What is a landing page?

A landing page is an online page designed and developed solely for a single purpose: to capture the attention of a potential buyer. Additionally, they are implemented to capture user information, such as a form completion, sign up or purchase. These are used in conjunction with dedicated marketing campaigns and often functions as a ‘standalone’ page that has no connection to the brands website.

The buyer is usually incentivised to complete the desired action on the page, in order to receive something in return – for example, a free download.

What is the difference between a landing page and a home page?

Good question. When building a landing page, there is usually one sole desire in mind: to capture the customer’s information. The structure of a home page of a website is somewhat different, as it is presenting multiple actions for the user.

Think of the multiple links on a home page as leaks, diluting the message and therefore decreasing the likelihood of a conversion to take place. For example, category pages, a product page or a newsletter sign up. These are all great tactics to entertain a user in order for them to get a feel for the brand, however, they can also distract the user from the main action that you wish for them to take.

Why do I need one?

If you are launching a marketing campaign, it’s important that you launch a landing page also. It’s the perfect opportunity to target and capture potential customers behavior and if done correctly can be the sole driver of new business. It can be used for not only the physical information (email, name, e-books, sign ups, quotes etc.), but it can also be a nice way to warm up customers towards getting a feel for your brand and its message. It’s also a great method for incorporating offers and marketing features into one page, rather than having them spread all over a website that has mixed messages and call to actions. Lastly, it’s a great idea to segment your audience and your messages to fit buyers’ needs and ultimately increase the chances of converting.

What are the benefits?

Landing pages are like cars – the better you oil them, the better they will perform in the long run. They can be built for almost any purpose and are simple and easy to get live and running in line with any targeted marketing effort, such as AdWords words or Facebook marketing. Once converting well, it’s just a matter of ensuring that the page is able to be found online. By collecting the user’s information, you’re able to gather important information such as their age, demographic or locations which can be fundamental in providing insights into the marketing campaign as a whole. It can also allow you to repurpose content on the site that may already exist, therefore giving it a distinct message and defined need for action. Another benefit is that the clear goals set out by the page are measurable and therefore make it easy to determine whether or not the page is performing successfully. Landing pages are the perfect way of testing how a design can affect conversions and this can be done via split testing to see how the user behaves on each one. The results are then used to determine how best to optimise the user experience.

How should I attract people to my landing page?

Online users of today are bombarded with messages and choices. This makes it even more difficult to be found and convert in the competitive digital world. However, targeting traffic to the landing page can be done through a number of mediums. These can be things such as AdWords, Facebook remarketing, homepage links that go to a dedicated landing page, blog posts, print mediums, email marketing, or even a thank you page. Landing pages can pretty much be used in any context where there is a specific call to action present.

How should it be designed?

It is vital that your landing page is built to covert with your customers at the forefront of the design and user experience. You don’t want them bouncing off and wasting all the effort you’ve gone to.

• Keep it simple – don’t complicate the page with too much information or too many colours.
• Ensure the text is directly related to the ad copy. This is also known as ‘message match’. If the ad they see before they land does not match anything on the landing page, there will be an instant disconnection and the user will not convert. By having the same message reinforces the user that they have made a good choice in clicking on the landing page.
• Offer useful features or benefits that make your brand stand apart from your competition. The customer has to see a benefit in engaging with you.
• Do not clutter the page – if you distract the user they will get frustrated and leave.
• Make the user experience a pleasant one – make it simple and easy for the customer to find what they are looking for without having to search for it.
• Don’t come across as too pushy. Customers need to know why you are requesting the information and for what purpose you need it.
• Give credibility – customers will not want to give their personal information if they don’t trust your brand or don’t see a benefit in providing it, so promote yourself as the expert.

Once these core principles have been put in place, it’s also important to ensure that your whole brand is presented across all marketing efforts in a similar style to the landing pages. For example: your blog posts, email marketing, social media campaigns, paid marketing etc. All marketing efforts need to be holistically combined in a strategic manner to create the best possible outcome for not only the landing page, but for the brand itself.

Call us now on 1300 663 995 to discuss how we can assist you with creating a landing page that converts.