What’s the best number of fields on a form?

Some of Cheltenham website designer Tigerfish clients’ ask us what are the best number of fields to have on a form.

The usual, common thinking is that the fewer questions asked on your form, the better.

We at Tigerfish analysed data from hundreds of forms over the past few months and calculated the conversion rate as the number of submissions per unique visitor to that page.

As you’d expect, the less fields that were asked, the less the drop out rate for submission.

There’s as much as 16 percentage points of variation between using 2 fields and 15 fields.  But most of the forms seem to settle between 5 and 10 questions in exchange for an average 40% conversion rate.

Of course, not all forms serve the same purpose. Forms that are offering a trial don’t see a significant drop in submissions until you get to about 8 fields. Forms where you’re offering a download of some sort can ask around 11 questions before a noticeable drop off.  Where as webinar event registration forms see a significant drop after only 5 fields.

You should also be matching up the forms on your landing pages to the stage in the buying cycle.

Streamline your forms to make them as easy as possible to submit, including using pre-population data from previous applications and spreading out your requests for information using Progressive Profiling.

Equally you could consider using your applicants’ social media profiles from Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn or Instagram which would allow visitors to access content using their exsisting social profile.

As with anything to do with marketing- be it online or offline business promotion, the most effective way to determine when your form is optimized is to test it like crazy.

So if you want to improve your online marketing’s effectiveness by improving your website please contact us straight away and we arrange everything for you.

Call us: 0800 019 9860  or Email: [email protected] or you can visit the Tigerfish contact page