Let’s say you own a restaurant on Main Street. You have a great chef, an exciting menu and a clean, welcoming decor. And while plenty of passers-by stop and browse the menu posted to the exterior wall, only a small fraction of them open the door and ask your hostess to be seated at a table.

Every business owner, restaurant or otherwise, faces a similar dilemma — how to convert more browsers into buyers. Fortunately for you, there are a number of tools and strategies to deploy on your business website to increase conversions and grow your bottom line. One of our favorites is the pop-up form.

Wait, a pop-up?!

Pop-ups made a bad name for themselves over the past decade by bombarding user’s computer screens with annoying third-party advertisements. Today, pop-ups are popular again, but they’ve taken a different (and usually better) form. Perhaps aware of the stigma attached to pop-ups, you’re more likely nowadays to hear them referred to in more specific terms, like lightboxes, banners, overlays, welcome mats, slide-ins, etc. So what makes the 2017 version of pop-ups far superior to their predecessors?

1. They offer actual value to the user
2. When set up correctly, they are triggered at specific times and on specific pages, ensuring relevance to each individual user’s customer journey and needs

Odds are good you’ve encountered pop-up forms asking for your email address in exchange for something of perceived value — a discount code, an ebook download, a free trial, a newsletter subscription, etc. It probably looked something like this:

They can take other forms, of course. Banners occupy the top, side or bottom of your page and don’t have to obscure the content. Lightboxes appear over the content in the center of your webpage, as with the example above.

You have triggering options, too. Exit intent pop-ups use mouse-tracking technology to detect when a user appears poised to leave your webpage and deliver a specific message before they can do so. Pop-ups also can be set to trigger based on scroll depth — for example, after a user has scrolled down a certain percentage of the page — and based on time on page, say after 30 seconds.

Why use pop-ups on your site? And how?

Well, because pop-ups deliver results, making them a worthwhile part of your marketing campaigns. The fact is marketing pop-ups, overlays, slide-ins or whatever you want to call them convert at a higher rate than traditional forms. Check out these stats from Hubspot. Whether you’re selling a product or trying to grow your email database, pop-ups focus on a single business outcome for site visitors who already are engaged with your company.

As with any digital marketing tool at your disposal, pop-ups should be strategically deployed and with a clear goal in mind. After all, it takes a sound strategy to elicit the high conversion rate you seek.

The folks at Unbounce break it down here in five simple steps, emphasizing the who, what, when, where and why of any good pop-up campaign. At the heart of your strategy should be this fundamental question: Am I enhancing the user experience by providing them something of value at the right time and in the right place? If the answer is no, it’s time to go back to the drawing board.

Next steps

We’ve only scratched the surface of pop-ups and how they can deliver strong marketing returns for your online business. Interested in learning more? Swift Local Solutions’ team of marketing experts is happy to help. Give us a shout as soon as you’re ready to put pop-us to use on your website.