I frequently see ASK Method marketers ask if they need to use a Welcome Page or not
There’s essentially two reasons you need a welcome page:
) Pre-framing the conversation
) Ad Network Policy Compliance for Landing Pages
The guiding principle here is that when it comes to online forms, funnels or interaction of any kind, the shorter and more direct path to the destination, the higher the conversion rate will be. (or the completion rate for the form/quiz/survey).
Why?
Because there’s a general principle that at every step, you’ll lose a few more people (people who won’t move along to the next step).
And so quite simply, the more steps you have, the more people are going to fall off before they make it all the way to the end of the funnel (the outcome page).
However! There’s a balance, because at people also need context and persuasion, possibly info and education too. (This is why long-form sales copy generally works better than short … people have more time to soak it up, learn, and be persuaded.)
In the case of the ASK Method, they need to know what you’re asking them to do, what to expect, and What’s In It For Them (WIIFM).
So the first “reason” to use a Welcome Page is pretty easy to deal with
If you can lead the visitor into your survey with a longer piece of content that give them all the pre-framing info and direction that they need, such as an email or a Facebook ad, then people already know what they are getting into when they hit the first question…
… and that means you can probably do without a Welcome Page, and increase the total funnel conversion rate by saving one more step and its potential drop off.
Conversely this means if you’re using something like AdWords, banner ads, or any similar cold source of traffic where there is very little context or preparation before they see the ASK funnel.
So going from ad to question will likely be a bit of a chock without a Welcome page.
The users will need a little bit of explanation in order to know why they are being presented with a question when they were almost certainly expecting info instead…
… and so you will have to use a Welcome page
There’s still the second reason to use a Welcome Page
Most ad networks have landing page policies and they actually check the landing page when you start new ads to make sure the page is compliant in their view. This is certainly true on AdWords. Google does not want to see people driving traffic to sites that are not going to engage the searchers.
The Welcome page format in bucket will generally pass AdWords’ policy requirements quite fine. You can try getting by without it but a page that’s only showing the first questions is more likely to get disapproved.
When running paid traffic, no matter if you use the Welcome page or not, be sure to the navigation links (to your own Policy and Terms and Contact pages) and a logo at the top.
Its far more likely your ad and page will get approved with the nav links and logo enabled.