It's probably one of the most delicate points of the conversion process, yet many marketers give it the least amount of thought: The Landing Page Conversion Form. Believe it or not, there is a rhyme and reason for how to develop your Joomla landing page forms for the most success.
Let's take some time to break down the strategy of what makes a good Joomla landing page form and how we can develop yours for maximum success.
Bare Minimums
The first step is to get with your team and find out what are the BARE minimum questions you need to get from a lead in order to be able to get them into your funnel for further marketing. This is typically just a first name, last name and email.
The reason I'm specifically stressing the "Bare" minimums is because many times marketers get too excited to ask for information they don't necessarily NEED to start bringing them down the funnel. This will scare off some of the top funnel visitors.
Pro Tip - Keep in mind that you can always collect more information later down the buyers lifecycle once you have a better relationship established and they are more engaged.
These "Bare Minimum" questions will become the foundation of every form you create on your website.
Determine Persona Based Questions
Next you will want to think of questions that you can include that will help you start segmenting your leads by persona. This is extremely critical because it will help you tailor your marketing content, messaging and approach to that persona's needs and wants.
This can typically be one or maybe two questions. Find a question (or two) that once answered it makes it very clear which persona "Bucket" they would fit in.
For Example - If you're a B2B company who sells the same widget in 4 different industries in which each industry uses the widget differently. Then a simple question, "Which Industry do you Operate in?" will clearly tell you which persona they are.
Talk to Marketing for Lead Qualification Criteria
Ultimately your job as a marketer is to hand off marketing qualified leads (MQL) to the sales team. These are leads who meet specific criteria to be someone who is a great fit for a client and the marketing team has deemed them as a good fit.
Take the time to talk to your sales team to brainstorm the questions that they would most be interested in knowing about a lead and would make a clear case that this lead is a good one to contact as soon as possible.
Naturally they will probably have questions that are best NOT to have on forms, rather would be questions brought up in a personal consultation. But there should be a few you can agree on to ask that will help give you the ability to mark a lead as a MQL if they match those criteria.
Segment By Stage of the Buyer Lifecycle
Everything up to this point has been looking at all the different questions we want to ask our leads, however, if we asked all of these questions at once it would be a bit overwhelming. So instead, you can break up the questions based on which lifecycle stage they are in.
The idea is that leads who are further down the process would be more engaged and more open to filling out longer, more "personal" questions. Those who are at the top of the funnel we will want to gain simple the basic information just to convert them into the funnel in the first place.
Here's one example of how you can break up your questions.
Top Funnel - Information Stage:
- First Name
- Last Name
- Website (if B2B)
- Persona Differentiator Question
Middle Funnel - Consideration Stage:
- (all the information above)
- Qualifying Question 1
- Qualifying Question 1
Bottom Funnel - Decision Stage:
- (all of the information above)
- Any other qualifying questions
- Text box: "What is Currently Your Biggest Problem with X"
- This will be a great conversation starter for your sales team
Test, Test, and Test Some More
There is no "formula" for exactly what you should include in your forms. Every audience, company and individual offer is different. This is why it's critical that you plan on running tests to see what performs the best, while still getting you the information you need. Make testing your forms a regular activity so you can find the best fit for that specific landing page.
The above considerations are simply that - topics that you should consider when developing your forms, they are not an ideal blueprint. In the end of the day, there isn't a set formula for total success with your Joomla landing page forms.
Each form will be different for each company and for each persona. It takes a conscious effort to continuously be testing and iterating on your forms to try and find the best formula for that specific conversion point.