# Contact form open by default, not hidden: 1.16% to 1.65% conversion

- Outcome: Won
- Page type: Lead form (Lead-gen)
- Elements: Form visibility, Choices
- Test run by: [Seer Interactive](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/seer-interactive/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://www.seerinteractive.com/work/case-studies/1169-additional-conversion-industrial-water-treatment
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/seer-water-treatment-contact-form-open/

Showing the product enquiry form open by default on the contact page, instead of hiding it behind a menu choice, lifted the sitewide conversion rate from 1.16% to 1.65% (+45.3%). Seer Interactive made the change for an industrial water treatment company. This was a before/after comparison of two periods, not a split test.

## Result

**1.16% to 1.65% conversion**

- Sitewide contact form conversion rate: 1.16% (February to April) to 1.65% (June to August), a 45.3% relative rise.
- Seer credits the change with 1,169 extra organic conversions.
- This compares two time periods, so other factors could have played a part.

## Control

The main contact page held four forms, all hidden until the visitor picked a reason: buying a product, support, emergency support or other.

## Variant

The product enquiry form was shown open by default, so visitors could start filling it in straight away.

## Why it likely won (our reading)

- A hidden form gives no clear way to act. Visitors had to make a choice before they saw any fields.
- Most visitors arriving from product pages wanted to ask about buying. Opening that form matched the most common intent.
- Seer found the best-converting product pages already sent users to a form that was visible straight away.

## Caveats

Before/after comparison of February to April against June to August, not a split test, so seasonality and other changes were not controlled. Seer notes summer is usually a weaker season for this industry, which if anything works against the result.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we show the most-used contact form open by default instead of hiding it behind a reason picker, then more visitors will submit an enquiry because they can start typing straight away.
- Primary metric: Contact form submissions per contact page visitor
- Guardrail: Share of enquiries sent to the wrong team
- Guardrail: Support and emergency request volume
- Guardrail: Lead quality
- Who should test it: B2B and lead-gen sites with one contact page serving several needs, where most visitors want the same thing. Run it as a split test if traffic allows. It fits less if each enquiry type needs very different fields.

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Credit: Seer Interactive ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/seer-water-treatment-contact-form-open/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.