When beauty meets business...
Lately we've been posting a lot about the design features of Thrive Architect and while in awe of the Photoshop worthy capabilities, it's easy to forget that the plugin has some really impressive list building features under the hood!
If you're serious about building an online business, you need to build a mailing list and Thrive Architect is the only visual editor that gives you the power to create lead generation forms, 2-step opt-in forms and exit intent lightboxes without needing any other add-on or tool.
Let me show you!
More...
API Connections & Thrive Lightboxes
When you install Thrive Architect on your site, you'll see that you get access to the Thrive Themes Dashboard and to something called "Thrive Lightboxes".
From the Thrive Themes Dashboard, you'll be able to connect your email service (such as Aweber, ActiveCampaign, Drip, ConvertKit, Mailchimp, etc.) via API. This will only take a few minutes to set up when you follow our step by step tutorial videos.
As soon as your service is connected you can now decide what will happen AFTER someone signs up and you'll be able to design your opt-in forms from within Thrive Architect.
This means no more struggling with ugly HTML forms or copy pasting new forms each time you want to send people to a different download page. Thrive Architect will take care of all of this for you!
Thrive Lightboxes is where you'll be able to customize and create opt-in lightboxes (also called pop-ups).
Landing Page Lightboxes
Thrive Architect comes bundled with hundreds of landing page templates and as soon as you load a 2-step lead generation landing page a pre-designed Thrive Lightbox is created.
Edit and connect landing page lightboxes in Thrive Architect
In order to edit and connect this lightbox to your email service, go to the Thrive Lightboxes menu in your WordPress dashboard and click on the "edit with Thrive Architect button".
This will allow you to connect the lead generation form on the lightbox with your email service.
Select the lead generation form and click on "connect form to service"
That's it. That's how easy it is to connect a landing page lightbox to your email service and start collecting leads.
And if you're looking to set up a full list building funnel, you can follow this step by step tutorial.
But that's just the beginning... Thrive Architect also allows you to add lead generation elements to any page or post.
Pages & Posts Lead Generation Opportunities
There are 3 big levers to build your list with Thrive Architect:
- The lead generation element. This element allows you to add an opt-in form anywhere in your page or post content.
- The 2-Step lead generation lightbox. This lightbox is triggered when someone clicks on a button (or a text link).
- The exit intent or timed lightbox. This lightbox will show up when someone is about to leave your page or after a certain period of time.
1. Add an Opt-in Form Anywhere on Your Page or Post (3.01 min)
In the elements list, you'll find an element called "Lead Generation" this element allows you to add an opt-in form anywhere on your page or post.
Simply drag the element on the page an customize it to your liking and connect it to your email provider.
2. Create a 2-Step Lightbox (4.30 min)
To create a 2-step lightbox, you'll first have to create a new Thrive Lightbox.
Add new Thrive Lightbox
Then, click on the element you want to use to trigger the ligtbox (eg. a button) and use the Actions and Animations menu to trigger the lightbox.
3. Set Up an Exit-Intent Lightbox (6.28 min)
After creating your lightbox in Thrive Lightboxes, you can use the page events to set up an exit-intent (or timed) lightbox.
1. Go to the Thrive Architect settings
2. Click on "Setup Page Events"
What About You?
Are you using the full power of Thrive Architect to build your list? Let me know in the comments below!
This post sums up one of my favorite features of Thrive products– the ease of creating and connecting these funnel building elements. One question: it seems that using the API connection, you can only add name, email, and phone to an opt-in form; while using HTML, you can add whichever fields are present in the original form created in the email program (Aweber, in my case). Perhaps I’m missing something. Is it possible to add other fields to forms via API or no?
Hi Rick that’s right. With API the number of fields is limited to name, email and phone number.
Hi Hanne,
It would be really cool if you guys extended the lightbox functionality to also accept text fields for questions/comments etc
Maybe an API call to contact form 7 or even WordPress directly.
Thanks
Hi Onuora,
What exactly would you like to accomplish?
Hi Hanne, is that a limitation of the API? Could the connection via API be extended in some way? Great tutorial by the way.
Hi David,
Yes that’s the limitation of the API
Como puedo adicionar un nuevo campo para que dejen un comentario o la información que requiera el cliente, por cuanto el formulario; no contesta directamente lo que quiere saber el cliente; hay alguna solución?
Sorry Manuel… English please?
Looks great! Can your developers integrate one of the most popular email/listbuilding services from Germany, Switzerland and Austria called Klick-Tipp?
Here is their API integration documentation:
https://www.klick-tipp.com/handbuch/application-programming-interface-api
This would be a huge step and help for many of your german/swiss/austrian users 🙂
Hi Ivan,
We already integrate with Klick-tipp 🙂
I’ve created my home page with Thrive Architect and connected my email service with it. It’s not the most impressive page but at least I hope I’m learning to do it the right way.
Hope to use the awesome homepage template you guys created when I’m ready.
Great to hear that Kevin. Action over perfection!
It is simply awesome. Thank you so much for sharing.
Glad you find this helpful
Love how easy it is to create everything my website needs just with Thrive Architect!
We’re doing our best Jane 🙂
Love the features, just wondered when the contact form inclusion would be coming, seem to remember reading it somewhere
Hi Martin,
It’s on the list of features to develop but I can’t give you an ETA yet.
Amazing!
this new plugin is f…. amazing
Thanks Daniel
Just wondering if it’s possible to add Mailwizz in with API access. Wouldn’t be much work on your side as you already have send reach which uses mailwizz. You only need to ask users for there API URL as well as what you ask for in send reach.
Hi Kieron,
We collect votes for new API connections and implement them based on demand. I added your request for Mailwizz to the list
Dear Hanne,
I also would like to request for API connection with Mailwizz.
What camera and mic set up do you use
Camera Canon EOS 650D and zoom H1 for mic
Hanne, just the video I needed. I have been using the content builder for years and with the new update with thrive Architect, it’s easy to forget, you’re so right. I was feeling a little lost getting comfortable using it. Thanks, so much. Keep them coming. I love your videos.
Thanks Dennis
Hello Hanne, your how to videos are very informative.I have a question I hope you can help me with. Bear with me; I’m new at this.I have created a landing page with buttons and links to a Free ebook offer. Once the link activates, is it possible to trigger a thankyou page at the same time? I don’t want to lose people once the ebook is downloaded, but at the same time, I need to get them to the thankyou page without too many steps. On the thankyou page there is another free offer which needs to do something similar— open an application (to either sign up or screen out people) and
a scheduling calendar with possible openings. Is this too much to expect in the sequence? Help, I’m going in circles! 😉 Sandra
Hi Sandra,
Take a look at the list building funnel tutorial. That will answer all your questions 🙂
Great, Thank you so much!
Great article. I just have a couple of question.
1. Is there a way to add an event globally to the entire website? Because now I have about 50-60 posts and if someone comes to them directly (e.g. from a search engine) there is no event set up. Do I have to go to each post individually and set up a timed or exit intent Lightbox?
2. If someone has already seen the lightbox on the home page and then goes to another page which also has a timed lightbox. will that person see the lightbox twice? Is there not a way to make one appearance per session of the user?
Hi Shajee,
For both of these cases you would need to use our list building plugin Thrive Leads
Hanne. Thanks! Thrive Leads looks like a great plugin! Definitely getting it!
Short and sweet! Already putting lead generation element to use it but Thrivebox and pop-up are also very very apropo. I second the idea of getting a contact form element for Thrive Architect, and when that happens, I’ll ditch Contact Form 7 and the endless HTML tweaking for real. You guys are visionaries in the true sense of the word.
Thanks Thomas
Thank you, Hanne. I appreciate the information.
Thanks Zane
Thank you. Great as always. Maybe you could do one (or maybe there´s already an existing tutorial) for Thrive Leads + Thrive Quiz Builder. I´d like to learn step by step how I could add a powerful email segmentation strategy plus adding tags to leads/customers but using GetResponse as the ESP. They have automation ready as a tool now, so I´m curious on knowing how I can take advantage of this in the most powerful way possible.
