the problem, but the events that happen around it are.
If you have too many components put together in a form, it is most likely to lower the conversion rate by causing friction. When the different elements of a page conflict against each other, it gets tough for the respondent to concentrate and make the right decision.
So, even if you are successful in sending the users to your landing page but still are unable to get click-throughs, this might be because of the friction.
If you don’t want that to happen, here are a couple of ways in which you can minimize friction around your contact form.
- Allow white spaces: A lot of marketers work pretty hard to build their website but still aren’t able to fetch the desired results. This may be due to the clutter and friction they have on their form page. If you truly wish to draw people in, create a page that allows plenty of white space. Such space allows for readability and scalability, increasing click-through rates. The best example here is the Google homepage.
- Make some fields non-compulsory: The most effective content that increases conversions is always phrased with the right words, right formats, and right sentences.
- Moving on, it is advisable to make certain fields optional. Less enthusiastic leads who would otherwise not fill-up the form might find this suitable as you are making it easy for them. Also, many people perceive that you are asking too much and don’t trust your website. But by making some fields optional, you will make such respondents believe that they are not under any stern obligation to fill out everything.
- Use a two-step process: If you want to capture the maximum number of leads, you need to be more creative. When new people visit your website for the first time, they don’t trust you enough to provide you with all their personal information. So, you can divide your contact form into multiple stages. For instance, start by asking their first name only. In the second step, you can ask for their email address, contact number, etc. This approach is found to be more effective, leading to a larger number of leads.
- Sync the surrounding text and images with the form: If you wish to secure greater submissions, then you need to sync your text and images that appear in the form page together. Make sure the product image does not overlap with the form or call-to-action. Of course, there must be white space around but it must be used in a way that gives life to the surrounding elements.
4. Split Test to Determine the Best Lead-Generation CTA Placing
One of the most effective ways to generate leads and secure greater submissions is by ensuring that your call-to-action is well-placed. And the best way to do this is via split testing.
The only sure shot way to determine whether placing your CTA button above, below, to the right side/ left side or beneath the copy is to test it out. Remember, the slightest of the change can cast a major impact on the conversion rates.
But remember, while split testing your CTA button, you must ensure that all the other elements of your landing page are well taken care of. This might include a compelling heading, enthralling images and a persuasive copy.
Conclusion
So, these are some of the best strategies to get 2x submissions on the contact page of your website.
It is important to understand that even the most effective inbound marketing techniques are of no use to a landing page if it is not well-optimized for the audience. The primary objective of every website’s landing page is to secure a prospect’s personal information and not sell a product.
So make sure that your landing page is neatly designed with adequate white space and a well-positioned CTA. You must give the respondents some digital breathing space to assist them to think clearly and make the best decision.
Author Bio:
James Grills is currently associated with Cumulations Technologies, an UI UX design company in India. He is a technical writer with a passion for writing on emerging technologies in the areas of mobile application development and IoT technology.