Optimizing thank you page: 17 concrete tips & examples

After all, it's a dead end and that doesn't make anyone happy. Not you, not your client. Nobody.

High time to dive into the thank you page together and see what could be better. So see here: 17 concrete tips for optimizing your thank you page.

Tip #1: Make your thank you page measurable

'What gets measured, gets managed' is a well-known saying. And the same goes for your thank you page.

So the first step is to make your thank you page measurable. That means:

• Making sure Google Analytics is also on your thank you page
• Setting up your thank you page as a conversion
• Possibly working with a datalayer (if you have a web shop)
• Keeping an eye on the bounce rate, average session duration and exit rate of your thank you page
• Possibly include your thank you page in the funnel of Analytics or another tool

If you don't have or don't know this data about your thank-you page, that's your step 1: make sure your thank-you page is measurable.

Tip 2: Make sure your thank you page is not indexed

Tip #2 is an extension of tip #1. Namely, you want your thank you page to be measurable, but you don't want it to be indexed.

There are three reasons for this:

• You don't want people to reach your thank you page through Google
• You don't want certain bots sifting through Google's search results and ending up on your thank you page
• And, of course, you don't want to see your thank you page as a sitelink extension in the organic search results. That's where you want other pages to appear.

Ps. Of course, you can also set up a mandatory path for people to follow before they get to your thank you page, but that's not always convenient either.

Tip #3: Don't ask for a review

Before you write an article, of course, you always research competitors. I did the same when writing this article.

I saw it in almost every article: ask for a review on your thank you page. Personally, I think that's really an incredibly bad idea.

Suppose you just ordered a product and you come out on a thank you page. Then how can you leave a review already?

Or you have just requested and received certain information through the mail. Then how can you already leave a review?

You can't do that at all. After all, you don't know the quality of the product. You haven't received anything yet. Of course, there are always exceptions to the rule, but I think this is bad advice.

So don't.

Tip 4: put your thank you page in Hotjar

Tip 4 is actually an extension of tip 1. You can make your thank you page measurable and set it as a conversion, but you can also make it measurable with Hotjar.

Then you can see exactly how people behave on your thank you page. You can set up a heatmap that allows you to see exactly the following:

• Where people click
• How people move their mouse
• To how far people scroll

In addition to setting up a heatmap, you can also set up recordings on thank you page. A recording is nothing but a video of someone viewing your website. With it, you can see exactly how someone behaves on your page.

Tip 5: Add links to your social media channels

Tip 5 is a universal tip that applies to all marketing. B2B as well as B2C as well as D2C.

Social media are an incredibly important part within online marketing. You know that by now. By adding social media icons and linking them to your social media channels, you can easily ensure more followers, likes and views.

In addition, you also give another opportunity for your customer to better connect with you as a company and see more content from you.

Ps. Of course, this tip also works well for people who want to build their personal brand. Then add a link to your personal LinkedIn page instead of your company page.

Tip #6: Put relevant content such as videos, blogs and case studies on your thank you page

The rule of thumb for your thank you page is to never provide a dead end. The easiest way to avoid this, as tip 5 has shown, is to add a piece of content.

This can be in the form of a button, or in the form of a video. Or your last 3 blogs. Or your latest case.

This is content that you often already have on the shelf and can therefore add without effort.

Tip 7: Give people the opportunity to sign up for your newsletter

I personally think this is one of the most important tips from this list. After all, email marketing is an awfully important marketing channel and one of the few channels where you can really build a list that you are in charge of.

So without algorithms or other things that can affect your scoring rate.

Adding a subscribe option to your newsletter (on your thank you page) has become even more important since the advent of the AVG. That's because the newsletter sign-up checkbox should no longer be automatically on.

And since this is often a small checkbox and since people are often too lazy to turn it on, this can be an additional opportunity to get them on your mailing list anyway.

Tip 8: Add social media share buttons when appropriate to your product/service

Personally, I'm not really a fan of social media share buttons. Who uses those things anyway?

As a rule, therefore, I won't recommend them quickly, except....

Except when the product or service is really cool and worth sharing. For example, think of when you just bought concert tickets.

You are heartbroken that you are going to the concert of Post Malone (one of my favorite artists) and you want to share that on social media.

Or if, for example, you just paid the pre-order for the Tesla Cybertruck. Of course, you also want to show that to the outside world.

In those cases, I would then recommend using them on your thank you page. But as a marketing agency, an e-commerce shop or a plumber, I would not use them.

Tip 9: Show clearly what the next step is

When we talk about communication, expectation management is an important part of it. This applies to face-to-face conversations, of course, but also to communication on your Web site.

Suppose you've just filled out a contact form with a plumber. Namely, something is leaking in your home.

You then land on a thank you page that says "thanks for filling out the contact form. What then is your next thought?

uhhhh.... And now? Probably.

On your thank you page, indicate what the next step is. Should people urgently call a specific number? Within how many hours will you contact them? When can people expect a response?