Thank you in advance.
Luis
Hi Luis,
Take a look at the How to use Quizzes to Boost Conversions Course and if you want to tag/segment people based on quiz results, you’ll need to use the dynamic results content feature.
Thank you so much for your response Hanne.
First, Thanks Hanne, for laying this out in a straightforward fashion. Very helpful.
A question regarding the sample webpage you were using, “Hi I’m Elena,” there is a button on the top menu marked “free e-course.” Is there a tutorial somewhere on how to get/make/code that kind of button on my main menu? I’d love to use that for list-building purposes. Thanks in advance!
Hi,
That button is one of the features in our themes (the theme I’m using here is Minus) and it’s called a “Highlighted menu item”
Hanne, another great tutorial. I have a few questions..1) Im a beginner to intermediate when setting up a website. No coding skills. Will Thrive Architect be too difficult or should I outsource? Does support answer basic questions? 2) What Laptop do you and Shane use? Is that a Surface? Do you like? 3) What is the brand of microphone you use? Very crisp. Merci, Rob
Hi Rob,
1) Thrive Architect is made for non-coders. If you know your way around WP a bit you will be able to create your site (and we have a ton of tutorials like our website from scratch one.
2) Yes a Surface Pro 4 absolutely LOVE it!
3) A zoom H1 (or H2) best price/quality I found so far 🙂
Thanks Hanne, very helpful!
Will the new Thrive Lightbox capture UTM data out of the URL using hidden fields?
Hi Chett,
Hidden fields are only possible if you connect through HTML (and not through API) and I think it should but not 100% sure…
Hi Hanne, Thanks again! Always very helpful to steam up with the valuable tools within Architect. Question: I use also gravityforms on my sites. Sometimes I need more fields, so can I use these forms as well within Lightboxes?
Hi Tom,
I haven’t tried it… But I guess gravityform gives you a shortcode? I’m pretty sure it should render correctly.
I really like this incredibly helpful and timely video. I’ll definitely be adding more sign ups to my site so thanks for highlighting Architect’s features to facilitate this. So useful to be shown where these features lie in the menu systems. Thanks Hanne.
You’re welcome Julian!
Thank you Hanne, really helpful tutorial.
Happy to hear Ramesh
Yet another reason why I love love love Thrive Themes. THANK YOU Hanne 🙂
Thanks Roxanne
Hi Hanne,
A truly helpful tutorial that comes at the right moment in time.
I have created a Lightbox with an opt-in-form that I added using a HTML-short-code. However, it does not work properly.
I use the same HTML-short-code on a landing page where it works just fine.
Are the lightboxes programmed so that you can only go through API? If yes, that would be a pity.
Many thanks for your help.
JuanPedro S
Hi JuanPedro,
The way to set this up is to add a lead generation element and connect that lead generation element with the HTML form instead of the API connection.
Ha me, Love this short & informative tutorials – keeps all the options available in TA front & centre. Keep them coming 🙂
Alison
Will do Alison
Hi Hanne, I really appreciate all the tutorials you and Shane are making. It’s really helpful. I still have a question though, I don’t quite understand the difference between Thrive Leads and Thrive Light Boxes. When do you need to use what? Maybe you can elaborate on that in a next video?
Thanks!
Hi Harry,
If you have Thrive Leads, I would always recommend using Thrive Leads Thriveboxes instead of the Thrive Lightboxes. Reason being that you will be able to A/B test and get detailed stats!
Amazing content you put out, wow! Question; is is possible to have the “thank you page” of a lightbox popup leadform stay inside the lightbox popup, so no other URL is shown? And the 2nd question; if that is possible , is it possible to “fire” a pixel/tag when that thank you page loads inside the lightbox?
Hi James,
That is possible if you use our listbuilding plugin Thrive Leads (you can use the “thank you state” of the lightbox.)
In that case it is not possible to fire a pixel because there is no page reload but you can fire a tag if you connect your email provider through API.
