Why You Might Want to Consider a Subscription Popup for Your Blog

July 9, 2013 by Daniel Sharkov|

Popups… Why would anyone want to have a popup appear on their site?

Yeah, I know a lot of you dislike those silly little boxes that appear in the middle of the screen right when you are reading something interesting…

But then again isn’t this whole popup issue a little overrated?

Do you really end up clicking the X button every time you happen to come across a popup?

Well honestly I don’t really think that’s the case.

Today I am going to cover the topic of list subscription popups that a big part of the internet users seem to hate.

In the below paragraphs I will try to show you a different perspective on popups by sharing how incorporating one affected my blog’s subscription rates and bounce rates.

Do The Big Blogs Have Them?

Since we are talking about something that seems to be quite the issue, it might be a good idea to take a look at some of the big blogs.

Of course we can’t talk about a direct correlation between how good or bad popups are and how many high-profile blogs have them. However if many of the big names in the blogging industry have embraced popups, they probably aren’t as problematic as some believe.

Neil Patel from QuickSproutis definitely one of my favorite marketing bloggers out there and with the hundreds of shares that his blog posts receive, it seems like thousands enjoy his content as well.

The second example comes from none other than Derek Halpern and his blog Social Triggers. If you like reading about traffic generation and conversion optimization, his blog is tough to beat.

Ana Hoffman from Traffic Generation Cafehas some of the best social media and traffic generation tips around so it’s no wonder why her content receives a huge amount of social buzz.

The above screenshots take a look at just three of the more popular marketing blogs. There are dozens and dozens of other ones in different niches that also take advantage of popups.

But of course that’s hardly a proof to anything, is it?

Let’s move on to the next paragraph!

What is the Effect on Bounce Rates?

One of the most solid arguments that popup opposers put to use are the bounce rates. As you know the bounce rate is the percentage of visitors who basically exit a blog right from the same page they landed on.

So the idea is that when there’s a popup, the percentage of people bouncing away would increase dramatically.

But is that really so in the real world?

Well I won’t lie to you. Popups will increase your blog’s bounce rates.

However…

I’ve been using a popup in the hopes to get more list subscribers for almost three months now. And for those three months of having that popup up and running I haven’t noticed THAT much of a bounce rate increase.

But words are just words so here’s a screenshot from my Google Analytics dashboard to make things more “real”:

So what do we see in the above example?

The screenshot takes a look at the two month period after me installing a popup plugin and the two month period before that. As you can see for the period after the implementation of a popup the bounce rate has increased by 3.19% from 76.44% to 78.88%.

And yes, we do see an increase, but not a big one. Additionally there are other factors that must be taken into consideration such as the organic traffic growth of this blog, since the latter has a little higher bounce rates than social media traffic for me.

Okay, so in reality it turns out popups don’t have that much of a negative impact over bounce rates.

Now let’s look at the actual ROI of using popups…

What is the Effect on Subscription Rates?

That is probably the most important question. You may have come across landing pages of some of the popup tools out there. One thing authors claim is that having a popup will improve results with over 400%, 500% and even 700%.

Let me tell you one thing straight –
those figures are NOT realistic.

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But let me also tell you something else –
popups DO make a difference and a good one.

How much of a difference exactly?
Well speaking in numbers in my case I was able to pretty much double the sign-ups. Although far from the “predicted” results, it is still pretty impressive.

Here you can see a graphic of how my subscriber numbers were growing before me implementing a popup form and how they improved after installing a popup:

The table in the above screenshot speaks for itself. What we are seeing is almost twice as many sign-ups after the popup installation, compared to their number before the popup plugin was uploaded on this blog.

As you can see the three consecutive months after the implementation show how consistent the flow of new subscribers is.

Which Popup Plugin does This Blog Use?

Okay, did I change your mind?

Probably not…

If you simply don’t like the idea of a popup, chances are nothing is going to change your mind.

However if you weren’t quite sure whether incorporating a popup was worth it, well, now you have the answer.

It’s great if you’ve decided to try this concept on your own blog,
but first you need to choose the right plugin to do the job.

If you do some research you’ll come across a lot of different options. Some of them would set you back a hundred bucks and others even more.

The plugin I use is called Ninja Popups(aff. link)
.

And you know what the good thing about it is?

It costs just 18$ and at the same time it supplies you with pretty much every feature you would need.

You get to choose from eight different layouts You can do further background and image customizations You can disable the plugin for those who subscribed You can include a redirect to a custom welcome page You can enable a display delay

If you decide Ninja Popups isn’t what you are looking for, you might also check out PopUp Domination- an alternative plugin that is also highly-recommended around the blogosphere (but comes at a heftier price).

The Verdict

So all in all it turns out a popup isn’t the worst thing in the world. Yes, it’s a fact – having one might make a small percentage of your visitors leave your blog. But on the other hand having a subscription popup DOES increase conversion rates and DOES result in more subscribers on per day basis.

Now on to you friends!

What are your thoughts on popups? Are they worth the risk in your opinion? Have you already implemented one such plugin? If so what are your results? Please take a minute to share your thoughts!

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