So clearly indicate (or show) what the next step is. And why that's important with web shops I don't think I need to explain .

Tip 10: Provide additional information about the product or service

You've probably seen them flying by or you've probably seen them passing by on YouTube or Instagram: a drone.

The first moment I saw one my thought was: I must have it. So what do you do? You go to the Media Markt website, Coolblue or you order it somewhere else.

But do you actually know how to use such a thing? Do you actually know what the rules regarding drones are? And did you know that you are not allowed to fly them everywhere?

No, you won't know that by then. But you can share that kind of information nicely on your thank you page in the form of a video, blog or e-book.

In a webshop with thousands of different products, that might be tricky. But if you only sell drones, it can be heartbreakingly convenient.

Yet another example. During the black Friday of 2020, I bought a Mate X. That is a very fat e-bike (in my opinion).

The delivery time was March 2021. That's not a problem for me, since I don't ride my bike in the winter anyway.

On the thank you page, they could have shown a nice video of the process of making the bike, how to receive it or how to assemble it (if necessary).

Unfortunately, they didn't and I haven't seen a message, email or video since then. That's a missed opportunity.

Ps. Here is a picture of the bike I purchased. Literally and figuratively a "fat" bike.

Tip 11: Make your thank you page personal (personalize + personalize your business)

I apply this to my thank you page myself. After all, I find it important to end on a personal note.

I like to show that "there's a human being" on the other side of the screen. People like that. After all, people like to do business with people.

You can personalize the thank you page in one more way. When someone has entered their first name, you can use it on the thank you page. For example, by addressing that person.

"Hi Daniel. Thank you for purchasing the Mate X Black Knight. We put Michael to work immediately to get the order in order....... "

But you can also return the product, the e-mail address or other data people have entered.

This makes the thank you page even more personal.

Tip 12: Ask for feedback on your website

By feedback, of course, I don't mean what the visitor likes or dislikes about the website, but sincere feedback about the process.

Consider, for example, the payment process. Did certain things work or not work? Were you able to find everything? In this you can of course steer by having people click on options, but you can also choose an open input field.

Another option is to ask people to rate your website from 1 to 10. This used to be very easy to do with Hotjar, but Hotjar threw that feature out.

With certain tools you can also set up that when people give a grade lower than 4 or higher than 9 that again they get a fill-in box.

Tip 13: Try to keep people on board through an (exit intent) pop-up

As you know, I'm a fan of the exit intent pop-up. That's a pop-up that comes up when someone wants to leave the website.

Chances are that when people land on your thank you page, they've done what they wanted to do and are leaving. This may mean that they're not going to read the content, and thus you won't have much use for the other tips in this list.

By deploying an exit intent pop-up, you can prevent people from leaving your website and still provide them with some additional information.

What that extra information should be? Well, you'll just have to read the other 16 tips for that :-).

Tip 14: Offer related products or services (upsell)

For e-commerce, I think up- and cross-listing products is one of the best tips from this list. You can of course do this during the payment process by using an order bump or a heading with related products, but also by putting the products or services on the thank you page.

After all, you don't want to make the payment process as difficult as possible and display an awful lot of unnecessary information. This can actually reduce conversion rates.

But of course you want to show that you have a special maintenance kit or that there are super cool accessories for the e-bike your customer just bought.

Tip 15: Encourage a repeat purchase through a discount code or voucher

Scientific research shows that people are more likely to buy from you more often if they have bought something from you once.

And that people are even more likely to buy something from you when they have bought something twice has also been found.

And they are even more likely to buy one more if they have bought something three times.

You get where this is going, I think. The more often someone buys something from you, the more likely people are to buy something from you again.

You can encourage that repeat purchase by offering a discount code or a coupon on your thank you page. Of course, you can do this only for people who buy something for the first time, but also for people who buy something for the second or third time.

Tip 16: Give people the option to create an account anyway if they haven't already done so

The easier and the less friction people experience during the payment process, the more likely people are to convert. That's the rule.

This has caused web shops in recent years to increasingly offer the option to checkout without creating an account.

Because how often does it happen that you forget your password? And how often does it happen that you don't feel like creating a new password right now? Let alone an entire account...

Well, very often!

But when people have checked out as guests, you may know less about/from them and chances are you may not send them a newsletter either because they haven't checked that option.

On the thank you page, you can ask again if they still want to create an account. This can then be done very easily because you already have all their information. You can then make sure that people can create an account with the push of a button with all their data already filled in for them. That way, all they have to do is enter a password (and you can have that emailed to them as well).

Tip #17: Don't use all of the above methods :-). Test what works and suits your business

The last tip is very simple: above all, test what works and suits you, your target audience and your business. Never stare blindly at these lists and certainly do not apply all 17 tips.

Simply figure out what works best for you.

This article was written February 13, 2021 and updated July 4, 2023.