Landing pages are arguably the most important part of your website. Each landing page is an opportunity for prospects to engage with your products or services. When a landing page is designed and written well, it serves as the “engine” that produces conversions and moves users through your sales funnel.
In fact, 64% of marketers surveyed say landing pages are the best way to test a value proposition.
Since landing pages are so important, it’s a good idea to invest time optimizing them. Just one mistake can sink a landing page, making it all but ineffective. On the flip side, relatively small, easy tweaks can supercharge it.
When developing landing pages, keep these factors in mind:
Keep Information Requirements Light
Persuading a prospect to share his or her email address is difficult enough. When you ask for a lot more than the user’s name and email on a landing page, it’s a risky proposition. Since they haven’t built trust and rapport with your brand yet, prospects are likely to think you’re “up to something.” Only ask for information that’s absolutely essential.
Focus on One Specific Call to Action
If the landing page is the most important part of your site, what’s the crucial part of the landing page itself? Here, it’s a toss-up between the top headline and the call to action. The headline sets the tone for the page, but the CTA determines whether the prospect will take the next step. There should be just one offer on each landing page, and it should have an unmistakable CTA.
Keep Landing Pages Short and Direct
The days of “long form” sales letters doubling as landing pages are quickly coming to an end. More Web searches now originate from mobile than desktop, and mobile users may find it hard to navigate large amounts of text. Your landing page only has a few seconds to make an impact on the reader, so pare it down to essential text that remains completely “on message.”
Use an Exciting, Specific Headline
The headline is the first thing site visitors see: A good headline makes it that much more likely they’ll engage with content on the rest of the page. The purpose of the headline is to clarify the page’s purpose and greet the reader – it begins the tough process of building trust. To be effective, headlines should be specific, interesting, and laser-targeted to the contents of the page.
Focusing your efforts on better landing pages can have an outsized effect on your bottom line. By following these four best practices, you’ll avoid some of the biggest errors and position your offers for success.