Manipulating Popups

[Dinghus]

A client wants to have a popup window that thank a person for visiting when they leave the site UNLESS they click on the SUBMIT button for the purchase form.

I've tried using JS with the button to disable the popup but seem to be missing something, like maybe it can't be done.

Anybody know how to do this?

[DaveSawers]

Anything can be done... Even naff features like a thank you message!

Are you using the "onunload=somefunction() in the body tag for the page?

Instead of using the SUBMIT button to submit the form directly, fire off a Javascript function instead that sets a flag and then submits the form. Then use the flag in your unload function to bypass the display of the message. You will need to do some thinking about how to cope with users who have Javascript disabled, otherwise, they won't be able to submit the form.

[DrTandem1]

If someone wants to leave the site, they don't want to see a pop-up. They want to leave. The best "thanks" you can give them is not to screw with their navigation.

[Dinghus]

Well, as much as you may believe people want to leave a page unmolested, the stats prove you wrong. Popups of all sorts actually work to bring in revenue. Why else do you think the porn industry uses them so much? If they didn't work, nobody would use them.

However, saying "thank you, please come again" is the same as having a person standing at the door to the store saying the same thing.

Now the reason many are going to exit popups vice entrance popups is the PPC industry which won't allow landing pages that open a popup onload. However, they don't stop popups created other ways. So the industry is shifting and we have to keep up or lose out.

Besides. If a customer says "make me a popup" and they are paying me for it and it is not illegal, immoral or whatever, then who am I to say "no"?

Anyway, what I'm trying to do is exactly that. The button is clicked to go to the checkout and it calls a javascript that redirects to the desired page. It also tries to block the popup. I'm almost to the point of having it close the popup as soon as it opens.

[DaveSawers]

Can you link to or post the code you are using? Hard to debug something that should be quite simple to fix without seeing anything.