How to Create A Seamless Landing Page Experience

Written on 22 February, 2018 by Julia Hammond
Categories PPC

There are actually two vital creative components to a successful, high-converting AdWords ad: the creative ad itself and the landing page. One without the other makes for a lacklustre result. So, what do you need to do to ensure the two are working seamlessly together? First, let’s go back to basics.

What is a landing page?

In the broadest sense, a landing page is the page on which a visitor lands. Pretty simple, right? Many people would assume that it would be the home page, but that’s not always the case. For example, if a user was browsing on a search engine and came across a blog of yours that related to their search, the blog would act as their landing page to your site. From there, hopefully, the visitor will browse around the site. However, in reference to pay per click advertising, a landing page often refers to a custom-built web page that directly relates to the ad on which the user has clicked.

AdWords continues to provide a pivotal platform for digital advertisers to build upon as it delivers a more prominent advertising solution among a highly-distracted online market. A well-crafted ad/landing page combo can further enhance your digital efforts and send you careering towards those coveted high-conversion rates.

What are landing pages used for?

These tailored pages are used to attract the user and entice them to complete a specific action. This could be anything from clicking through to a specified section of your website, to making a purchase on the spot or any other action valuable to your business. However, for the most part, the aim for a designated landing page revolves around conversions.

While the ad itself is charged with catching the attention of potential clients at the top end of the sales funnel, it is the job of the landing page to make the consumer feel comfortable enough to make a conversion. That’s why it’s so important to ensure you have the right balance between your ad and your landing page.

It’s far easier to peak interest in your target market than it is to make a sale, so oftentimes you’ll see campaigns that look great and get people through to the landing page but, ultimately, don’t convert. There is largely no point in paying for clicks if your landing page isn’t making conversions and producing sales, and that’s why it’s essential you put the effort into creating a high-performing landing page.

The Perfect Marriage

Your ad is a single piece in a far more complex puzzle but it’s the first component of the campaign that your lead sees. However, the success of the campaign is judged upon ROI and your ad’s conversion rates. An ad without a landing page will never reach it’s potential, which ultimately is a waste of your ad budget.

Therefore, you should pay equal attention to both your ad and the landing page it leads to, as they both have equal weight in reaching the ultimate goal – conversion. The ad draws your audience in, while your landing page guides your visitor through to transaction.

How to Optimise your Lading Page

While AdWords is not the most expensive form of advertising, when you put a significant budget behind it, you still want to make sure you get a return on your investment. Ensure you’re hitting the mark every time with your landing pages by following these easy guidelines.

Match Ads to Landing Pages

The initial step to take towards a higher conversion rate is to ensure your ad is enticing to your target consumer. A landing page is the extension of this ad and should reflect the same or similar conventions, message and design. This will ensure a seamless customer journey through the sales funnel, from initially seeing the ad in the awareness stage, right the way through to your call to action (CTA) at the conversion stage.

Feels like Home

A significant aspect to consider when crafting your landing page is the message you are sending to prospective clients. To ensure that the visitor feels relaxed and comfortable, it’s important to keep your advertising messages familiar and consistent. You’ll want to preserve the tone of your brand, generate a similar impact and ensure that there is no conflicting information. It is particularly important when re-targeting to pay close attention to familiarity so that your consumers are not blindsided by differing ideas.

The Post-Click Promptness

What happens after the visitor clicks an ad is arguably the most crucial part of their experience, as it establishes the customer’s perception of the brand and determines whether or not they will convert.

The response time (load speed) must be swift to please not only the consumer whose busy lifestyle and goldfish-like attention span demands speed and precision, but also to appease the ‘Google Gods.’ The Quality Score of any ad will determine its rank and, ultimately, affect the cost per click and how frequently your ad appears.

You don’t want a potential customer to leave your page before it has even loaded. The statistics say it all – you will lose 53% of your audience if your landing page takes longer than 3 seconds to load. That’s more than half of your leads gone, without a trace because it took too long to engage with your brand. To check your page load speed, you can use the simple Google PageSpeed Insights tool, which will also give you smart suggestions to optimise your landing page speed.

The ‘F’ or ‘Z’ Configuration

There are many more subjective elements that can affect conversions, such as design. It has been studied and concluded that digital content is generally absorbed in a well-defined shape. Readers tend to scan the screen in an ‘F’ or ‘Z’ pattern (above). By using this as a template you can guide your visitors’ attention to the right place.

Unencumbered Communication

Keep it simple. There is nothing worse for consumers than having to sift through over-enthusiastic design to get to the information they’re looking for. You should have a clear, obvious CTA that directs visitors to exactly where you want them to go. Don’t bury your CTA among fluffy content and avant-garde creativity. You should also ensure that your contact information is front and centre because, if a visitor is not going to convert on the spot, the next best outcome is for you to get them on the phone or making an enquiry by email.

Keep them Curious

While it’s important not to clutter the page, you also want to ensure that the reader is engaged and comfortable. This will deepen the viewer’s connection to your brand. You can do this by making sure that there is a sense of familiarity on the page. The tone of the content should be consistent with any past communication (especially the preceding ad) and the colours both for the brand and the advertisement are matching in order to prevent the customer from feeling bamboozled by unfamiliar content. This allows the consumer to feel comfortable moving forward through the sales funnel.

In Summary…

There are many steps you can take towards creating a more effective, higher-converting landing page. Alternatively, you could invest in professionals to do the job for you, ensuring you have the highest chance of increasing your ROI. Chat to one of our Performance Media Specialists today!

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