Register your interest form

[standout]

A new online store will be opening at present the site is simply a page withh our logo and then coming soon...

When we start releasing info we'd like to add a register your interest type box on this single webpage so that we can start collecting data on potential customers.

How an what should we be using to do this, we're really worried about spam!

 

[ozbon]

Well, you could do it with a form that also has some validation on - although at that point you also risk losing customers who want a simple signup.

Possibly the easiest way is to do a form that takes the email address, then sends out an email to that address. The 'register interest' link is in the email, so you know that the user is definitely opting in.

You'd need some kind of database to record email addresses against a unique id, and the register interest return page would flag a "Y" against that address once they were done.

When it comes to sending out the emails, you just send them to those rows where the flag is "Y".

All told, I could probably set that up from scratch in two hours, so it's not too hard to do.

 

[webworxindia]

A form with some validation code will work well.

 

[ozbon]

A form with validation can work well - but you have to remember that usually a "register interest" form simply consists of (at most) a name and an email address. What is there to validate?

Sure, you can add another input that says "I am not a spammer" with a yes/no , or "What colour is an orange" - but it's extra work for the customer, and you can lose people easily. It also says to a customer "We're already getting spammed", which is never a good image.

Do the work for them - let people type in name and email, then the registration is done through an email to that address. Sure, they have to click a link in an email, but so long as the email text says something like "Someone has registered your address as being interested in [xyz]. If it wasn't you, or you're not interested, simply delete this email. If you are interested, click this link to confirm that".

Job done.

 

[stugster]

Don't forget to log the IP address.

If you're going to put captcha in, have a peek at this: http://www.captcha.net/