Have you heard of landing pages? They’re quite different than traditional pages on your website, and serve different purposes. A landing page is a page on your website specifically created for a digital marketing or advertising campaign. Users typically discover landing pages through online ads or links within emails. Landing pages are specific type of web pages that discourage exploration and instead promote a single goal, known as a call to action (CTA). In this blog post we’ll explore the key differences between regular web pages and landing pages, what makes landing pages effective, why landing pages are important for your business, and different ways you can use landing pages to increase conversion in your business.
Web Pages vs Landing Pages: What’s the Difference?
Take a look at the picture below featuring a home page and a landing page. See how the home page contains dozens of links while the landing page only has one? This is standard.
Home pages are important parts of your website, but they do not serve the same purpose as landing pages. Yes, they probably do explain what your company is and may feature an offer that you are selling, but they don’t encourage focus on your offer. Home pages encourage exploration, which is why they feature so many different links. The links can be referred to as leaks because they can take your user to a page that isn’t necessarily designed to convert.
In contrast, landing pages are designed to be hyper focused on a product or offer. They dive deep into the topic and encourage a user to learn about it. They also contain CTA buttons which lead users to convert and either purchase the offer or trade their information for the offer. Users generally convert at higher rates on landing pages because the pages are designed to keep them distraction free.
How are Landing Pages so Effective?
The main goal of a landing page is to keep a user’s attention focused on the thing you are promoting on the page. By doing this, you are able to increase the rate at which users convert through the CTA and sign up for more information or directly purchase your product or offer. Landing pages are a key component of good marketing campaigns, and they help you capture leads with targeted messages to a specific type of audience.
We’ll dive into the most important components that make landing pages convert so well below:
No Navigation
The goal of a landing page is to convert. This means it’s important to guide them to the button that allows them to do that. In contrast, the goal of a navigation bar is to encourage exploration. It may lead users to a page within your site that has nothing to do with the offer you want them to focus on. Removing the navigation from a landing page leads a user toward your CTA because they are focused on the content within the page you have created.
Enable Sharing
Landing pages have the opportunity to be marketed for free by your audience. Encourage them to share your page with others by including share links within the page. One of the best ways to include share buttons in your landing page campaigns is to include them in the thank you page after a user converts through the CTA. This will ensure that they are a qualified lead that believes in your product or service and will be good advocates for it with their own audiences.
Deliver Value
It is important to demonstrate value within a landing page. This encourages the users that end up on your page to convert and share their contact information in exchange for your offer. You can add value to your landing pages by showcasing to your audience the type of content they are going to receive through your offer directly on the landing page. This will make it more likely for them to convert.
Keep it Short
Shorter landing pages encourage conversion by preventing users from overwhelmed. Longer landing pages increase friction in your audience because there is more content for them to look through and potentially more information about them they need to share. Eliminate distractions and focus on what is the most important in your landing pages. You can get more specific in other pages on your website.
Why are Landing Pages important?
As we’ve already mentioned, landing pages encourage users to convert. This is why they are critically important for your marketing efforts. Sending users to your home page in a marketing campaign is a huge missed opportunity. Instead of having them focus on a particular offer you are providing, you are encouraging them to learn about you instead (and not convert.)
When you create marketing campaigns, it is important to sit down and think clearly about what you want a user to do when they click on a particular link. What action do you want them to take? Then, create a landing page that supports that action. Doing this will increase the effectiveness of your online marketing dramatically.
Examples of Landing Page Usage
Here are some ways you can use landing pages to start building relationships with your future customers:
Ebooks and Whitepapers
If you wrote a blog post or article about a topic that your audience may find important, you can go deeper into the topic in an ebook or whitepaper. A landing page can be used as a gate to access this resource, forcing users to either share their contact information with you or buy the offer in order to download it.
Email Newsletter Subscription
If you write lots of blogs about similar topics, you don’t necessarily have to elaborate about them in a ebook or whitepaper. You can compile all the blog posts into a newsletter that you regularly send to your email list. In your blog posts you can include a CTA button that leads users to a landing page where they can share their information with you. In exchange they’ll be added to your email list.
eCourse Enrollment
Online courses should have specific landing pages to encourage enrollment. These pages can invite new students in and lead them to sign up for your offer. They will build a relationship with your audience for you, reducing the amount of work you have to do in order to get new students. They will assist you in creating a passive income stream with your audience.
Event Registration
Industry events require that you connect with your audience prior to the event so they can receive updates and news about it. Landing pages can encourage users to share their information and attend the event. Furthermore, after the event is over, you can use the list you gathered from a particular event landing page for marketing purposes that are specific to that audience.
Free Product Trial
Do you want users to be able to demo your product? Use a landing page to share twos offer. You can focus on gathering their information for future marketing once the product is live in exchange for access to the demo.
Create Your Own Landing Page
