Getting traffic, capturing customer emails, utilizing popups and encouraging social shares doesn’t have to be difficult, that’s why we’re bringing you this Sumo review (formerly known as SumoMe) to share the 20+ tools Sumo’s created to help all websites interact and engage with their customers more effectively.
Whether you want to collect more emails from your website visitors every day, or you want to encourage your visitors to download your free ebook so you can get them started in your sales funnel, or if you want your customers to be able to easily share your blog post, Sumo’s created tools to help you do exactly that, and more, in a way that looks and functions exactly how you want it to.
These are some of the most powerful tools for any website no matter what content you’re creating or products you’re selling, and there’s something for everyone. If you’re interested in improving the way your visitors interact with your website then check out this Sumo review to learn more about what their tools can do for you.
Let’s dive into it.
What Sumo (Formerly SumoMe) Does
Sumo creates tools to help website owners drive more traffic, get more customers and track their success. The tools that Sumo’s developed were born from their own pain points that they experienced while they were trying to get more customers and traffic to their AppSumo newsletter and tools to track their success while doing so. After they created, used and refined these tools they’ve shared them with us so we can all effectively drive traffic, engage customers and track our data for our websites, too.
Sumo has created some of the best tools on the market to automate website growth and even companies such as Airbnb, Entrepreneur Magazine, and more, use their tools simply because they’re so easy to integrate and they’re so effective.
Whether you’re interested in getting more customers, growing your traffic or monitoring your performance, Sumo arms you with a suite of tools you can customize and adapt to suit your website and visitor’s needs.
Who Sumo is For
Sumo provides optimal tools for website owners who want to drive more traffic, get more customers and measure their performance. With the 20+ tools Sumo has created there’s an option for every website owner whether they want to aggressively drive more traffic or if they’d rather use a more subtle approach, and they’ve made sure that every base is covered when it comes to functionality and appearance so you can be sure their tools will work for your website.
Their tools are also low maintenance to use so there’s very little effort required to install, customize and manage their tools, which is ideal for website owners who want to set it and forget it and simply let the tools to all the leg work.
If you’re interested in boosting your visitor interaction and engagement without paying for expensive tools and professional designers while still using tools that work effortlessly and make an impact on your traffic, then Sumo’s tools are for you.
Sumo’s Features
Sumo’s features boil down to making their service work for you without any hidden fine print or confusing integrations. They make sure their products just work, so no matter whether you’re an amateur or an industry professional, their services will work for you.
Sumo’s Suite of Tools
Sumo has 20+ tools for website owners to choose from which means there’s something to suit every website. Each detail has been carefully considered so at least one of their tools is sure to match the look, feel and style of your website so it integrates seamlessly with the rest of the content around it and feels like it was made for your website in particular.
No Coding Required
You don’t have to be a professional to make these tools work for you; they’ve all been created so that even the least tech-savvy amongst us can integrate them into their website with ease.
Free to Use
When you see Sumo’s list of tools, how functional they are, and the power they have to drive traffic and engage customers it’s reasonable to assume that they would cost an arm and a leg to use on your own site. Au contraire, mon ami, all of these tools are available to use with Sumo’s free pricing plan so long as you don’t mind some of Sumo’s branding being present. You can still customize the tools to have the look and feel you want, but there will just be a small Sumo logo present. If, however, you’re not interested in having the Sumo branding present at all you can choose from one of their paid pricing plans.
Works With Major Email Services
Many of Sumo’s tools enable you to collect email addresses from your customers and one even allows customers to email you directly. These tools integrate with all major email services, plus others, so you can seamlessly use the service you’re already using.
Sumo’s Tools
Sumo’s tools generally fall into these three categories:
- Tools to get you more customers: The Welcome Mat, Scroll Box, and Smart Bar tools.
- Tools to get you more traffic: The Highlighter and Image Sharer tools.
- Tools to track your success: The Content Analytics, Google Analytics by Sumo, and Contact Form tools.
Most tools are made to have a couple of different variations of their functions to suit every website’s exact needs, but what it comes down to is that Sumo’s tools help you get more customers and traffic and they help you monitor your analytics to prove it. Remember that these tools were built from Sumo’s own need to solve their pain point of driving traffic and getting customers, so they know exactly what it is that websites struggle with and they’ve created the solutions to solve these pain points.
