10 ways to use the Squarespace announcement bar
I’d like you all to take a few minutes out of your day to read this post and show some love for the humble announcement bar! It’s an extremely simple, yet powerful tool that I personally think can often be overlooked.
Now, before we continue with this post, some of you may be wondering: what is an announcement bar? Let me explain this for you:
Announcement bars live at the very top of your website page and can act as valuable tools to draw attention to a particular action, message or feature you’d like your website visitors to see or do.
You can include a message along with some linked text where you can add a click-through URL (the page you want the bar to link to). For instance, say your announcement had the following message:
‘New Year Sale! Get 20% off all paper planners today! Shop now.’
You could then add a click-through URL to the words ‘Shop now’ that linked to the printable planners product page on your website.
All Squarespace users are lucky enough to have the announcement bar as a built-in feature included in their plans that’s super easy to set up! We should definitely count ourselves lucky for this as other platforms including Wordpress and the majority of templates in Shopify will probably need a plugin to be installed in order to add this feature. Note to all Wordpress and Shopify users! Some commonly used plugins for this are HelloBar, or Powr.io.
Why you should use the announcement bar:
It’s an unintrusive way of promoting a key message to your audience -
Much less intrusive and potentially annoying than a pop-up. As the bar is stationary and just sits neatly at the top of the page, it’s one of the first things visitors will see, without it being too in their face.
Tips for writing an effective announcement bar message:
Keep it short and sweet
Communicate a clear call to action
Communicate the value it will bring to your visitor’s lives
How to set up your announcement bar on Squarespace:
Here’s a quick rundown of how to set up the announcement bar on your Squarespace site as well as how to customise it to your unique brand colours, fonts and styles.
Step 1 | Log in to your Squarespace account
*Nifty tip!* You can instantly be directed to the backend of your Squarespace site from the frontend of your website (i.e www.kurlycreative.com) by simply pressing the escape key!
Step 2 | Head to ‘Marketing’ then ‘Announcement Bar’
Step 3 | Enable announcement bar, then type your message into the editor box
Step 4 | Add you click through links...
...either directly into a specific part of the text, or alternatively, you can add the link to the whole bar. It’s personal preference really, but I tend to prefer adding an enticing call to action that’s bold and underlined just to make it really clear to your audience to take an action.
Step 5 | Style your announcement bar
Head over to design - site styles and select your chosen fonts and brand colours to make it unique to your brand.
Now you’ve got your announcement bar set up, here are 10 ways you can use it on your website today:
1 | Sign up to your waitlist
If you offer services through your site and are booked out for the foreseeable future - go you! That’s totally awesome! This would be a great opportunity to use the announcement bar to link to a form so people can join your waitlist. This strategy will build instant credibility with your site visitors - as being booked out = being in high demand = being awesome at what you do. Everyone wants to work with a total pro who’s in high demand right?!
2 | Sign up to your mailing list
If you have a mailing list (which you totally should by the way!) the announcement bar can be a great way to advertise this by linking through to a signup form page.
3 | Download a freebie (which also signs them up to your mailing list!)
Offering valuable, useful free content to your audience is a great way to build trust and credibility, and can be used as a tool to grow your mailing list too - bonus! Write an enticing message to advertise your freebie in your announcement bar to encourage people to sign up to your list.
4 | Offer free consult calls
This one’s a good one if you’re a service-based business owner. Hopping on a call and having a conversation with potential clients can be one of the most powerful, effective ways of building connection and getting that next sale! Link your announcement bar to your online scheduler or contact form to make it as easy as possible for your potential clients to take that next step.
5 | Show your next available project slot in your calendar
This is a great strategy to show your audience that your services are getting booked up and can create a subtle sense of scarcity. No one likes FOMO, after all!
6 | Promote a sale
If you’re planning on offering a sale on your products - displaying this at the top of your website on the announcement bar can be a great way to alert your audience. You can state your offer (- perhaps it’s a percentage off or free shipping), timeframe and maybe even include a discount code too!
7 | Important announcements
The announcement bar can be a quick, simple and effective way to inform your website visitors of important announcements, such as being on holiday and shop closures.
8 | Promote free shipping
It’s a pretty well-known fact that everyone loves free shipping! People will do anything to get it, even if it means spending more money than they’d originally planned, just to push their order up to the free shipping threshold. If this is something you offer - then use the announcement bar to shout about it!
9 | Promote new products or services
If you’re launching a new product then why not build a bit of buzz around it and encourage people to click through to learn more?
10 | Notify people of an event
Are you hosting a live webinar, retreat or in-person event? The announcement bar is the perfect place to promote it! The image below shows a great example of crafting your message to build scarcity at the same time as promoting an event which is an added bonus!
Right, I’m going to stop right there. I could keep going as there are so many ways you can use the announcement bar on your website! If you’re looking for more ideas drop a comment below or send me a DM on Insta @Kurlycreative.
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