Detailed Review of WordPress Plugin OptinMonster – Get More Subscribers Fast
Email marketing is one of the main things every website builder should focus on. But in order to start doing it, you will need a group of people who already provided their emails to you.
Today we are going to review one of the best tools on the market for creating forms that will increase your leads, and get you more subscribers fast. So without wasting any more time, I want to present to you OptinMonster – the best lead generating WordPress plugin.
What does this plugin actually do?
OptinMonster is a great solution for internet marketers, bloggers, developers, eCommerce websites, and all other small businesses. Using it you can easily create option forms that will increase your email subscribers, thus your sales.
Who is this plugin for?
The simple drag and drop builder allows everyone, who wants more traffic, to add beautiful forms on their websites. Basically, if you are building an online business, you need to collect emails in order to attract more traffic to the site and make more sales.
You won’t need to hire a developer in order to set it up. It won’t take less than 60 seconds like they advertise on the official website, but I am sure once the plugin is activated you will be able to easily navigate to the customization page.
I am sure you saw the plugin popups appearing on famous websites like wpbeginner.com; shoutmeloud.com; eofire.com
If you haven’t, just visit one of the sites above and you will see what I am talking about. Did you see it? The big popup window taking all of your screen? Me personally, I am not a fan of popup windows, especially if you are not expecting it. However, it works, it have to be, since everybody is using it, right?
Get more subscribers fast installing the WordPress plugin OptinMonster
Like every other plugin, once you have the files for it, you can install and activate it from the plugins section. If the little green monster icon appears on the right side of your WordPress dashboard, everything was done properly. Just put the license key and you are ready to rock.
Let’s take a look at the available options OptinMonster has to offer:
Each of the licenses comes with different options and features, but more about that later. Let see what kind of email forms we can create using this plugin.
Popup Opt-in Forms: Of course starting with the lightbox popups. Popups are one of the best way to grab the attention of your visitors. There is a little chance to piss them off (if the form pop-ups on every single page), but still worth trying.
Exit-Intent Technology: Statistics show that around 70 % of the people leaving your site will never return. Since they will never return, why don’t we try to capture their email for one last time. This option will provide us with exactly this. OptinMonster’s exit-intent technology detects user behavior and prompts them with a targeted campaign at the precise moment they are about to leave.
Floating Header and Footer Bar: Attach a bar to your header or footer section, that will stay when visitors scroll up or down. The feature is highly effective because the bar stays there when the visitors go to different pages.
Slide in option: Slide-ins appear on the bottom right-hand corner as the user scrolls down on your website. This makes them highly noticeable and effective, without disturbing the peace of the reader.
After Post and In-Line Optin Forms: One of the best places for adding an email subscription form is after the post. The main reason for this is simple: when the reader is satisfied with what you provided, he will immediately give away his email address.
A/B testing: A/B testing helps you eliminate the guess work and make data-driven decisions on what works best. Try different content, headlines, layouts, and styles to see what converts best with our smart and easy to use A/B testing tool.
These are the main features available in this subscriber magnet plugin.
Available integrations
OptinMonster can be used with 19 email marketing providers. MailChimp; Aweber; Infusionsoft; GetResponse; MailPoet, MadMini; Emma… (see all below)
It can also be activated on 13 different site building platforms, besides WordPress. Some of the other applications are Drupal; Joomla, Magento, and Weebly.
Extra tip: Not sure what is email marketing? Check this guide: Email Marketing: The Ultimate Guide.
Setting up the WordPress plugin OptinMonster
Configuring the popups and the other features is really intuitive, it reminds me to the WordPress customize section. On the left side is your menu, and all changes made are immediately shown inside the working area.
Provided layouts are fully customizable, you can either select an image to cover all the space:
or to have a text area with little thumbnail showing:
Once you select what kind of opt-in form you want to create, just start editing it.
As you will notice, there is nothing unclear about this plugin. You don’t want the visitor name, that is fine, just un-check the box in regards this:
How many seconds should pass before the window is displayed and where to take your potential customer? Fill the fields below with the desired URL and the loading delay, like shown below:
Moving on to integrating the form with one of the available services. Like we already discussed, there are 19 available, just select the one you are using:
We finally got to the place where we need to determine where the form should be displayed:
Pricing
After having the opportunity to play around with this plugin, the saying: “Quality comes with a price” came into my mind. Yes, it has a wonderful design and amazing options, but they are not cheap.
Even if you go with the least expensive plan, the 49$ a year one, you only get the lightbox popup form, which is not cool:
To use the true power of OptinMonster, consider purchasing, at least, the middle package (99$/year). Let see full features list:
- Basic: $49/year (1 site, lightbox only, no exit intent).
- Plus: $99/year (3 sites, lightbox & foot, no exit intent).
- Pro: $199/year ( unlimited sites, all forms, exit intent).
Pros and cons of the WordPress plugin OptinMonster
Pros:
- Awesome lightbox popups.
- A/B testing.
- Multiple form types.
- Exit intent.
- Page level targeting.
- Built-in Analytics.
- Easy to setup process.
- Compatible with a lot of email marketing providers.
Cons:
- With the basic plan, you get only lightbox popups.
- The price for this kind of plugin is high.
Final Thoughts
The forms, the layouts and the opportunity to track the behavior of your visitors is everything you will ever need to build a huge email list. It definitely isn’t the cheapest solution for capturing emails, but look at this purchase in a different way, like an investment. If you want to get more subscribers fast, OptinMonster will do the job for you.
If you are not building just a personal site, but something bigger, that will reach a lot of people: my personal recommendation will be to invest in this WordPress plugin.