Do you want to design a registration form for a website that is more effective and able to encourage more people to sign up? Although registration forms can come in many shapes and sizes, the factors that determine their effectiveness are fairly universal.

Seeing as that’s the case, if you’d like to design more effective registration forms there are a few ways you can start:

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  Eliminate unnecessary fields from the form

Go over your registration form and identify any fields that aren’t essential to it – then remove them. By shortening your form in this way you’ll simplify it, making it easier to fill out and attracting more signups in the process.

• Use a single-column layout

Be sure that you design your registration form in a single-column layout, as it will be easier for people to scan over it as they fill it out. Research has consistently shown that single-column forms can be filled out faster and more easily, which will definitely appeal to users.

Keep in mind that this rule applies to the labels for your fields as well, and they should be placed above each field rather than beside it.

• Make sure the registration form is mobile-friendly

Every registration form that you create must be mobile-friendly, otherwise a good 50% of users will have difficulty using it. To start with you should use a responsive design for your form, so that it can adapt to varied and smaller-sized screens of mobile devices.

• Add guidance to the form wherever necessary

Considering registration forms can be complex at times, adding guidance will go a long way to helping people complete it successfully, and avoid any leaving because they get stuck. That could take the form of hints for specific fields, or even more effective error messages.

As far as error messages are concerned, try to design them so that they clearly identify the problem – and suggest a solution.

• Don’t use CAPTCHA that is too complicated

Having CAPTCHA on your registration forms will make it less susceptible to bots, but if the CAPTCHA itself is too complicated it will also repel actual people. In short the CAPTCHA should be easy to complete, such as Google’s reCAPTCHA.

If you aren’t sure you have the chops to design an effective registration form on your own, there are platforms you can use that will make it easier. For example you could try AidaForm.

By following the steps above when you design a registration form for your website, you should be able to ensure that it is much more effective. That should translate to more signups on the whole – which should be how you can gauge whether or not any further improvements are necessary.