Regardless of the type of marketing campaign, you’re trying to run, from PPC ads to email marketing, the importance of having a thoughtfully designed, properly optimized landing page at the heart of it all is literally something that cannot be overstated.
According to one recent study, long-form landing pages don’t just generate up to 220% more leads – they also convert a significant percentage of those leads into paying customers.
If you were trying to pre-launch your eCommerce store, you could create a landing page that outlines:
A) what your service has to offer, and
B) what makes it so unique in an era where more and more of these sites are cropping up all the time.
Instead of just throwing your potential customers into the deep end, you’re warming them up – giving them the information they need to come to the decision to sign up for your service on their own. This is a far more natural way to market to someone in the modern era, and make no mistake: it’s an effective one, too.
But simply having a landing page isn’t enough to get the job done. If you really want to turn your landing page into the high-converting engine it was meant to be, there are a few core elements you’ll want to take care of.
1. It’s Built With Your Customers in Mind
Your landing pages cannot be generic – they must be precisely built with your core audience in mind. Only after you learn as much about the people you’re talking to as possible will you be able to get the right message, with the right terminology in front of them.
You essentially need to get into your target audience’s head and find out what is it exactly that makes them take the leap and become your customer.
For proof of this, look no further than the fact that customer journey analysis improves conversion rates for 60% of online marketers with their landing pages.
To build a high-converting landing page, you first need to establish a buyer persona. A buyer persona is essentially a representation of your ideal customer; the individuals who will get the most out of your products and services and keep coming back time and time again for more. Once you have a clear representation of who your ideal customer is, you can then craft your message and landing page around that.
2. Keep Things Simple
As is true with other areas of your content marketing strategy, your landing page is something that you do not want to let grow too complicated and unwieldy.
Consider the fact that according to another recent study, the average number of form fields on a landing page is 11. However, when you reduce that number to four, it can often result in an increase in conversions of 120% or more.
This is what we mean when we say “don’t let your landing page get too complicated for its own good.” Anything that gets in the way of your offer gets in the way of your website conversions, too – meaning that it’s an element that has to go.
When putting your landing page together, make sure that your landing page has a clear message with a clear CTA. You don’t want to leave your audience wondering about on your pages. Your landing page needs to guide the users down through your marketing funnel.
But creating a simple high-converting landing page, is not easy. You need to constantly audit, improve and optimize it for the best user experience. Analyzing heatmaps and recordings that tools like Hotjar and CrazyEgg offer, is a great place to study how your audience interacts with your landing pages.
3. It’s Got a Compelling Headline
This one may seem like a simple tip, but the impact it can make is profound. Your headline is your first opportunity to really grab someone’s attention with your landing page – and it’s one that you can’t afford to overlook. Your headline is also an essential part of your search engine optimization efforts and it can have a great impact on the ranking of your landing page on Google and other search engines.
Studies show that about 90% of the people who read your headline will also read your call to action – so you’d better make it a good one. Provided your CTA is optimized, too, at that point there’s nothing standing in the way of a conversion.
Here’s a great example of a compelling headline from Mixbook:
On this landing page, the idea and philosophy behind Mixbook are captured perfectly — which not only has a direct and simple headline that would entice anyone to create a custom photo book, it also has a beautiful hero image of a custom photo book example.
When crafting your headline remember to:
- Keep your headline simple and to-the-point.
- Have your buyer persona in mind, and use the terminology that connects with them best.
- Don’t be too self-promotional, and let the facts speak for you.
- Make it more personal and engaging.
- Ask the right questions that would make your users think.
4. It Has Bold, Attention-Grabbing Images
As seen in the previous example from Mixbook, your graphics and imagery can play a huge role in how engaging your page is to your users. Always make sure that you use bold, captivating imagery that connects best with your target audience.
It’s an element that can definitely help make people more comfortable with your offer, which will, therefore, make them more likely to act, too.
Another study from Xerox showed that users are on average about 80% more likely to actually read your landing page content if it is partnered up with bold images that command every bit as much of their attention as the words do.
5. Speed in the Internet Age
Another one of the most important qualities that your landing page must have to generate high conversions is speed – and as much of it as possible.
We all hate to click on a link and stare at a blank screen for a few seconds while the content we were after tries to load. But what you might not realize is that this problem is far more serious than you think. Even a one-second delay in loading your site can reduce conversion rates by as much as 7%. Keep in mind that this number will only get higher for every additional second that goes by.
Source: NeilPatel
For the absolute best results, make sure your landing page loads well not just on desktop and laptop computers, but on tablets, smartphones and other types of mobile devices, too. Not only will this improve your search rankings but also it will greatly improve your website’s user experience.
In the age of conversational AI and chatbots, your landing page’s load-time and performance is the foundation that your campaign will be built upon.
6. Video, and Lots of It
Finally, one of the most essential ingredients of any high-converting landing page is and will always be video content.
This can take the form of anything from explainer videos to customer testimonials to on-demand demo videos and more. Another recent study revealed that relevant, embedded videos can increase conversions on a landing page by as much as 86%. Experts also agree that using videos on your landing page increases the amount of time people stay on that page – meaning that your messaging has a longer time to “sink in.” This is true for almost all niches leveraging videos on your pages will not only make your offer far more compelling but also help increase your engagement, which in turn could boost your rankings on Google.
Video testimonials are some of the most powerful and high-converting marketing and sales tools, you can use on your landing pages. In short, a video testimonial is a video of a customer talking about their experience with a company. In most cases, they talk about how that company’s product or service has changed their lives and helped them solve a problem.
Here’s a great example of a video testimonial from Salesforce:
Customer video testimonials are extremely effective at evoking emotions and converting your users. Creating a great video testimonial isn’t easy, but it can be one of the most powerful pieces of content that you’ll create.
Wrapping this up…
We’ve looked at a lot of different key ingredients that your high-converting landing page needs to have.
In the end, remember that landing pages are not something you “do once and forget about.” For the best results, you should be creating unique landing pages for every campaign and every offer that you conduct – thus giving people as many chances as possible to be exposed to your message.
You also need to keep experimenting and optimizing your pages to understand what exactly drives the most action and conversions for your target audience.
At that point, your campaign will do more than just resonate – it’ll create that steady stream of new customers you’ve always wanted.
For some tips on these optimisation strategies ‘to do’ check out these recent Marketing.com.au articles: