It seems people often get focused on more traffic to their site and higher conversions, and put little effort into making their existing conversions become returning visitors, future shoppers, brand advocates and spend more money.
A "Thank You" page can provide a wide array of different options to your existing conversions that can maximize the average spend and increase your customer lifetime value. A good "Thank You" page can turn a one-time business engagement into a lifetime business opportunity. It will allow you to build a relationship with a customer and not just capture them.
Business-to-Consumer (B2C) Conversions
Instead of chasing new customers, you can always generate extra income from up-selling or cross-selling your products. Its a fact that 30 percent to 67 percent of all people can be up sold at the time of purchase. After a customer has purchased an item you can offer a second item, a subscription to your newsletter, RSS feed, or an ongoing email course. If they subscribe you have the ability to offer them upgrades, or new items or a continuous basis.
Some good things to find on a B2C "Thank You" page are:
- Customer Satisfaction Surveys
- Tell-a-Friend Options (Use social media)
- Downloads (Catalogs)
- Incentives (Coupons, Customer Loyalty Programs)
These are some of the questions in the customers mind post-purchase. Some common questions are:
- Did the order really go through?
- Have I been charged via my payment method?
- When will the product(s) arrive?
- Can I track my order?
- What if I want to change my order before it ships, can I do that?
Anything you can do to ease anxiety and answer their questions is a best practice
Business-to-Business (B2B) Conversions
After a business makes an inquiry on your Website they can be routed to learn more about your business and accomplishments to add further credibility. Ensuring that the user is being educated about your company, services, products, or processes important to the closure of the lead and helps for an easier follow-up response.
Some good things to find on a B2B "Thank You" page are:
- Downloads (Whitepapers)
- Latest Media Highlights (Articles, Press Releases, Awards)
- Highlight Testimonials or Successful Case Studies
- Anything to get them to know the company better
General "Thank You" Page Rules of Thumb
- Be Consistent
If someone fills our your form and goes to a page that looks nothing like the page where they filled out the form, they may worry that they did something wrong, or that they didnt understand the form. They may hit the back button to go reread the form before they even read whats on the thank you page!
- Be Specific
Clearly explain what just happened, what to expect, and what (if anything) the subscriber needs to do.
- Inform and Educate
Its a good idea to remind your customer to check for an order confirmation by email (show which address to add to safe list on your thank you page). Remind customer to check junk mail folder and let them know when and if they should expect a response.
- Set Expectations
Try to give an estimate of how soon they should expect this email (within 24 hours max). Also let your customer know if they will receive additional emails when items ship (especially if you use multiple warehouses and items may ship separately).
- Reassure
Use 'Thank You' pages to reassure customers that their transactions were successful and provide comprehensive FAQs to alleviate any post-purchase anxieties.
- Optimize
Utilize website optimization to increase conversion actions on your 'Thank You' page.
At SES Chicago I gave a presentation on SEO and Usability and on slide #15 there are some general brief tips I covered for "Thank You" pages that I'll share below:
- Provide option to refer a friend.
- Show how to track their order.
- Show products related to the order.
- Ask user to fill out a feedback survey.
- Provide a coupon for next purchase.
- State when theyll hear back if needed.
Great "Thank You" Page Examples
Aaron Wall points out a well done Thank You page by BBSdocumentary.com. This "Thank You" page tells a story and makes the customer feel like they made the right decision in the purchase to ease any buyer's remorse.
Amazon.com has superb cross-selling and up-selling model built into their shopping cart that is quite sophisticated. Upon checkout you are still posed with more relevant and related products to purchase.
Marketing Sherpa's "Thank You" page has all their products, some of which are related to the sale that has just been made, and some are not related at all.
(thanks to Vishen Lakhiani)
Anne Holland, Marketing Sherpas President, says,
Another interesting fact: the most popular offer on that page gets a 29% acceptance rate, which is fabulous, but not the whole 39%. That means giving folks a choice on that page has helped our overall offer conversions increase by 10 percentage points.
Additional Tips
If you find you may have peaked with customer cross-sell after X amount of time you can also offer up relevant affiliate or advertisement links on the "Thank You" page to gain additional revenue. The key here is to make sure the offerings are 100% relevant to their purchase so customers feel like they are being assisted rather than marketed.
About the Author: Jordan Kasteler
