The confirmation/thank you that you get when you first sign up for an email newsletter, a webinar, a special offer, or what have you, is a really important first impression. If you send a confirmation email, that email sets the tone for your email relationship and, if it is personality-free and dry and offers no value, not only is it a wasted opportunity it really starts things off on the wrong foot.

I have blogged before about how to write Thank You emails. Now MarketingSherpa has covered the related topic, of Thank You web pages…

According to MarketingSherpa: “When a prospect signs up for a webinar — or a white paper or newsletter for that matter — be sure to include more hotlinks or offers on the ‘Thank you’ page they see right after submitting their registration. Prospects are in the perfect mood right then to learn more about you, so they may click on links for white papers or other offers. Why not deepen the relationship right then?”

In fact, their research pointed to 39% of viewers accepting offers on ‘thank you’ pages.

It is amazing the proliferation of “thank you for (ordering/signing up/inquiring)” pages that contain … well, nothing else. No offer. No suggestions like “if you enjoyed reading this, you may enjoy reading this …white paper, article, news release.” As MarketingSherpa says “they are wasting valuable real estate.”

A fundraising/nonprofit consultant I know says that the ‘thank you’ is the beginning of the next ‘ask’. There’s a lesson here for us for-profit folks too: don’t let an opportunity go by where you could be cross-selling and up-selling.