How To Make A Lightbox Newsletter Sign Up Box

i cannot afford that but i use free one zookoda newsletter

I have been struggling with the idea of doing the lightbox sign up box. My gut is telling it would carry too many negatives. But now that so many probloggers are doing it, I think I might give it a try.

Hey John - while this is a great idea to get new subscribers, there is still a big problem with the blog broadcast for aweber feature. I mentioned this to you at the blog world expo. Basically, aweber can't pull in the description of the post. Just the title. And you can't do much with what you can pull - its preset. Just the title and date. This makes it hard to provide anything but the blog post title when trying to automate a 'newsletter' going out. Which isn't that great for trying to get someone to click through.

I started using aweber blog broadcast, but because of this issue, I actually use their regular broadcast email, put my own links in and do my own teaster descriptions. I do this manual newsletter once a month and has worked well for me.

Anyone else noticing this issue?

Rich Page (a web analytics fanatic)
http://www.rich-page.com

I don't think it's THAT obtrusive seeing as it only pops up once per visitor.

Interesting.

Personally, I don't mind it, since I clean my cookies every few weeks.

Would I try it on my blog? Yes. But only when it grows bigger.

I used the lightbox and my conversion was 3.6% which is pretty good

John

Will this work on any site? I have a subscription based site that this would work great for I think

Pop-up newsletter ad is bleeping annoying. You may lose this reader.

great thanks for this info ill give it a try

Isn't this against the TOS of many websites, including adsense?

@Mike Huang you are right

I've said this before, but thought I would say it again. If users didn't want to sign up in the first place, this method is just like "spam". There are a lot of users that delete their cookies once a week or even once a day.

-Mike

Thanks for posting this video John; great instructional. OK, so I installed Aweber lightbox forms on 2 of my sites and it works fine on 1 of them but on the other, which has a Javascript slide show on the home page the lightbox form appears UNDER the flash so you can't see it. Anybody here have that problem or know how to fix it by chance? Thanks.

Its supposed to only show to new users? but what if old viewers use firefox and have cookies and cache cleared on exit...pops up everytime !!!!

It works, sure.. but at what expense? It is annoying and a disservice to the reader. Moreover, it may push readers away from reading your actual website because they will get the newsletter which doesn't have this "pop-up" in it and is nearly 100% ad-free, thus causing you to have lower page views, thus dropping how much you earn from advertisers.

John, I have a question: your sign-up box (and other sign-up boxes I've seen) don't mention that you are signing up for a newsletter, just an e-Book. Isn't that misleading? Why *don't* you mention it? Would sign-ups go down?

Woot! I'm implementing this right now.

Coming form you John is OK because we know you are evil. I was surprised to see that on ShoeMoney though and I hated it.

We ll now see this on all blogs :( ......who has already installed it after reading this review ?

I ve done it for one of my sites and it converts well

I've been doing this for a few weeks now and have found the same results. The hover works! I'm a new site, so my signups aren't as impressive but I think aweber might just be the best $20 I've spent on promotion to date.

4 x subscribers for only once per user has definitely got to be worthwhile, and outweigh a small number of slightly & temporarily disgruntled readers

I don't really like those hover boxes, they're a pain, but I guess if you get more newsletter signups it's probably worth using.

I'll definitely be giving this a shot once I get more traffic coming in. I really do want to up my subscriber count.

I'm 100% against traditional popups, but I've used something like this on a static website once before and I was very impressed with the results.

The only reason I would use it is because you can set it to only display the first time someone visits your blog.

"In other words, if you’ve been shown the Lightbox, you’ll never see it again unless you delete your cookies."

Or if you switch browsers, or virtual machines, or reboot back into another OS... :) That's ok though - I'll have all my browsers cookie'd up soon!

I have never joined a highlight box on my first visit, because it is my first visit. What do I know about this site/blog on my first visit. If I could set it for third visit or so, yeah, I am going to have try it. Probably give it a trial on one of my lesser sites before I use it on my main site.

Tempted to try it too- can see aweber is really setting a high standard

i read problogger's post on this as well, and Aweber seems like a must-have for every blog. though i'm not going to be able to do any upgrades, configurations or enhancements under after the election, and i suspect i'm not alone in that.

I think this really depends on the niche you're in. I don't feel that this has any effect at all on the "make money online" niche. You sort of expect it. Just as long as you limit it to once per visitor (via cookies) - as John has done.

Now, if you're in a more mainstream niche, I'd argue that you're doing your brand a lot of harm. It will give your site a spammy impression, and that impression will stick.

I have to try this one and hope my visitor will enjoy.
Thanks

This is a very good way to draw attention to subscription (or to anything else), if used wisely. Show it more than once and it will start to annoy people.

I have been struggling with the idea of doing the lightbox sign up box. My gut is telling it would carry too many negatives. However with you doing it John and Darren over at Problogger, I am thinking I may try it.

I'm not a big fan of this technique (it reminds me of the ridiculous Pop-up days of previous years) because it is overly obtrusive. Of course, I do see that it has the potential of increasing your subscriber base simply based on the numbers game. Because of the obtrusive nature, do you think it is worth the inconvenience and potential negative portrayal of your site to get a few forced subscribers? Personally, I don't think so!
--TheBusyBrain