How much do you think about your thank you pages? You know, those pages that you’re sent to after you sign up for something like a mailing list or a contest or after you purchase something online? Most people never get more than the “Thank you for buying, have a nice day.” message. Even worse, some don’t have a coherent thank you page at all. If done correctly, thank you pages can be a great marketing tool that can help you sell more, get marketing information from your customers, or start connecting with them. Here are five ways to make your thank you pages more effective.

1. Connect- Are you on a social networking site like Twitter, Facebook, or LinkedIn? Here’s a great way to encourage your customers to link to you. Ask them on join you on your thank you pages. Provide links that will allow them to easily friend, follow, or connect with you on your thank you page along with a brief description of why they should follow you. Don’t forget to also provide information on how to connect with you in other ways, such as by email and phone.

2. Offer instructions- Sometimes when customers sign up for something like and email list or an online class or seminar, there are some things that you’ll need them to do, like check their email, send a confirmation, or add your email address to their address books. A great place to put those instructions is directly on your thank you page. It helps ease the minds of those who might be anxious about what comes next, plus it can also cut down on customer service questions that you need to answer.

3. Give a free gift or a surprise bonus- Almost everyone loves a pleasant surprise or an unexpected gift. A sure-fire way to wow your customers is to offer them a surprise gift after they sign up for your mailing list or purchase something from you. This could be as simple as telling them that you’re adding a free thank you gift in with their purchase or offering a coupon for their next purchase. Whatever the surprise, you want to make it something that your customers will enjoy and you want to tell them about it on your thank you page.

4. Upsell- Once a customer has already taken action on one thing, it’s much easier to encourage to them to take action on something else. This is the “would you like fries with that?” tactic. So if someone has decided to sign up for your email list, you can “upsell” them by encouraging them to visit your web store to purchase something. Or if someone has purchase something from your web store, you can upsell them with another complimentary purchase. The upselling technique works especially well if you also give them an incentive like free shipping, discount, free gift, or coupon.

5. Ask questions- Surveys and questionnaires are a great way to learn more about your customers and about what they want and need. The only problem is that it can be terribly difficult to get them to fill them out. For better results on your surveys, try putting them on your thank you page. Again, it’s easier to get people to take action on one thing once they’ve already take action on something else. Plus, if you offer them a small gift or bonus for participating, that’s another useful push to get them to fill out the survey.

So what do you think? What do you have on your thank you pages?