Did you know contact forms have one of the lowest conversion rates, ranging between 3-5% only? It’s surprising, right? Since contact forms are usually one of the first things you set up on your site, ensuring their effectiveness should be a top priority.
This blog post will show you some best practices for contact us forms. Following these actionable suggestions will get more folks to reach out to you. They’ll also be more likely to fill out forms to the end and take the plunge — yep, we’re talking conversions!
Following Contact Form Best Practices for WordPress
We don’t have time to discuss all the website contact form best practices out there. Instead, we’d like to highlight seven fantastic tips for crafting a form that converts and boosts user engagement. Let’s get into it!
1. Ask Only Necessary Questions
Consider including only the essential fields in forms to make them user-friendly and less time-consuming. Reducing unnecessary fields minimizes the chances of user frustration and abandonment.
However, what if you require all these fields on forms because multiple user types must answer the questions? The solution lies in smart logic.
Conditional logic empowers you to change fields dynamically. Based on the user’s input, you can show applicable fields and hide extraneous fields. This approach improves the UX and ensures fields are represented appropriately to the user’s specific situation.
2. Style WordPress Forms for Better Aesthetics
“Don’t judge a book by its cover” doesn’t apply to contact forms. In this context, the appearance matters the most. Enhancing form visuals can significantly boost conversion rates.
When styling forms, ensure you align them with your site’s design. Ninja Forms automatically inherits the style of your WordPress theme and matches the page aesthetically.
Other design elements also contribute to a form’s success. One is the CTA button, a key component that directs users to complete the action. While the text on the submit button is essential, the CTA color can influence whether users click it.
Incorporating rounded corners for form field boxes is another effective way to improve the form’s appearance. Rounded corners are easier on our eyes and make information easier to process. You can implement this using our styling plugin to give WordPress form fields rounded corners.
Want to make forms more visually appealing? Our guide, How to Style WordPress Forms, teaches you how to design attractive forms without special skills or a developer’s assistance.
3. Follow Up With User After Form Submission
Raise your hand if you’re a fan of ghosting — probably not many takers, right? Well, the sentiment’s the same for visitors filling out forms. No one likes to be left hanging. So, it’s essential to follow up after they’ve completed the form submission.
When you reach out after someone has engaged with your form, it shows you value their interaction and tells them you care about them. Reaching out is also a key step in any sales or engagement funnel. It’s a way to keep the conversation going or provide additional information to your form submitter.
Ninja Forms, even the free core version, lets you send an email notification or confirmation to form submitters and customize it to create a more personalized experience. Besides sending an email, consider setting up a success message to display right after form submission or redirect the user to another page.
4. Consider Multi-Page Forms
Who likes to read long texts, or scroll through 50 plus form fields? You guessed it right. No one. If the WordPress form has to be long because you need to collect a lot of information, break your form into multiple steps.
It’s easier for users to fill out five fields on one page and then five more on another rather than trying to tackle them all at once. This way, you make things smoother for them and avoid overwhelming visitors. When you force users to scroll and fill out a form with too many fields all at once, they might abandon it.
To prevent this from happening, consider breaking forms into multiple pages using the Multi-Step Forms add-on from Ninja Forms. And if you’re looking to take multi-step forms to the next level, don’t forget to check out our Quick Tips for Using Multi-Step Forms in WordPress!
5. Navigate Visitors Across Your Forms
Your website visitors should know how to fill out your form and what information to enter. A simple form with few fields is usually straightforward. But if it’s more complex, you want to keep it clean and easy on the eyes while ensuring a user-friendly experience.
One way to assist users is by incorporating tooltips (help text), offering subtle guidance without being too intrusive. Additionally, using clear descriptions beneath the form labels can help clarify each field’s purpose.
Placeholders, which provide examples or formatting cues within input fields, are also handy. They serve as visual cues, showing users exactly how to format their information, such as date formats or required data. This can reduce errors and make the form-filling process smoother for visitors.
6. Optimize Forms for Mobile Devices
Since nearly every website has a contact form, best practices like prioritizing mobile optimization are critical.
With the right theme, assuming it has comprehensive responsive scaling rules, Ninja Forms is entirely mobile-friendly. Many form builders will stay quiet about this fact, and then you might wonder why forms look funky on mobile devices.
However, some rules help ensure optimal form design for mobile devices. Always center field labels at the field’s top, never to the sides. Reduce the amount of scrolling users need to do, especially horizontally! Avoid redundant fields or drop-downs if you have over 100 fields. You don’t want users to scroll too much on a mobile screen.
Top tip: WordPress themes that look lackluster on mobile will create underwhelming forms as well.
7. Track CTA Clicks to Measure Form Effectiveness
Every form features a Call to Action (CTA) button. You’ve achieved a specific objective when a visitor completes your WordPress form. If you want to measure these objectives, Ninja Forms lets you easily monitor user interactions like this.
With our free Redirect action feature, you can create a thank-you page and designate it as a goal in Google Analytics. This connection allows you to measure the effectiveness of marketing efforts, and we encourage you to use it. In our step-by-step guide, learn how to create a thank you page redirect on Ninja Forms. We’ll also show you how to set a goal in Google Analytics.
Implement These Tips to Boost Contact Form Engagement!
It is crucial to prioritize WordPress contact forms’ effectiveness. By incorporating our easy-to-implement tips, you can improve engagement with new potential customers and lower form abandonment.
Are you new to form building? Get the Ninja Forms free core plugin and see how easy it is to create your first WordPress form! Explore our best free features every Ninja Forms user loves, or explore over 40 integrations to superpower forms when you are ready to take that next step. Download Ninja Forms today, and see why we have been one of the leading WordPress contact form plugins on the market since 2011!
