Legendary sales guru, motivational speaker, and author Zig Ziglar once said: “gratitude is the healthiest of all human emotions. The more you express gratitude for what you have, the more likely you will have even more to express gratitude for.” In light of this wise advice, here is an unusual question for you: when was the last time you thanked your customers?
We aren’t referring to direct communication with customers in person, over the phone, or through email, chat/text, or video conferencing. Obviously, you say and write thank you all of the time, because you truly are grateful for the opportunity to be of service. Rather, we’re referring to another channel that is a major part of your brand identity, and for some customers might be the only way that they interact with you: your website.
The Power of “Thank You” Pages
Indeed, if your website doesn’t have a roster of thank you pages ready to display at different touchpoints, then you’re missing out on a valuable opportunity to drive engagement, nurture leads, and ultimately boost sales. Or if you prefer to look at things in a glass-half-empty way (which at times is necessary to get the full story), failing to thank your customers on your website could accidentally send a message that they aren’t important to you. Aside from being unfriendly, this is also costly: research has shown that a whopping 68% of customers will leave a business if they perceive it is indifferent to them — or frankly, just doesn’t care.
Once again, you most certainly DO care a great deal about your customers. But unless you demonstrate it with thank you pages on your website; your customers may get the wrong message — and form the wrong opinion. That’s the bad news.
The good news is that you can easily and affordably ensure that your customers know how much you value their patronage and loyalty. You simply need to create (or have created for you) thank you pages that display whenever customers perform any action that should spark your gratitude, such as when they:
- Fill out a form (e.g. subscribing to a newsletter, request a quote, etc.).
- Download a report, white paper, infographic or any other digital asset.
- Participate in a poll, survey or contest.
- Request a free trial.
Best Practices for Thank You Pages
Now that you’re inspired to shower your customers with gratitude, gratitude and yet more gratitude, it’s worth keeping these 5 best practices in mind:
1. Make sure that your message is loud and clear. There should be no mistaking the purpose or point of your thank you pages.
2. If applicable, use different thank you pages for various customer actions. This will allow you to slightly alter the message (e.g. “thank you for downloading our latest infographic!”). You can use the same basic template for all pages.
3. Use warm, welcoming fonts, colors and images. Feel free to use humor as well, if appropriate.
4. Make sure that your website’s standard navigation (typically a menu at the top and/or side) display on all thank you pages, along with all of your social sharing buttons. You don’t want customers to feel as though they have left your website.
5. Use the opportunity to recommend additional content, resources, products, special offers, and so on. It’s important to be careful here and not be too aggressive, because you don’t want customers to perceive as though your gratitude is a thinly veiled attempt to get them to do something else or buy something else. Whatever you recommend should align with the context. For example, a customer who just downloaded an infographic might be open to downloading a complimentary ebook or checklist.
The Bottom Line
You like your customers. Actually, just like us here at Noble Webworks, you probably LOVE your customers — because they are the reason you are in business! And while you certainly express your gratitude when speaking with and writing to customers, your website might not be doing its share. Adding thank you pages is a simple, effective and affordable way to ensure that your customers know how much you truly care — while you drive engagement and nurture leads in the process.
Learn More
To learn more, contact Noble Webworks today. We will perform a comprehensive audit of your website to identify where you can effectively and strategically add thank you pages. Your consultation with us is free.
