How much thought or how little thought goes into a Submit Button? It’s usually very little thought and that’s the problem. In a programming world, it makes sense a visitor is submitting information to a server after all. But your visitors aren’t programmers nor do they know anything about programming, all they know is they have to fill out some information to get what they want often times having to jump through hoops and be made to feel like an idiot because they entered their phone number with dashes. Maybe they are more the submissive to the dominatrix submit button?
On the other end of this communication is the Submit button usually placed there by a programmer who thinks like a programmer not like your prospect that you’re so desperately trying to get an email address from. Well OK maybe the Submit button is the fault of your designer and not your programmer, which is even worse because design should empathize with the user not tie him down in chains and whip him, but usually it’s because the designer or copywriter is lazy.
Lazy on the web is a very bad thing. It gets in the way of leads, sales and revenue. There are so many elements on a form page that can cause friction and anxiety in the mind of your visitor which add up to less conversion and take away from your bottom line. Web pages today need to work, they can’t afford to be even a bit lazy. They need to work harder than ever in this day and age. Every element of your page has to work towards getting that conversion and making it easy for your visitor, giving him or her reason to part with his email address. Your Submit button also needs to pull it’s weight and work hard to close that conversion. There’s no reason why any form page button should ever say SUBMIT. Submit won’t reduce the friction in the mind of your prospect. Submit doesn’t give your visitor a reason to push that button. That little button has to sell. It has to close the sale just as strong and effectively as all the copy and images on the page. That little button should speak to the benefits of clicking it. Why not have a more persuasive button like Get your Free White Paper or Learn How To Save More Money.
There’s opportunity and conversions that your web pages should be delivering, don’t submit.
Image by vintagev via Flickr, used under a Creative Commons license.
