Do you just have one optin form in your blog or.. and where do you have it I'm thinking of placing one in my sidebar of my blog
The closer to the top of the page the better. You want visitors to see the optin form without having to scroll down - this will immediately increase conversions. With blogs, a lot of the times the highest you can have it is at the top of the sidebar. Always have your optin forms on the right hand side of the page - many studies have been conducted and this position has always come out on top. There are a few programs you may want to use to help stick your optin form right infront of your visitors face. 'Action popu'p by Robert Plank is a great tool. It will display your optin form in the middle of the screen as soon as a visitor tries to leave your page. There is also another program called 'Ultimate Footer Ad' which allows you to have an optin form displayed in the footer of the browser window - and best of all, this will stay there no matter how far your visitors scrolls up and down the page. Hope that helps!
Down on the bottom. After they have read all the good stuff, the odds are greater they will sign in. Why would they give you their addresss without first seeing your site?
I totally disagree with you on this as would most Internet Marketers. It is a well known fact that having your optin form above the fold increases conversions. By having your optin form down the bottom of the page you are limiting the amount of people who are going to see it. There are two types of people who will land on your page. There are those who will have a quick look and then make their decision and there are those who will read every word and then make their decision. You need to cater for both types of people. The smartest way to do this is to have an optin form at the top of the page and another down the bottom under your content. But if you are just going to have the one optin box then the higher up on the page the better. Unless you have tested both variations then you are just assuming your one down the bottom works better. I have tested both methods and everytime the one at the top outconverts the one down the bottom - there have been various other high profile Internet marketers who have run countless tests and come to the same conclusion. Put it this way, do you really think having your optin box at the top of the page is going to decrease conversions? No way!
Do you know any real internet marketers??? I don't mean the ones who get only a couple of hundred hits a day, and a bounce rate over 50%. Just curious. Genuine internet marketers, (professionals) would never try to either sell to their visitors or try to have them make a decision without FIRST showing their visitors what they have to offer. That's just common sense. But I keep forgetting where I am at. It is a well-known fact amongst noobs who just assume. Or, they hear it from other noobs, repeating it from other noobs. So on and so on.... What you are saying is that many will not finish reading the page. Most are not going to read every word, but if they don't at least go down or near the bottom, there is not much on the page that has KEPT them interested. If that happens, just about all of them are not interested enough to sign up for the newsletter anyway. A webmaster who knows what he is doing sells first, THEN he asks his visitors to act. This also increases the odds of getting real addresses, and also having more subscribers reading more than just the typical 2 or 3 e-mails, if that, and then stops reading them altogether. I will, however, agree that one should put it both on top and near the bottom. In most cases, yup.
Perry, As stated I am not assuming anything. I may listen to what others recommend however I don't assume anything without at least testing it myself first... and I have. I never once said you should have a blank page with just an optin form on it. Of course you need to sell your optin to your visitor - THAT'S just common sense. However that has nothing to do with where you place your optin box or which position converts better. By having your optin box buried underneath your content, first time visitors to your page do not even know you have something of value they can optin for - that is unless they somehow make their way through all your content to the bottom of the page. By placing the optin box at the top right hand side of the page, visitors are immediately alerted to the fact that there is a free report/video/whatever they can download and if it looks like something of interest to them, then they will either optin right then and there, or if they need a little more convincing, they may read through some of the content and then make their decision. The important thing here is to have the free offer above the fold. A lot of your visitors won't give your content the time it deserves unless there is some pay off at the end - ie a free report, etc. That is why having an optin at the top and bottom of your page is the best route to take - it will cover both bases and maximize conversions.
I agree above the fold is best, to catch attention, although at the bottom too. Content must be of value, and opt in box should be clear, and easily visible.
I use aweber to create simple optin, this works greats. i tried other plugins but sometimes there difficult to install and setup. aweber is just copy and paste.