Some people hate popups. There’s no denying that. Yet they still come into view from left, right, and center on websites.
Why? Because they work. There’s no simpler explanation than that. And there’s plenty of data to back it up.
Case in point, you can convert up to 7% of visitors from abandoners into email subscribers if you offer a discount for their next purchase. (Getsite Control)
You can reduce abandoned sales by 13.5% if you encourage customers to finish checkout with a coupon (Getsite Control). So, it’s safe to say that popups can increase conversions, sales, and newsletter subscriptions. They’re even great for lead generation.
And if used correctly, they won’t hurt your search engine optimization (SEO) efforts or your rankings on Google.
In this guide, we’ll share seven key elements to help you nail popup campaigns and score the conversion rates you’ve always dreamt of.
What are Website Popups?
Website popups are little windows that appear or “pop up” from different corners of a webpage while you’re visiting a website. They usually contain offers demanding action from users, such as:
- Subscribe to our newsletter
- Unlock a discount coupon for a certain product
- Sign up for a webinar
Marketers use them for different purposes, such as lead generation, conversions, driving more sales, or promoting a specific offer.
On websites, popups appear when someone visits the site for the first time — they either come into view right after a site loads or a few seconds later.
Specific actions also trigger popups, like scrolling or clicking a button or when visitors are about to exit the website. These are exit-intent popups, and we’ll explore them in more detail later in the blog.
Source – www.poptin.com
However, not all popups are created equal. If website visitors find your popups annoying, they’ll immediately close them or bounce from your site. The result? A missed opportunity and lost trust.
Thus, you must know when and how to use popups and for what audience. So, it’s time to explore the different types and how to use them to achieve specific goals.
Types of Popups
It’s crucial to use popups wisely and sparingly, making certain they augment rather than hinder the user’s browsing experience to avoid irritating them.
| Types of Popup | Description | Purpose | Effectiveness |
| Entry Popups | Appear when a user enters a website. Used for various purposes, such as highlighting promotions or featuring new products. Tricky to use as they can make or break a user’s trust in your brand. | Highlight promotions.Feature new products.Establish trust. | Moderately effective. |
| Scroll-Triggered Popups | Appear when a visitor scrolls down a certain percentage of the webpage. Present relevant content or offers as the visitor engages with your site.Come into view of users interested in your product. | Provide relevant content.Engage visitors. Capture user information | Highly effective. |
| Timed Popups | Display after users spend a specific amount of time on a webpage. Allows you to engage visitors who have been on your site for a while but haven’t taken action.Used to capture user’s attention by pushing offers, newsletter sign-ups, or other intended goals | Re-engage visitors.Capture attention. Promote offers and sign-ups. | Moderately effective. |
| Exit-Intent Popups | Triggered when the user is about to leave your website.Offer a last-minute incentive to encourage visitors to stay or take a specific action. Great for reducing cart abandonment rates.Have a 2–4% conversion rate — they certainly work. | Prevent abandonment.Encourage action.Effective in reducing cart abandonment. | Highly effective. |
Reasons You Should Use Popups on Your Website
Love them or hate them, popups appear on nearly every website because they work.
We’ve looked at their conversion rates and how marketers use them to nudge users to take specific actions or to achieve certain goals.
But if you still aren’t convinced, here are three reasons to run popup campaigns on your website.
Build an Email List
Users are far more receptive to signing up for a newsletter or giving you their email address once they’ve consumed content on your website and gained value.
Therefore, your best bet is to nudge them with a popup when they’re leaving your site or after spending significant time on it.
With Google Analytics, you can find the average time a user spends on each page of your website and then time the popups accordingly.
Try not to shove a popup into users’ faces immediately after they’ve landed on your website. Not only is it off-putting, but it can trigger users to either dismiss the popup or leave the site altogether.
Timing is the key to building trust.
Reduce Bounce Rates
Use exit-intent popups to target visitors about to leave your website. You can give them one last push to promote content, offer a discount, or ask them to sign up for your newsletter.
Countdown timers work exceptionally well in such cases, as they create a sense of urgency among users and make them take a specific action ASAP.
Source – www.poptin.com
However, it’s essential to provide users with the right value before you ask them to take a specific action. You can do that by split-testing your popups and looking at the numbers to see which ones are converting.
These popups can be your best bet at reducing bounce rates and keeping users on your website for a significant time.
By using OAuth, you can enhance your popup campaigns with social proof, personalization, and gamification while respecting your users’ privacy and preferences.
For example, you can use OAuth to create a popup campaign that invites users to sign in with their social media accounts and have time to win a prize or a discount.
This way, you can increase your conversion rates, grow your email list, and build trust with your audience.
Increase Engagement
This might sound counterintuitive, but good popups provide value to users and can increase sales engagement on your website.
When you give users an excellent offer or value (through a popup) in return for a specific action, they’re naturally inclined to take the action.
This gives them a good user experience and builds trust in your product or service.
Remember, the popup world is a slippery slope, and a tiny mistake can disappoint users. And you wouldn’t want that.
Here’s an example of how you can nail user engagement with your popup campaign.
Hims & Hers excels at enhancing B2C engagement with their spironolactone product. They offer comprehensive yet concise information, addressing key concerns transparently.
Source – Forhers.com
Interactive features like assessments and chat support guide users toward personalized solutions.