No matter what your particular pain point is whether it’s building your email list, encouraging social shares, driving referral traffic, engaging customers through calls-to-action, getting ebook downloads, alerting visitors to new features on your website, or something else, Sumo has a tools for it that can help you interact with your visitors more effectively.
They’ve created 20+ tools to help you do this, and most of them include a virtual demonstration so you can see exactly how they work, so let’s dive into them.
List Builder Popups
It’s no secret that popups work, that’s why so many websites use them. Sumo’s List Builder Popups show up on a webpage one second after loading and prompt the website visitor to sign up to your newsletter which helps you build your email newsletter subscribers. Without popups such as these, it can be easy for your visitors to gloss past your email newsletter signup area, but with this pop up they won’t be able to miss it. If popups like this are too aggressive for your website, don’t worry, you have other options which we’ll discuss next.
Embedded Popups
If a popup that shows one second after the webpage loads is too aggressive for your website, visitors, or branding, try the embedded popups option. By using this tool you’ll still be able to draw attention to your email newsletter sign up and be able to collect emails without coming off as “pushy” as you might with the previous popup we mentioned. These embedded popups still capture your visitor’s attention as they’re placed directly within the visitor’s main area of focus, they just simply look like part of the page and the visitors don’t actually have to click out of them to resume using the web page.
Exit Intent Popups
Another list building popup that Sumo offers is an exit intent popup. These popups are a less aggressive popup strategy as well because they only show up after the visitor’s cursor has reached the address bar. When the cursor clears this area it’s an indication that the visitor is about to click off the webpage so these popups are typically a last-ditch attempt to engage with the visitor before they click off. These popups are especially advantageous to use because they only show up after a visitor is already probably thinking about exiting the page so you likely have nothing to lose by showing them a popup.
CTA Popups
Instead of showing your visitors a link building popup, or a popup with an email collection field to help build your email list, an alternative type of popup that you can show your visitors is a Call-to-Action (CTA) popup. These popups, instead of including an email collection field for your visitors to input their email addresses, include a call-to-action that you can customize to promote a message such as, “Download Now,” “Buy Now,” or “Learn More”. These popups encourage your visitors to complete an action such as downloading an ebook, buying a product, or they direct them to another part of your website that you want them to visit. They’re a powerful way to draw attention to an action you want them to take and help encourage them to actually take that action.
Click Trigger Popups
This popup option only shows itself after your visitors have triggered it by clicking a button somewhere on your webpage. This is another option that can make your popups seem less aggressive because your visitors have to actually engage in the act of clicking a button to trigger the popup to show, they don’t just show without being prompted. The potential downside to using this popup is that it’s a two-step system, which means you’ll have fewer conversions rather than if you were to use a one-step system. Visitors have to actually opt in to clicking on the trigger button and then enter their email address into the collection field to complete the conversion, whereas with the other options users don’t have to opt into clicking the trigger button. Depending on your website and how you interact with your customers, however, this could be an ideal option for you and it could also mean that you collect high-quality leads as opposed to a high quantity of leads.
List Builder Scroll Box
This popup style is unique because it doesn’t actually take up the entirety of the webpage and force the visitor from using it, it simply scrolls along with them as they move up and down the page. This is an ideal option for businesses who are looking for a less invasive popup as it doesn’t actually force the user to click away from it, it simply sits as an option in the corner of the page.
CTA Scroll Box
Similar to the List Builder Scroll Box, the Call-to-Action Scroll Box also scrolls along with the visitor as they move throughout the page and doesn’t force them to click out of it to access the rest of the webpage, however, this popup box includes a call-to-action as opposed to an email collection field. This is ideal if you want your visitors to download an ebook, purchase a product or if you want to direct them to another area of your website rather than just collect their email.
Link Building Welcome Mat
This tool is the ultimate popup. After the web page loads, the Welcome Mat will scroll down and take up the entire web page so your visitors actually have to scroll or click out of it to get past it. The Welcome Mat captures the visitor’s attention fully as it places the email collection field directly in their line of vision, but you’re able to customize it fully so it fits in with your website’s brand image. If the full Welcome Mat that scrolls down once the page loads doesn’t fit in with your website or brand, you have other Welcome Mat options available to chose from. Check out the following options.
