Pop ups - why they work!

Why do we hate pop-ups?

They interrupt me

You've Googled your way to a page that you assume will give you the answer you're looking for. Full of anticipation, after 2 seconds you are interrupted by the first pop-up. You spend time looking for the tick that closes the box, scroll a little and the next pop-up hits you.

Pop-ups are disruptive to the user experience when they don't take into account the user's motives and behaviour on a page.

When using pop-ups on your site, it's a good idea to use settings that only open a pop-up when the user has shown a sufficient amount of interest and has found your content interesting. Once you've 'banked' something, a user is more willing to accept or interact with your pop-ups. Therefore, the best converting pop-ups won't appear right away.

The rhetoric is patronising

Some pop-ups are downright patronising in their rhetoric. You may have been faced with this choice in a pop-up: "Yes please, I want to learn more" or "No please, I want to remain ignorant".

There's nothing wrong with using YES/NO boxes in conjunction with FOMO (you can read more about what it is later in the article), but be careful not to offend users with your options.

Slightly maliciously, you click "no thanks, I'd like to remain ignorant", but it's as if the system hasn't really respected your choice, because shortly afterwards a new text pops up with the exact same message.

They provide a poor user experience

Yes, many might think so, but good UX design isn't just about making sure users can find the information they are looking for.

Good UX design is about giving users what they are looking for while ensuring that our business gets new leads that will eventually become loyal and paying customers.

Many would argue against the fact that over time we have built up an understanding that pop-ups, used in the right way, are to be expected and not necessarily disruptive to the user experience. But pop-ups have their place - because they work!

Data tells us that people - despite being reluctant to admit it - interact with pop-ups on a large scale. For example, in sign-up campaigns, pop-ups perform far better than a static sign-up form in a footer or sidebar.

The psychology behind pop-ups

To be successful with pop-ups, it's necessary to understand what fundamentally drives us to interact with a pop-up.

As humans, when it comes down to it, we are far from rational. We act 90% of the time with our 'lazy' part of the brain, which relies on pattern recognition, habits and primitive behaviours.

When a pop-up disturbs us in the mission we're on, we get annoyed to begin with. This means that you, as the sender, are already behind the curve in terms of getting the user to perform the exact action you want. However, there is a small hope, because despite the annoyance you have caused, you have also captured the user's attention for a split second with the interruption.

And how you utilise this ultra-short attention span is crucial to whether the user's behaviour leads to a conversion.

To maintain attention, you can use some of these psychological triggers to your advantage:

FOMO - Fear of missing out

Humans have a built-in fear of missing out on something important, so the better you can articulate what they are missing out on, the more likely they are to interact with your pop-up.

If we can access something for a limited period of time or in limited numbers, it has a big effect on our desire to interact.

The desire for reward

When we get or expect to get something as a result of our interaction with a pop-up, whether it's a product we buy or a freebie, it triggers the neurotransmitter dopamine in the brain, which makes us feel good.

It is therefore natural that pop-ups that offer a reward in exchange for a sign-up, for example, convert far better than those that do not. The knock-on effect is that users who have received a freebie are also more likely to subsequently purchase our products.

If there is a direct link between the freebie and the product, such as a free chapter of a book or a free first month of a subscription, you have already created ownership of the overall product, which is a feeling that is difficult for the user to let go of and they will most likely buy the rest of the product.

What you need to consider is what your visitors will perceive as a valuable reward.

Social validation

"Join 100,000 others and sign up for our newsletter"

We have a strong desire to be part of the "club" and we trust that if enough others have also signed up for the newsletter, there must be something to it and we decide to do the same.

The brain is lazy

Due to the short attention span, it's important that you are extremely clear about the action you want them to take. There should be no doubt about what the reward is and how the user should act to achieve it.

The user should intuitively understand the text and the desired action in the context of the pop-up. If users need to activate the rational part of the brain to understand the context, they will most likely close the pop-up box and continue what they were doing.

A success story

As part of a larger lead generation campaign, we implemented Sleeknote for one of our larger customers. Sleeknote is a Danish product and just one of many 3rd party scripts that handle pop-ups on your website.

With the implementation of Sleeknote, the desire was to expand a mailing list and convert website visitors into customers through inspiring newsletters.

Previously, the customer's website had a static sign-up form in the footer that hardly anyone found their way to. Today, the footer form has been replaced by a variety of pop-up campaigns, all customised to a specific context.

We implemented Sleeknote on 23 May 2019 and activated a number of different pop-up campaigns.

Simultaneously with the implementation of Sleeknote, we ran a Facebook sign-up campaign where you could win tickets to Legoland. The Facebook campaign linked to the website, and this is where the conversion happened via a Sleeknote pop-up.

2.543 new leads in 4 1/2 months

During the first 4 months, 2,543 visitors signed up to receive newsletters through the different campaigns. The sign-up campaigns had an average conversion rate of 4%. The campaign that delivered the most leads (37%) had a conversion rate of 13.25%.

Today, exactly one year later, Sleeknote campaigns have generated just under 4000 leads.

In comparison, Sumo.com analysed more than 1.5 million pop-ups, where the average conversion rate was 3.09%. The top 10% of pop-ups had a conversion rate of 9.28%. Only 3 out of 100 pop-ups had a conversion rate above 11%.

In the first 4 ½ months after implementing Sleeknote, the website had 178,612 visitors, of which 63,471 were shown a campaign pop-up.