Source – Forhers.com
Clear calls to action streamline the user journey, making it easy to access relevant information and products.
Integrating user testimonials and success stories, Hims & Hers creates relatable connections, encouraging trust and engagement.
Through these thoughtful strategies to improve the user experience, they effectively elevate B2C engagement for their spironolactone offering.
7 Key Elements of Successful Popup Campaigns
Are you ready to generate more leads with the help of popups? Use these seven key elements for the best results.
1. Make Your Popups Fit the Style of the Website
Banner blindness is a user’s ability to ignore elements of a website that appear as ads. When a user sees popups that have buttons, fonts, and styles that don’t feel on-brand with the website, they click away.
That’s why you need to design popups that fit the style of your website so they don’t appear spammy. You want the user to consume the content of the popup rather than dismiss it.
See how Semrush does it with such finesse. Their popup looks coherent with the website, with all its pieces appearing like a part of the larger brand, so it looks and feels trustworthy.
The color, fonts, and style are all taken into design consideration.
Image Source – SemRush
Editor’s Note: Poptin provides all you need to create popups that seamlessly match your brand’s look and feel. You can match your fonts, colors, logo, and unique elements that create the overall aesthetic of your brand.
You can achieve all of the above even if you use an external service for your popups. With Poptin, you can design on-brand popups in minutes using a drag-and-drop editor.
And the best part is it’s all free. You don’t even have to use your credit card.
2. Provide a Clear Offer to Customers
The online sphere is filled with popups that can overwhelm users as they pop up on every website, urging them to sign up for newsletters or take advantage of specific discounts.
Simply pushing offers into people’s faces and asking them nicely won’t cut it. You need to give them a proper and clear offer.
Otherwise, they’ll think you only need their contact to bombard them with spam emails.
You can achieve this by providing users with an offer of immense value, which will be hard for them to miss. For that, you need to write clear, concise copy for your popups.
Capitalize on the fear of missing out (FOMO) and create a sense of urgency for users so they’re tempted to sign up, just like Crocs does for first-time visitors to their site.
Image Source – www.crocs.com
Users can unlock 15% off their first order by signing up to their email list. It’s worth the exchange of contact information. Why? Because the offer disappears once you decline it.
3. Prioritize Timing
Showing popups to users five milliseconds after they’ve landed on your website might come off as a desperate move. It does nothing but make users click away or abandon your site.
You need to ensure they’re well-invested in your content before you poke them.
Make sure you get your timing right. The best duration is between three to thirty seconds.
Plus, don’t add a popup to every single webpage. Add them where they’re most fitting, like blog posts, resources, pricing pages, and case studies.
Editor’s Note: For welcome popups, aim for a gentle delay of 3-5 seconds. Trigger exit intent popups as the user’s cursor moves toward the browser window’s edge. Use page scroll triggers around 50-70% scroll depth.
4. Only Ask For Relevant Information
The more fields to fill, the more it’ll overwhelm the user. That’s why you need to ask users for the most relevant information only.
Most times, two options are more than enough. One for the name and the other for the email address.
See how Wild Souls does it to perfection. There’s a clear offer with an interesting CTA and only one information field to fill.
Source – www.wildsouls.gr
5. Focus on Popup Placement
User experience must always be your top priority. You don’t want to interrupt a seamless browsing or shopping experience by showing them a popup that takes up all the screen space.
Make your popups less intrusive and add a prominent exit or minimize button so they’re easy to dismiss, just like Olipop does for their email list popup.
Source – www.drinkolipop.com
Also, it’s essential to test everything for mobile because it drives over 50% of web traffic. So, you need to keep their user experience in mind.
6. Use Gamification
Gamification is an intelligent way to get users’ attention and compel them to take a desired action. It not only increases engagement but also doubles up conversion rates.
Mount Crest Gardens has created gamified popups to urge users to spin the wheel to unlock an exclusive discount.
Source – www.mountaincrestgardens.com
7. Test, Test, Test
Every popup is an opportunity to engage with your website visitors. But not all are winners out of the gate.
It’s crucial to experiment with elements like timing, copy, imagery, fonts, and placement. The difference between a captivating call-to-action and one that’s easily ignored can come down to a simple tweak.
Whether it’s adjusting when the popup appears or refining your message, iterative testing ensures you’re delivering the most compelling content to your audience.
The process of Reverse ETL, which involves copying data from a central warehouse to operational systems and your existing tech stack, plays a significant role in refining these elements.
By employing Reverse ETL, you can ensure that data flows seamlessly between platforms, empowering your marketing teams with a goldmine of data that can help you tailor popup experiences more effectively.
It’s with this rigorously testing approach that you can weed out lackluster popups and invest more in those that truly engage and convert.
Wrapping up
And there you have it — a comprehensive guide on everything you need to know about sprucing up your popup campaigns to drive B2C engagement.
Are you ready to launch your next popup campaign and reap the rewards of higher conversion and a better bottom line?
If you want to make things even easier for yourself, give Poptin’s popup builder a try — no strings attached. You won’t be disappointed!
Author bio
Guillaume is a digital marketer focused on handling content management at Wordable. Outside of work, he enjoys his expat life in sunny Mexico, reading books, wandering around and catching the latest shows on TV.