Embedded Welcome Mat
If the previous Welcome Mat option that scrolls down immediately when the page loads doesn’t appeal to you, another option is the Embedded Welcome Mat which just shows up as part of your web page as the visitor scrolls down. This type of welcome mat is advantageous to use if you’re looking for an option that looks more organic and like it’s just a part of the website design, rather than it looking and acting like a popup. This is a great option if you don’t want your visitors to feel forced into seeing the Welcome Mat as it doesn’t take over the web page, it’s just embedded into it.
Welcome Mat Parallax
The Parallax version of the Welcome Mat is very similar to the Embedded Welcome Mat in that it feels like an organic part of the website and less like a popup that visitors are forced to interact with. Just like the Embedded Welcome Mat, it appears as the visitor scrolls throughout the web page, but it’s not static and stationary like the Embedded version, the Parallax version has a stylish scroll motion to it that looks impressive as the visitor moves throughout the page. To compare how the two Welcome Mats appear, check out the Embedded Welcome Mat demo here and the Parallax Welcome Mat demo here.
CTA Welcome Mat
If the Link Building Welcome Mat isn’t what you’re looking for, another option you have is to use the Call-to-Action Welcome Mat. Instead of including an email collection field like the Link Building Welcome Mat does, the CTA Welcome Mat includes a call-to-action button that you can use to encourage your visitors to take some kind of action. Use this to promote your products, suggest popular webpages or to encourage ebook downloads, the choice is yours.
Video Background Welcome Mat
Instead of using a static image as a background for your Welcome Mat, another option Sumo gives you is to use a video background. Depending on your website or the products you sell, capturing your visitor’s attention with a video may be a more effective way to engage them and it may be more entertaining for them to interact with. Use video to create a beautiful backdrop for your email collection field, make it interactive and fun for your visitors to watch, use the feature to show your visitors how to use your product, or whatever else makes sense for your website.
Share Buttons
It’s very likely that you’ve seen this tool before on other websites and that’s because it works. One of the best ways to drive high-quality traffic to your website is through direct referrals and one of the best ways to get direct referrals is to make it easy for your visitors to share your web pages with others through social media. Encourage your visitors to share your webpages with others by having share buttons ready and waiting to be clicked so your content can be shared easily across Facebook, Twitter, Google+, Pinterest, WhatsApp, SMS, and email. Simply having these buttons easily accessible on the top, sidebar, and bottom of the page can make a difference in the number of shares your content receives plus it acts as social proof.
Smart Bar
If popups aren’t your style but you still want to subtly promote an email collection field, Sumo’s Smart Bar might be your ideal option. These Smart Bars, which you can locate either at the top or bottom of your web page, remain stationary within the window so they don’t force the visitor to interact with them, they simply take up a small portion of the window to prompt the visitor to enter their email address. They’re compact, classy and can be customized to fit your branding, so they’re an ideal option if you’re looking for an understated version of a popup.
CTA Smart Bar
This Smart Bar option is exactly like the previous one, however, instead of an email collection field, it includes a call-to-action button instead. Like we’ve mentioned before, the call-to-action buttons are an ideal way to encourage your visitors to take action whether it’s by downloading an ebook or to redirect them to another part of your website, and the Call-to-Action Smart Bar does just that in a simple, compact and understated way.
Highlighter
The Sumo Highlighter makes it easy for your visitors to share pieces of content on social media by allowing them to highlight text and share it directly to Facebook and Twitter with only a couple of clicks. It also shows your visitors the sections of your web pages that other visitors have highlighted which acts as social proof and encourages them to share, too.
Image Sharer
Content shared on social media is more likely to get more engagement when there’s an image included. Make it easy for your visitors to share your images by enabling Sumo’s Image Sharer! You can choose exactly which social platforms your images can be shared to out of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Yummly and you can also choose where your share icons show on your images and on which pages your images will be sharable from. When your visitors share your images on social media through the Image Sharer it links directly back to you which helps you drive even more traffic to your site.
Content Analytics
Not only does Sumo create tools that help you capture emails and encourage your visitors to take action on your site, but they also create analytics and tracking tools to help you gauge the impact your website has on your visitors in various useful ways.
One of those ways is through their content analytics tool which tracks how much of your articles get read. This is a useful tool to measure how engaged your visitors are with your content so you can understand how much of it they actually read before they click away and the percentage of your audience that reads the entire article completely. This data can help you understand how engaging your content is, whether your articles are titled appropriately so your visitors are clicking on the article they think they’re clicking on, where you should place calls-to-action and more. Set up this tool on all your blog posts and view the results in real time, no need to wait to see what your visitors think of your content.
