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You can’t have an effective email marketing campaign if you don’t have the email addresses. You can’t argue with that! So it’s clear that acquiring emails is an imperative task you need to perform if you’re hoping to run successful email campaigns. However, increasing the number of email subscribers isn’t always easy and initially takes a fair bit of trial and error until you’re able to find the perfect recipe that caters to your target audience. There are lots of aspects that can affect your email marketing campaign’s effectiveness, but one of reasons you could be losing out on vital subscribers could be because your email sign-up form isn’t up to scratch.

If you’re looking to grow your email list, My Emma has put together this handy blog posts which digs into each layer of a successful email sign-up form and explains how to approach your design. My Emma have broken down the many strategies you could use to move forward with your email marketing campaign and have written handy tips on how to implement them to support your particular business, no matter which industry umbrella you fall under.

Hopefully, by the end of this post and with thanks to the people at My Emma, you should be feeling more confident about setting up an effective sign-up form and motivated to try out the tips featured. Reading through the following points will give you an understanding of how to layout your email sign-up form and what content you need to be featuring to get those subscribers.

How to design an effective sign-up form

When it comes to your email sign-ups, success is based on three vital elements: design, copy, and the information gathered. Let’s start with the foundation of your sign-up form: the design.

There are so many things to consider when it comes to your sign-up design, and it’s vital not to slack on any of them.

Placement

The placement of your email sign-up form is vital to its success. While you may not think this would fall under design, we believe it does. After all of the hard work you put into creating your sign-up form, it would be a shame for it not to be seen.In order for your sign-up form to bring in more subscribers, you have to make your form present in the right place at the right time.

When you’re finding a location for your sign-up form, you need to take your audience into consideration. Would they be more likely to sign up if it was at the top of your website, or if it was available on your Facebook page? There are a number of places where you can place your sign-up form, however, it’s up to you to decide where it will be most successful. Here’s a list of some places that you may want to include your email collection form:

• Header of your website
• Footer of your website   
• Pop-up window
• Facebook page   

Including your email-sign up form on your Facebook page is a great way to build your email list. Social media and email may seem like they’re always competing, but they actually work best when integrated. So, don’t forget to include your sign-up form on your social account pages.

Layout

The layout of your sign-up form is basically the blueprint of your design. It will map out where your header, image, and CTA (call to action) will go. You can use a template that is provided by an email service provider or customize your own.

In your email sign-ups, you’re not going to be promoting anything – no blog posts or YouTube videos. Nope, you’re simply going to ask them to subscribe to your email list, that’s it. When you have just the one goal in mind, there’s a specific way to strategise your layout which will help you to achieve this.

It’s imperative to keep the layout simple so that your user remains focused on your message and the action you want them to take next. Comparable to landing page design, you don’t want to distract your user from the goal, so maintaining a simplistic design will help your users stay on track.

In summary, you should always avoid any busy compositions and make the graphic easy to digest.

Color selection

The colours you choose to incorporate into your email list sign-up form hold a lot of responsibility. Obviously you don’t want to include too many colors that will distract your user, but you definitely want to maintain your branding and communicate messages clearly.

When you’re considering a colour palette, it’s important to include contrasting colors so that it’s easier to draw your user’s eye to specific places. It’s also helpful to keep your color choices simple. Maintaining a simple color scheme allows you to keep your user’s attention and help them focus on the most important information.

Using contrasting colors gives you the opportunity to create the path you want your user’s eye to take. The distinct difference in contrasting colors gives you the opportunity you to organize your form. Take this Headspace email as an example.

Image Source: Really Good Emails

Blue and orange are contrasting colours, and Headspace used this colour pairing to help segment the content within the email. First, you’re greeted with the chance to subscribe with a white background. You then proceed to the next section that includes a discount offer within the orange section. The color scheme encourages the user to scroll down and is complemented with blue CTAs that draw you in to subscribe. They choose to set up colours this way to purposefully set the CTA apart from the other text; and let’s be honest, if you’re going to draw attention to anything, it should be your CTA.

What you choose to say

Of course, you can just ask plainly: “Sign up for our email list,” or you can get a little more creative and explore other options, as long as the end goal is always clear. The email sign-up wording you include in your sign-up form should be relative to the business you’re trying to promote. Maybe a humorous tone will work best to engage your audience, or you want to convey the sincerity and importance of the updates you’ll be providing.

No matter which tone fits your brand, the phrase you use will help you achieve more subscribers. But, you need to find the voice that specifically draws in your users. Take this email sign-up from The North Face as an example. Their sign-up form is located at the bottom of their website and reads: “Adventure is everywhere. Even in your inbox.” This strategy draws their outdoorsy users in by creating an adventurous sensation with text alone.

The North Face also kept it simple by getting to the point right away. They avoid distracting their potential sign-ups with offers or the promise of freebies. They don’t ‘beg’ or try to bribe you into signing up and their email form is simple and tasteful. This sign-up from The North Face just goes to show that if you’re smart, you can use copy and only copy to get the job done.

Here are some other things you can include in your copy to encourage users to sign up:   

• Discounts/Incentives   
• Fear of missing out. Everyone can fall to FOMO, even people who aren’t your subscribers   
• A content preview
• Perceived value of subscriber content

The information you ask for

The information you are requesting from your potential email subscribers can make or break your mailing list sign-up form. There are some users who are immediately put off by having to complete multiple fieds and there are others who don’t mind as much. Although asking for too much information might not be a distraction, it can certainly be off putting for some and therefore you could be losing out on subscribers.

Here are some bits of information that you may want to request when creating your email collection form:

• First name
• Last Name
• Email Address (of course)   
• Interests       
• ZIP Code   

Image Source: Planet Fitness

Name, ZIP code, email address—that all makes a lot of sense. But, why would you want to access information regarding your new user’s interests?

Using this PacSun email sign-up form as an example, they not only offer an incentive, but they also provide an option to choose who you’re shopping for. This would fall under that “Interest” category. Including this in your email sign-up allows you to access more detailed information so that you can target them more efficiently in the future.

Image Source: PacSun

GDPR

As with all data collection, you need to ensure that it is absolutely 100% crystal clear what your subscribers are signing up for and how you care for their data. It’s a good idea to have a link to your privacy policy as well as and link towards your company’s policy for email subscriptions. GDPR also covers things such as ensuring that once you have your email subscribers on board, you give users the option to unsubscribe from your email marketing campaign at any time.

Wrap up

Design, copy and the information you request from your user all play a vital role in the success of your email sign-up form. The creative and content strategy behind each sign-up form is based solely on the company behind the brand, and it’s up to you to figure out what works for you. You might not get it right first time and there’s no harm in reevaluating and tweaking your campaigns as you go. Nailing the perfect sign-up form will require some testing as  no one succeeds on the first try and no one can tell you exactly what your users are looking for. As you learn more about your audience and what draws them in, you’ll be able to mold each aspect of your form to cater to your prospects.

Now You Have The Knowledge, Go And Get Some Sign Ups!

So now you know how to jazz up your sign-up forms and optimise them for your user audience, what are you waiting for? It’s been said a thousand times before that no matter whether you’re a big company, a start up company or even a blogger, your email sign-up list is your biggest asset. Your email list contains a huge list of people who are genuinely interested in you and what you have to offer them! So if revamping your email sign-up form and creating engaging email marketing campaigns is on your 2019 to-do list, now you have the skills and tools to help get you started.

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