Center-screen takeover beat bottom bars for newsletter sign-ups
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsGolf Channel found that a center-screen takeover overlay drove more newsletter sign-ups than bars or corner boxes along the bottom of the screen.
No figures were shared. Golf Channel ran the tests itself, and they were published as a MarketingSherpa case study.
- Newsletter sign-ups: the center takeover performed best of the formats tested. No numbers were given.
- Bottom bars: dropped after the data showed weaker results.
- Context: across the wider effort, which also included shorter forms and Facebook sign-ups, the list grew 32% in a year. That figure is not from this test alone.
The change
A center-screen overlay replaces the bottom bar sign-up.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
Newsletter sign-up lightboxes appeared as bars along the bottom of the screen or as boxes aligned to the bottom corner, staying in view as people scrolled.
Variant
A takeover overlay in the middle of the screen asked visitors to enter their email to get the newsletter.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- A center overlay is hard to miss. Golf Channel put the win down to its higher visibility.
- Bottom bars and corner boxes are easy to scroll past while reading an article.
- The form asked only for an email address, so a more visible prompt was quick to act on.
Caveats: No sign-up figures, sample sizes or test lengths were shared. The lightbox was shown only to first-time visitors of a media site, and the data dates from 2014-2015.
Who ran it
Golf Channel ran this test and published the results (MarketingSherpa case study). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on Golf Channel →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we show our newsletter sign-up as a center-screen overlay instead of a bottom bar, then more first-time visitors will subscribe because the offer is more visible.
- Primary metric
- Newsletter sign-up rate per first-time visitor
- Guardrails
- Bounce rate
- Pages per session
- Mobile usability and search penalties for intrusive pop-ups
- Who should test it
- Content and lead-gen sites that grow an email list from article readers. Be careful on mobile, where full-screen pop-ups can annoy readers and may hurt search rankings.
Questions
Which newsletter pop-up format works best?
For Golf Channel, a center-screen takeover beat bottom bars and corner boxes.
It was the most visible format, though no figures were shared.
Should you show a sign-up pop-up to every visitor?
Golf Channel limited it to first-time visitors to avoid being too intrusive.
That is a sensible default to test from.
Do full-screen pop-ups hurt SEO?
Google can demote mobile pages with intrusive pop-ups that cover content.
Check current guidelines before running a full takeover on mobile.