Google Analytics by Sumo
Google Analytics is a powerful analytics tool that most, if not all, websites use to track their data and statistics, but Sumo’s Google Analytics tool pulls your most important data in real time into one dashboard so you can easily view the numbers that matter to you without having to dig through the Google Analytics interface. With this tool, you’re able to see your website’s most important stats such as your active users, pageviews, bounce rate, organic searches and more without leaving your site or opening another app. You can see your data directly on each page and you can choose exactly the stats you want to see so it’s always relevant to you.
Contact Form
Last but not least, Sumo’s Contact Form tool makes it easy for your customers to get in contact with you. Whether you just need a simple contact form your customers can email you through or whether you need a place for your customers to easily ask you questions, Sumo’s Contact Form tools make it look like you had a designer custom build one for you. Customize it to suit your website’s branding by selecting your own background, button, and text color along with the text font so it seamlessly fits in with the rest of your website. It’s easy to integrate Sumo’s Contact Forms into your website and you even have the option to create an email auto-response for every contact message you receive through the form so you’re always ahead with your replies.
As you can see, Sumo provides a lot of different solutions for website owners to drive more traffic, engage customers and track their progress, and we hope our review of each of Sumo’s tools has given you some insight into all the various ways they can help you interact with your visitors more effectively.
Sumo’s Pros & Cons
The main advantage to using Sumo’s service is simply the sheer volume of tools they’ve created for all website owners to use, the practicality of the tools and the price at which the tools are available to use. All of the tools listed above are free for all websites to use, which is a major advantage for small and large websites alike. If, however, you want to remove the Sumo branding from the tools when you use them on your website, you’ll have to upgrade to a paid plan.
Pros
- Over 20 tools
- Free to use
- Customize the tools to fit your brand image
- Only use the tools that work for your website
- Boost your traffic
- Increase shares
- Increase visitor engagement
- Increase email newsletter signups
- No coding experience required to set up & use the tools
- Create directly on your own website
- Integrates with major email services, plus more
- Vetted & used by industry experts and professionals
- Improve the look, feel and function of your website
Cons
- To use Sumo’s tools without their branding you have to upgrade to a paid plan
Sumo’s Pricing
All of Sumo’s pricing plans enable you to use each one of their tools, or any combination of their tools, that you want. You don’t have to purchase a plan for every tool, all the tools are available to be used no matter which plan you choose. Each of the pricing plans include additional features that may appeal to your business based on your own particular needs, so check out what each one offers to find the one that works best for you.
Sumo’s tools are available in these pricing tiers:
- Just Starting
- Free
- 500 Subscribers
- Basic Email Integrations
- Creative Freedom
- Professional
- $29/month on a Yearly Plan
- The “Just Starting” Plan, Plus:
- Unlimited Subscribers
- Pro Visitor Targeting
- Pre-Built Templates
- Small Business
- $79/month on a Yearly Plan
- The “Professional” Plan, Plus:
- Live Chat With Customers
- Content Upgrades
- Pro Analytics
- Ecommerce
- $199/month on a Yearly Plan
- The “Small Business” Plan, Plus:
- Pro Email Integrations
- Discount Codes
- Remove Sumo Branding
- Team
- Contact for Price
- The “Ecommerce” Plan, Plus:
- Unlimited Sites
- Unlimited Seats
- VIP Sumo Support
Conclusion
We hope this Sumo review has provided you with insight into the value their tools can add to your website whether you’re looking to drive more traffic to your site, grow your email list, encourage more visitor engagement, track your progress, and more. With so many great tools on offer that help industry professionals and amateurs alike, there’s sure to be something for every website owner to use to help make their website look and function better.
With full creative freedom even at the free pricing plan tier, each of these tools can integrate seamlessly with your website’s branding so they look like an organic part of your website and like they were custom built specifically for your website. Make use of this feature to customize the appearance of every tool so they look exactly how you want them to.
Have a look at each of these powerful tools over on Sumo’s website so you can get an idea of how they look and feel in motion and see which ones would work the best for your website. These tools are so easy to integrate and use on your website, you truly have nothing to lose and everything to gain so try out Sumo’s 20+ tools if you’re interested in engaging with your website visitors more effectively and driving more traffic to your website.