Thanks Hanne!
When I use that lead generation element, does it show me the stats anywhere?
If not, how do I make it show?
Thanks,
Maayan
Hi Maayan,
No to get detailed stats you would need Thrive Leads .
How can I trigger showing the Thrive Lightbox (Exit Intent and on-click) without using Thrive Architect?
For example, I’d want normal blog posts to have links that open up a Thrive Lightbox + will activate on Exit Intent
Hi Allan, not sure how you would use Thrive Lightboxes (which is part of Thrive Architect) without using Thrive Architect 😉
If you’re not using Thrive Architect for your blog posts and you want to trigger a lightbox, you can have a look at Thrive Leads, Thrive Leads allows you to use shortcodes to trigger a lightbox within a WordPress post.
Hi Hanne, once again an awesome video and blog post! Thank you for including a bit at the end of your post about the power of integrating Thrive Leads, however I am still having trouble with the technical set up of using Thrive Architect landing pages (which already have forms) with Thrive Leads. I see from the comments that there are others trying to understand how to best put these two plugins together and I’m wondering if you could do a tutorial showing the steps on how to integrate Thrive Leads with Thrive Architect landing pages (so we can track, do A/B testing, etc)? I’m confused about the order…. for instance do I need to make all my forms in Thrive Leads first, then delete the forms on the landing pages then insert them from Thrive Leads?? How do I keep the design elements the same? Is there a recommended way to do this? Any help is appreciated!
Hi Lisa,
Yes you need to create the thrive boxes in TL first and we added all the designs in the templates library (for lightboxes). You can find them with the title “LP”. Then you need to connect the landing page with the TL Thrivebox by going to Animations and Actions.
But I made a video for this that I will publish very soon 🙂
I just watched the video you made. It is EXACTLY what I needed! Thank YOU!! 🙂
Please, can you post the link to this video? Thank you.
You can see how to do that here
Hi Hanne,
Please can you give us the link for this tutorial please as I too am struggling to use both plugins together. Cheers 🙂
Here’s the tutorial: https://thrivethemes.com/ab-test-landing-page-opt-in/
This is to A/B test opt-in forms if you’re using a 2-step opt-in process (this means someone clicks on a button first and then sees the opt-in form)
If you want to test a landing page you can Use Thrive Optimize
I used to be able to (pre-architect) type in the html code generated by Digital Access Pass (DAP) into the submit button html option on TLeads and it would take me to your matching thank-you double optin page and simultaneously add my optin’er to DAP. All I get now is an error msg. As you and DAP do not have an API, how do I use your “beautiful” optin forms and tie them to DAP. Like I said, all was good B4 Architect.
Hi Harvey,
Sorry to hear.
If you’ve followed the instructions here to add an HTML form and you still get the error message. Please open a support ticket so that our team can have a look.
Thank you Hanne. Excellent review of the features. So nice!
Great Job Hanne 😀
Initially, I was struggling with Thrive Boxes, API Connections but that has gone with today. Thanks for making such a descriptive, illustrative images pointing out as bullets in.
Happy this was helpful!
Thrive themes are the best converting themes i have ever found… Hope to increase my sales with the help of this lead generation plugin.
I want to put boxes below a post with titles taking the reader to another article to read. How do I do this?
Hi,
You would need to use Thrive Leads short codes for this.
Hello there.
I can’t put an internal link in a list element.
What should i do now? Please fix it soon.
Thank you.
Not sure what you mean with “internal link” in list element. You can add links in list elements. Select the text and click on the link icon. Then add your URL. You can see how to add links here ==> https://thrivethemes.com/tkb_item/hyperlinks-thrive-architect/
I am confused if i should use thrive themes to build my emailing list
Hi Lalina,
Our focus is very much on conversions (and leads are a big part of that) we have Thrive Architect which allows you to build awesome landing pages and also Thrive Leads to add any type of opt-in form on your site.
So I would say yes 🙂 You probably should use Thrive Themes to build your list.
Hi Hanne
Thanks for a great video…I hope I’m not asking a question thats been asked already.
