A great landing page is like your favourite pair of jeans. It should feel and look great, be easy to get into, comfortable, and above all user friendly.
Without wanting to push the analogy too far, we’re going to put those jeans through the wash, empty the pockets and see what falls out. In this blog post we’ll take apart the perfect landing page. We’ll unpick the sewing and explain exactly what it takes to write a page that gets excellent results.
For every marketing message you send out into the world, you need to be asking one fundamental question: What next?
What do you want the recipient to do and where do you want them to go after they’ve seen your message? For digital marketing campaigns, the answer is almost always “visit a high-converting landing page”.
Landing pages have just one main function, to convert visitors into customers, or subscribers, or whatever is the objective of your campaign. Marketing teams love writing landing pages because you can make endless tweaks and adjustments to maximise the conversion rate.
A great landing page is the equivalent to a trip round the supermarket. Everything is placed in a considered way. From the minute you walk through the doors of a supermarket your journey is mapped out in detail. Every product, all the signage, the lighting, the sounds and the smells, it’s all been maximised to create the perfect customer experience. The same is true of a great landing page.
If you’ve spent hours crafting the perfect sales email or advert, it makes sense to put a similar amount of effort into your landing page.
Your landing page is never complete
This is an idea that we’ve already mentioned. The beauty of a landing page is that you can always change things, test, monitor and change again. Even with the passing of time, things can get stale and need a refresh.
The old saying “if it’s not broken don’t fix it” only applies to landing pages that achieve 100% conversion rates. There is always room for improvement so check out what the competition is doing, learn from customer feedback, conduct A/B testing, and never stop trying to improve your landing page.
Use great images
Anyone who’s been in sales and marketing for any length of time will be familiar with the golden rule of “show don’t tell”. An image really can tell a 1000 words, and what’s more it does it instantly.
When someone comes to your landing page, show them what they want to see.
Never, ever produce a piece of text without a suitable image. If possible, start with an image and fit the text around that, because people see the picture first. Find or create an image that tells a story, one that is engaging, or an image that clearly conveys the benefits of your product or service, not just the features.
Depending on your budget, you might consider hiring a photographer or a graphic designer to create a series of images that you can use and reuse in different instances. Having similar imagery in your social media, your home page and your landing page can help create a sense of consistency across all your marketing channels, reinforcing your brand values.
Be clear, specific and compelling
The main function of a landing page is to persuade people to take a particular action, usually to create leads. The way to do that is to clearly and convincingly show the value of your offering.
You can do that with a catchy headline followed up immediately with a persuasive subheading. Remember the AIDA principle (Attention, Interest, Desire, Action)? Now is the time to put it to work.
The longer someone spends on your landing page the less likely they are to take the action you’re hoping for. People shouldn’t hang around on a landing page, if they do you’re making a mistake. The message needs to be clear and compelling, with no distractions. Don’t include links to other pages.
There are only two ways out of a great landing page, fill in a lead generation form or hit the back button (and we don’t want that to be an option).
Here’s a great exercise to help you create good copy for your landing page:
In a separate document write out the main benefits of your offering and make sure that each benefit is backed up with proof. Saying “we can save you money” is not nearly as good as saying “we can save you 20% on every sale”. Once you’ve done that, calculate your average sentence length. If it’s 20 words or longer, try to convey the same information in less than 15 words. If it’s 10, try to get it down to less than 8.
This exercise will teach you to be clear and concise. It will make your text easier to read and therefore it will be more likely that people will read it.
Lead Capture Form
The single most important part of any great landing page is the call to action (CTA). When it comes to B2B it is normally a lead capture form which gets the user input their data for a follow up. It must be clear and obvious what you want the website visitor to do and the best way to do this is by putting your form right at the top of your page where people will see it straight away.
Remember that people don’t read online text in the same way they read printed text. We scan websites looking for the information we need. If someone arrives at your landing page having read your brilliant sales email and hoping to buy a product, make sure they can do that quickly and easily.
We’ve got lots more information and guidance on creating landing pages that get results here with a free webinar, just fill out the form to get access. You can also get some great landing page inspiration on the Unbounce website.
Don’t forget we’ve got a team of marketing experts on hand to answer your questions and give advice on how you can use direct marketing techniques to grow your business. Get in touch for a discussion about how we can help you and your organisation.
