Improvements to Make Your Thank You Pages More Dynamic
September 8, 2009
There are a few reasons a website owner would want to have email subscriber form data (ie. what subscribers type into a form plus other info) passed to their thank you pages.
Examples:
Wanting to include some info about the subscriber, like their name and email, on the page they see after they submit the sign up form
Integration with a database for other, non-email related use (e.g. follow up by phone, any other CRM related tasks)
Integration with third party services (e.g. shopping carts, membership sites); note that many times this can also, or instead, be done with email parsers
If these possibilities sound interesting...
Good news! For a long time now, we've offered a feature that passes form data to the thank you page - the page subscribers see after successfully submitting a form - and turning on this feature is as easy as checking a box when creating your forms.
After that, get with your developer. Or, do it yourself, geeks! Either way, you just need a script written for your thank you page to do whatever it is you'd like to do with that form data.
Cool stuff, but what if you're using confirmed opt-in?
Err, hmph, actually that could be a problem. For example, maybe you don't want to do anything else with form submitters until they confirm and become active subscribers (ie. not dead weight).
In other words, in some cases it would be better if this form data was sent instead (or additionally) to the page subscribers see after they click on the confirmation link.
Ask, as some of you did, and ye shall receive. Well, not always, but you score this time...
Form data can now be passed to the "Confirmation Success" page, too!
Not only that, but if you or your developer have set things up for a thank you page, there's not much new to learn. You just have to setup your script on your confirmation success page and check a different box:
Bonus Points - How to put subscriber names, emails, and whatever else you want on your thank you pages:
At the top of this article, I mentioned this type of thing. Here's what it might look like:
Notice how it's taking the info our subscriber, Clark Griswold, submitted from the query string? To do this, even the non-geek may not need to get in touch with his/her developer.
There's just a block of code you need to copy and paste into the "head" section of your page. Then, you'll put a smaller block of code wherever you insert form data.
Sound like too much to handle? It should be easy for your developer, then. Otherwise, here's the code and instructions on how to do it.
Happy customizing!
