If you are going to be implementing any type of form on your organization’s website where you’ll be asking for information, remember to ask nicely.  Most people know why you want/need the information you’re requesting.

Creating such forms is rather easy (especially if you’re using a CMS — the Webform module for Drupal, particularly can make this easy.  Dreamweaver or Kompozer can nicely automate the process for you too).   It’s always so easy to just go with the default sorts of text.

Name, Email, Occupation, etc.

But Slife made this optional (which I love!), and actually asked “Do you mind sharing. . . ?”  (which I love even more).  If you can make your information request optional (which should be a reasonable option for anything but a purchase), the nice way of asking may go a long way in enticing visitors to actually supply the requested information.

Has anyone seen a study on how effective this actually is?