Create a Welcome Mat on your WordPress Website

This has just gone up as a post on my website, www.makemoneyonthemove.siterubix.com

I thought I'd share it with you.

What are they and how do they work?

Welcome Mats are a popup on your site, instead of a separate page. When active, it is the first thing visitors will see. One big, simple call to action asking them to do one thing. Very hard to ignore. However, your website, the blog post that brought them to it or whatever they clicked on earlier is still there, right below the welcome mate and just one click away. A Welcome Mat creates an entire landing page into one popup.

Welcome mats aren’t just limited to collecting email subscribers.

Here are a few alternative uses:

• Showing off your latest deals
• Moving visitors to a shop page
• Showcasing your most popular content
• Welcoming people to your site
• Ask them to follow you on Twitter or Facebook

For the purpose of setting up a Welcome Mat on your website, I will be walking you through the SumoMe plugin, which is free on WordPress.

SumoMe, allows the creation of a Welcome Mat as part of its standard app install, you can upgrade to receive more templates to enhance your offers, but I’m pretty happy to be able to add this to my site for free.

Setting it up is straightforward. Let's walk through it.

Log in to your WordPress dashboard and select plugins from the side menu. Click on Add New

You’ll get a list of possible plugins to add.

Type in SumoMe in the Plugin search bar and you’ll see the plugin in the top right of the menu.

Press the install now and then activate the plugin. Once installed you’ll see the sidebar on the left. Click on the crown to go the SumoMe dashboard. Click on Welcome Mat

Activate the Welcome Mat by sliding the button and go to design. Type the heading you want to be displayed on your Welcome Mat. Type the subheading and then decide on the colour of your buttons. Once this is done, remember to save your settings.

Go to the Behaviour tab and set the frequency of the Welcome Mat. You can set the number of days for the mat to be shown to previous visitors and you can decide whether to show the mat to those that have already subscribed or have opted out of subscribing. You can also set the redirect after they have accepted or declined. I have directed them to my Welcome Page.

Finally, it has been said that Google doesn't like these type of features as it can block the entire screen on mobile devices. To be sure this doesn't happen with your website, go to Device Rules and use the drop down menu to create a rule on desktop devices. The Welcome Mat will only show on these devices, keeping your mobile website clean.

Having set these parameters and saved them, you can close the plugin and sit back and see how many visitors you have had and your conversion rate from visits to emails collected. The app allows you to see the last 7 days of info in its standard form or you can upgrade to have further traffic breakdowns.

I’ve not upgraded and its only been installed for a day, however, I have had 5 visitors and whilst none have converted to an email address, it's good information that I didn’t have previously.

Thanks for reading and good luck with all your Welcome Mat efforts.