I would like a single button that is reused across ‘hundreds’ of pages.
I would also like a single Opt In form
OR
a Single Lightbox or Thrive Box
and a single form (which is just the email address)
What I need then – is the URL of the page the customer is visiting – being captured.
This way I can understand what their enquiry related to.
My overall goal is to have a simple ‘ Find Out More’ button on each page.
And if the URL of the Page is captured, then I know what the enqury relates to.
Is this possible?
Hi Carl,
What you’re requesting would need custom coding (depending on your email solution you might want to have a look at something like hidden fields).
What you can do in Thrive Architect is have one list and different opt-in forms that send different tags or segments to that list. (But you would have to create different opt-in forms).
Now probably, most of your pages can be grouped into categories… which might make things easier.
Eg. You could have a category “losing weight” and a category “building muscle” and depending on the page people are coming from you can show the right opt-in form.
Hanne
Thank you for the response
Carl
Hi Hanne,
i need the thrive architect. Is thrive architect sufficient to grow my emaillist? Does supplementing with thrive leads make sense?
best regards
Kai
Hello Kai,
You can do a lot of listing with just Thrive Architect. Thrive Leads adds several powerful and advanced features, such as targeting options, more form types, A/B testing, SmartLinks, Signup Segue and so on.
You can think of it like this: Thrive Architect is the sports car of list building and Thrive Leads is the rocket ship form the future. 😀
Awesome, Hanne!
I am a monthly subscriber from Thrive Plugins.
My home page is made using another theme that I have bought one year ago.
If I don’t want to re-create the whole page in Thrive Architect, is it possible to include a form the way you do in the video inside my home page?
What kind of Thrive plugins can I use inside a home page made in another theme from a different company?
Thank you in advance!
Hi Rosinaldo,
Yes you can do that. You can use a Thrive Leads Short code for this.
Hi Hanne
I currently have a basic wp website. I am planning to use TArchitect to make a better website on the same domain. Once I install TA and start working to build the new website, do I lose all the data (blog pasts, images, text etc.) on the old site?
Thanks very much – your clarity of explanation in this post is refreshing
and much appreciated.
Hi William,
No you will not loose anything. The only thing is that you can not edit old content with Thrive Architect (like an old blog post for example) but you will still be able to edit it from the WordPress editor as you were used to doing.
Thanks Hanne
I have since writing the first post ordered TA and getting
into it… so far I love it. And thanks for your helpful
videos, and from your colleagues too! Great!
Happy to hear!
Thanks Hanne.
This is most helpful. I have now purchased TA and love it!
Thanks for all your help videos, and those of your colleagues. Best wishes.
Happy to have you on board William!
Hello Hanne, thank you for the information.
What really is proving to be a stumbling block is the apparent inability to add additional fields to the API form (we are trying to integrate with DRIP).
For instance we have the additional fields “Country” and “State” which subscribers complete as this information is useful to us. Also “Last name”.
However I can see no way to add these fields and it appears that the only fields allowed by Thrive are First name and Email (I can see no templates at all in the Leads template listing that have a Last name field which I find pretty surprising).
Is there a way to do this? There must surely be as otherwise the power of Leads and Drip is simply wasted.
Many thanks!
Brian – I am having the same situation. I require 5 fields to integrate to allow us to run a report which is our primary prospecting tool. It would be very nice to take advantage of this feature in this capacity as well as the basic subscription for traditional list building. I look forward to responses to your request!
You can use the HTML integration if you need more opt-in form fields (instead of the API integration)
No words about your videos. My website captures many more leds just by applying your tips. Very good indeed! Gratitude!
Happy to hear Alessandro
I recently started a new website regarding Eco-friendly and reusable products for healthy environment. I was reluctant to use Thrive, as i am not into page builders. Most page builders bloat the website.
But on GreenMetropolis, I tried thrive architect and it is awesome. Too many functionalities and customization options. I am never gonna look back now.
Especially Thrive Leads is extremely powerful and yields best result.
Very pleased to hear that!