A landing page (in English, landing page) is a page with the goal of a single, clearly defined action to be performed by the visitor.
Such an action might be:
- Subscribe to the newsletter,
- Order product,
- Fill out the questionnaire,
- Submit form, etc.
A landing page is called a landing page because it should “land traffic” from other sites.
Let’s imagine an author who has a book published. He promotes the book on all his social media, in his newsletter and in blog articles. In all these places, he then adds a link to a website/landing page where people can buy the book. The page in question has a laser focus and is optimized as much as possible for conversion.If you still don’t picture anything by the term landing page, you can check out the “landing” page for the advent web challenge I hosted before Christmas.
Thanks to its focus on conversion rate, landing pages are a tremendously powerful marketing tool. But let’s start by defining a few key terms.
What is a conversion rate?
Conversion rate represents the % of people who performed the intended action on a given page.
If 200 people come to the landing page of a new book and 10 people buy it, the conversion rate will be 5% (10/200*100).
The higher the conversion rate, the better. So the goal of every landing page is to maximize this ratio.
What is a good conversion rate?
It depends (although I know that’s not what you wanted to hear).
In general, a “good” conversion rate will vary across industries and call to action types. If the call to action (CTA) is signing up for a free newsletter, the “good conversion rate” will be many times greater than if the CTA is a mortgage application form.
But if you want a specific number after all, something like 5%+ for order pages and 15%+ for email signups could be considered “very good.”
What is a call to action (CTA)?
A conversion occurs the moment a visitor performs what is called a conversion action. In order for this to happen, you have to prompt him to take the action.
So sometimes a call to action (CTA) is just a text “Call me at…” but most often it is a button that submits a form or redirects you somewhere further.
Now that we’ve had a quick introduction to the concepts of conversion rate and CTA, we can dive into 6 specific tips.
1. Proper page anatomy
How a page should look is a topic for a whole article. Additionally, it will (again) vary by CTA type and industry.
However, the structure outlined below should be a good starting point:
- Introductory section with a clear CTA
- Benefits section
- References section
- Ability to reuse CTA (only if followed by the optional section below)
- Additional information section (optional)
- Conversion site – CTA (order form, newsletter signup, phone number…)
- Frequently Asked Questions
So I recommend starting with this default structure and gradually modifying and adapting it based on feedbacks.
2. Benefits language, not features
How you talk about a given thing is extremely important. You should then speak the language of benefits, not features, throughout the site.
Read the text from the potential customer’s point of view and think honestly about whether the description would be appealing to you.
Let’s look at some practical examples:
❌ 365 nutritionally balanced, simple recipes focused on minimal carbs
✔️ Recipe for Every Day that Cooks in 8 Minutes and Gets You in Vital Shape
❌ Practical SEO information from 50 expert sources
✔️ Get your site ranked #1 on Google and bring in a host of new clients
❌ Sync your form with Google Calendar using API integration
✔️ Get more appointments
You don’t want to sound like a roundabout. However, as an “insider” you may often overestimate people’s ability to derive a benefit from a relevant feature. Just because it’s automatic for you doesn’t mean it’s so for everyone.Investing your best effort then to make that part easier for people is always worthwhile.
If I had to guess from the passport the thing that can help your landing page the most out of all 6 tips, it would be this one.
3. Optimized call to action (CTA)
The call to action is the centerpiece of the page. Optimizing it is therefore more of an obligation than an option.
- Contrast, conversion color
- Good readability
- Clarity (it’s clear what happens when you click on it)
I would start with this tripod.
Once you have that, I would focus on the “button text”. Try to figure out the format of the call to action:
- “buy now”
- “register”
- “get discount”
And feel free to try to come up with more options to choose the best one.
Maybe these things seem like trivialities. But even if they improve conversion by 1%, the minimal time they take makes them almost always worthwhile.
4. Page speed
Go to Google Page Speed Insights to see where your landing page stands in terms of speed.
If you intuitively sense room for improvement, take advantage of it. It’s a one-time investment that is often easily paid for just by converting someone who would have left the site long ago if it were slower.
5. Preventing problems, increasing trust
Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. What would be the biggest deterrent to conversion on your site?
- Would you be afraid of not being satisfied with the product and losing money?
- Wouldn’t the site give you credibility because of the way the testimonials look?
- Would you not know what the site offers if you are not directly in the industry?
Pay attention to even a mere outline of these sentiments. And try to come up with a defensive counter to every move your opponent makes.
Confusion -> Adding FAQs
Investment Worry -> Money-back guarantee within 30 days
Untrustworthy references -> Integrating references directly from Google
While I highly recommend this optimization and it will bring you many desired results, you will never see your site objectively on your own. Which is a problem. That brings us to our next tip.
6. Test your landing page.
If you’re a entrepreneur or small business, you can do this the “guerrilla” way. Go to a coffee shop and offer people coffee if they’ll answer a few questions about your site. Alternatively, just ask him or her to empathize with someone who wants to order on the site.
Follow the person on the site closely and write down/remember what their experience is like. Repeat this process three times (with different people) and I guarantee you’ll come up with a number of things you hadn’t thought of before from an insider position. And they couldn’t have.
If you’re a larger company I recommend guerrilla testing anyway. The return on this minimal investment is huge in my experience. In addition, you can also expand your testing arsenal by
- A/B tests
- Software that monitors visitor behavior on a site (e.g. Hotjar)
- Test the site directly on the target audience (e.g., you hire moms on maternity leave to test your product)
Landing pages are a complex topic. I hope this brief overview has been useful to you and if you have any questions or would like to know what others think of your landing page, please feel free to post a comment!
