A signup form let the user input the required data and the website to collect and save it. It is a means to subscribe the user to your email list. Sign up form design is the most important part of a website. It is because of the fact that those who sign up for the website, are more likely to be interested in the website and it's services or products or both. Email sign up form best practices must be adopted to get the best results.
It is important to put a sign-up form which is relevant and easy to access for the viewers, not some random sign up forms. Here are some of the sign up form best practices which can help you to boost the Sign up pages design :-
Above The Fold Sign Up Form
This is the most important tip for your sign up form. By placing the sign up form above the fold, which means in the top section of the website, people will be reminded to sign up to the website before scrolling down. You can also create a form which will be in the sight of visitor every time, i.e., by pinning it, it will work as a constant reminder to fill it up.
Run A/B Tests for Call-To-Action
Write a persuasive call-to-action phrase. Do not overdo it. Also, make it simple and natural. People will ignore words like “sign up to download”, etc. The line should contain more personal words like “my” rather than “you”, “your”, etc. The call-to-action line is the main thing which persuades a person’s mind to sign up for your website. So, do deep research on call-to-action phrases before finalizing the line.
It's always better to run A/b test for your CTA s. It will help you to understand which version is working better for you. Thus it will improve your conversion rate. You may A/B test your CTA's font size, font colours, positions, phrases etc.
Vidhi Punamiya
Showcase The Value of Your Sign Up Form
In the sign-up field, tell people about the value you can provide them if they sign up for your website. When people see the benefits of signing up, they are more likely to do it. But, don’t lie to your visitors. If they find out that you are fake, they will unsubscribe to your website which might affect your ranking in one or the other way. False promises will only affect the brand value of your company.
You can show the value through your CTA button or even integrating with a "thank you" page as well.
Guide Your Users
Guide the user in the form field, explaining them how they have to fill the form. You can also inform them that which is the important field and which is optional. Guiding them will save their time and energy. This will make the fill-up form a hassle free procedure.
Ask for Important Information
Asking for information which is not relevant to the website is fully wastage of time for both the parties. The fill -up form should contain columns for necessary details only. User’s full name and email address will be enough to get them subscribe. People hate to fill too many fields. Moreover, keep it as short as possible.
Labels’ Position
It might look like stupid thing, but studies show that top aligned labels take much less time to fill than right or left aligned labels. It is because of the fact that a person have to look right first and then to the left while filling a right-aligned label. Whereas, he/she only have to look down when filling top aligned labels. So, always put the labels on the top of the form field.
Privacy Statement
Privacy policies tick is very important to be included in the sign-up form. You can write a line below the privacy tick which explains your visitors that the web doesn't breach the privacy of any user. However, keep it as simple as possible. Furthermore, you can take inspiration from other websites to improve this field.
Confirmation Technique
After the form has been filled up by the users, the next step that the user accepts is the confirmation of the form, they filled up. There can be various ways to confirm the form. Such ways include confirmation code on the given mobile number, which the user has to fill in the blank space given on the page, then a confirmation letter to both email and the contact number or by providing confirmation link to the email.
There are many ways to it and the website can also get creative with it's way to give the confirmation to the users. However, do not forget to give confirmation of the signup form, otherwise the users will be in a dilemma of whether their form has been accepted or not. Sign up page design must be made accordingly.
Creativity on the form
Get creative in terms of the form's look. It is a good way to attract the users and urge them to fill it. Some people fill the form solely based on it's design, not facilities. Either way the benefit is of the website. Hence, getting creative with the form can be a generating way to get the viewers ,sign up for the website. If you are not a very creative person yourself, you ca hire a freelancer from websites like Fiverr, Truelancer, etc.
Clearly showing the errors in the first place
While filling out the form, people tend to make mistakes and that causes them not to able to confirm the form at the end. This makes them to fill the form again and that takes a long time. So users quit and don't bother to fill it again. Hence, design the form in a way that it shows the real time mistakes of the user and warn them about the same.This will allow them to correct their mistakes at the point and save from the pain of filling it again. Also, you can give little instructions beneath the column of what exactly the form field is looking for. This way the time of the users will be saved and they won't get impatient while filling the sign up form.
Don't get too compulsory about the format usage
There are certain signup forms which gets too compulsory about the format. For example, use of only upper case letters for name or use of a specific format for date. This forces the users to put extra efforts. Users are very impatient while filling out the form and creating such obligations make them more impatient. Giving away options regarding the format of the form will allow them to be less impatient during the form fill-up and they will fill it without any hassle or stress.
Avoid Distractions
There should not be any distractions like ads, photos, random popups or too much text. A sign-up form should have a dedicated landing page that fulfills the purpose of your opt-in form.
Integrate Social Sign-ups
Be flexible with your Sign-up process. Integrate social sign-ups that user can register themselves using their Social accounts without filling the form. Applying this will surely boost your subscriber list.
Enable Autocomplete
Enable the auto-complete feature on your Sign-up forms. As you will ask some personal details on your sign-up form, thus people might have answered those questions earlier on other websites. hence, depending on browser settings it can store that data. So, In that case, people don't need to fill up the sign-up form by themselves as it will be done automatically. It will make the sign-up process smoother and effortless.
Avoid Captcha
Nowadays lots of websites use Captcha to avoid bot sign-ups. But as a result of that, you may lose some prospects or leads. At times, some of the captchas are too complex to solve, thus people might get frustrated and leave without submitting the form.
Avoid Multi-Column Sign up Form
A single column Sign up form works better than the multi-column sign-up forms. As people get confused with multi-column forms and skip the mandatory fields, thus it makes the sign-up process much longer.
Use Sentence Case and Keep The Design Simple
Do not put unnecessary texts and photos on your Signup forms. Use Sentence case and avoid capital cases. Try to keep the design simple that your prospect can understand your offers or the value you are going to provide after they Sign-up.
Highlights Testimonials on Sign up form
Always highlights your social proofs and the people who have been already benefited from your products or service earlier. As it will build trust among your prospects and you will be able to convince your prospects much faster.
Make Your Sign-up Form Responsive
Make your Sign-up form responsive that it can be viewed properly on mobile, tablets and other devices. Otherwise, you will be unable to capture your prospects from mobile or tablets.
Ashwini
Conclusion
Sign up or registration form best practices play most crucial role for every business website or even blogs. Once you convinced someone to sign up to the website, it can sell the product to that user and generate leads. Signing up shows that the user believes the website and also interested in the website. So, if you don’t have a good sign up form on your website, then create it now.
If you already have one, then you can just go and edit it, keeping these practices in your mind. People don't like to waste much of their time in filling up such forms unless it is easy and free from any kind of twisted work. Hence, making formats easy will be handy for them to fill up the form .
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