WordPress Popover options and ways to make them less annoying

I have many clients who find that their email list is their most important marketing tool. If someone allows you to message then in their email inbox you have a great opportunity to communicate your ongoing brand messages.

The most sophisticated solution requires a member log-in system so the website can know who has signed up already. That’s what NYTimes has, for example. Without a login, the system can’t check the Mailchimp (or whatever) list and see who subscribed because WordPress doesn’t know the email address of the person who is currently visiting the site.

WHO CLICKED A LINK IN NEWSLETTER?
A partial solution is to add a special link in your email newsletter so when someone clicks a link from the newsletter they don’t get the “email wall”.

The Dreaded Email Wall and How to Make it Less Annoying

Another popular solution is to set up a “wall” where users have to give their email to read your content. Sometimes this “wall” can be “leaky” in the sense that you are not strictly requiring signup so users can just “close” the request to sign up. The strongest from of a “wall” is a “popover” where the browser screen dims and a message and signup form appear in the middle of the screen. This completely interrupts the users flow of reading your content and many users hate that interruption. But it can be effective. The name differentiates it from a “popup” which refers to how a ling can open a whole separate browser window/tab.

There are many ways to improve the way an email wall gets the users attention. Of course you want the wall to remember the user’s action from page to page so they don’t get asked over and over again. But another option is simple to have the popover appear at the bottom of the page – not when the page  first loads. Here’s a setting option for the free (but outdated) ITRO Popup Plugin that shows a pixel offset – a user has to scroll that far down a page to see the popover:

I also suggest if you use this option you set display mode to be once per 30 days –  or something like that – so if someone “closes” it the popover won’t come back.

I recommend GetSiteControl: it offers many options for when to trigger the display of a popover :

1. Based on rules and behavior triggers (location, language, scroll depth, time on page, exit intent, and other parameters.)
2. Upon click on a page button, link, or image (on selected page elements.)
3. Upon click on the popup button (based on the way visitors interact with your other popups)

I have also used this more sophisticated plugin: PIPPITY

To try it out is not free – it is @$50 (or google around for coupons) – but it offers some nice features. They do offer a demo mode on their site so you can test it to some degree before buying.

Not sure if you can make the text look like anything or just work within their templates.

Some features

• popup trigger only at the end of an article, once the reader has read some content
• popup appears after a certain number of pageviews
• Have popup appear only on article pages (posts)
• Create multiple popup profiles – view and manage them from an easy to use dashboard.
• includes analytics for each popover
• Settings require a few clicks in a kind of ‘wizard’ and would be simpler laid out in one form but overall I like this tool

See these hovers for an explanation of what it can do:

SCROLL TRIGGERED BOXES

There are other kinds of notifications – ones that appear at the end of a page and may slide in from the side. These are less intrusive than a “popover”. Also called “toasters” since they can pop up from the bottom of the screen.

this looks like a nice simple option: https://wordpress.org/plugins/scroll-triggered-boxes/screenshots/
UPDATE: Scroll Triggered Boxes is now Boxzilla

DEMO:
(their site is no longer working at http://wecandothatforyou.com/scroll/)

See more:

• https://wordpress.org/plugins/tags/scroll-triggered-box
• https://wordpress.org/plugins/scroll-triggered-boxes

ANNOUNCEMENT BARS

Another way to be less intrusive is to use an announcement bar at the top of the page instead of a popover.

• Foobar – a WordPress plugin: http://codecanyon.net/item/foobar-wordpress-notification-bars/411466
• HelloBar – Announcement bar with analytics and a/b testing (a bit more expensive): https://www.hellobar.com/use-cases
• AddThis: they call it a “custom message” and can be shown as popover or a “announcement” bar at top or bottom. They have a bunch of new share/follow options these days so be sure to check that out too.

All-IN-ONE TOOLS

1. MailMunch offers all 4 types of signup forms (Popup/Popover, Embedded, Top Bar, Scroll Box) and includes free and paid version (plugin links). Free version available.
2. Launch Effect is a WordPress landing page theme with built in MailChimp integration.
3. AddThis (free) or GetSiteControl  (free trial or starts at $7/mo): I mention them above but it’s worth repeating since they really have a fully-featured set of tools.

OTHER PAYMENT-BASED OPTIONS

1. There are some other interesting options at this link: https://wordpress.org/plugins/tags/paywall
2. But most of them are related to people paying $ for articles – not for requiring email signup. Like this one:
   https://wordpress.org/plugins/leaky-paywall-article-countdown-nag/
   A “leaky” pay wall is basically what NTtimes does.
3. This gives other options for the paywall – https://wordpress.org/plugins/bitwall/
   1. Pay to access content.
   2. Tweet to unlock access.
   3. Opt in to view an ad before consuming content.
4. This is similar: https://premium.wpmudev.org/project/pay-with-a-like/
5. Another fully featured payment system: https://zeen101.com
6. And another non-free, fully featured landing page and “LeadBox” creation tool: leadpages.net