E-commerce customer registration fields during account sign up

[PrintPlace.com]

I work for an online print company and recently we were considering adding a field titled "industry" so that we could figure out what industry our customers are coming from. Has anyone seen anything either in favor or against adding this field during the customers account registration process. We understand that less is best however feel that it is important to better serve our customers. Any information on this subject would be very useful.

[Andy-Halliday]

I would agree less is better, I've seen numerous reports over the years which say the more you ask, the higher the drop off.

Couldn't you get the customer to complete this field after purchase. Either at the end of the checkout, or follow up email.

Why not on the confirmation email ask them then, or in their account section. Anyone who doesn't complete it, leave it as general, and for everyone else you can target specifically.

I would highly recommend, putting the absolute minimal on the sign up form.

[tomfifteen]

Hello,

Neil Patel has written an in-depth article about it here,

http://www.quicksprout.com/2013/01/31/how-to-optimize-contact-forms-for-conversions/

Summary: Less form field = Higher conversion rates.

Maybe a good idea to split test the form over a 2 month period and check the results.

Rob

[PrintPlace.com]

My thought was that if we had it on the initial sign up as an option/not mandatory that maybe they would fill it out as opposed to if it is in their account they may never fill it out and just forget it all together.

when you do come across this filed {Industry} do you fill it out or select the industry via drop down or would you skip it?

MC

[Andy-Halliday]

I don't know if this is possible, but couldn't you offer 5% off your next order if you complete your profile.

This way you get a second order and a complete profile of your customer.

This way you are not reducing the chance of people not completing, increasing the number of repeat purchases and get the information and potentially more information that just sector.

I would be willing to complete my profile if there was an incentive, but as don't know the platform you are using, I don't know if this is possible in your case.

[Mike.NW]

I agree with Andy on the matter of completing your entire profile. The only way a customer would complete a profile is if, completing the profile would be beneficial to them in some shape or form.

Regarding the industry field on the sign-up form I would go ahead and give it a shot. You will have plenty of data on sign-ups without the field and be able to compare the results. I would advise looking at your current sign-up form conversions before you advance further.

Personally I have used the industry field for webinar sign-ups and find no difference in conversions with or without them. Also, I would use a drop down unless you a ton of options. In that case I would implement an auto-complete field.

I use:

• First Name
• Last Name
• Email
• Industry
• Company (Not Always Used)

Short is better but the only way to find out what is too short is to test!

All the best,

[KeriMorgret]

A different thought here. Since you are doing printing as the service, would some things (especially business cards) be able to give a good clue as to industry without having to ask people?