The Complete Beginners Guide to Landing Pages

A well converting landing page is crucial to getting results for your business. Whether your company is a business to consumer (B2C) or business to business (B2B), you will always benefit from growing your email list and nurturing new sales leads. A strong landing page plays a crucial role in your offering’s conversion rates. 

Despite the necessity of an effective landing page, there is still a great deal of confusion about what it is, and what it takes to create an effective one. This landing page guide will break down what a landing page actually is and outline the best practices to make sure your page successfully converts visitors into leads.

What are landing pages and what do they do?

A landing page is the first page you see after clicking on a link e.g. when a visitor to your website clicks on a CTA button, or when a visitor clicks on a PPC or Display ad that you have running. Many customers send traffic directly to their homepage, which is a safe route – however best practice is to send traffic to a more targeted page or create a new landing page for specific messaging within their inbound campaigns. 

Whether your landing page is the home page or another page explicitly created for an inbound campaign, the goal is always the same. The point of any landing page is to take web traffic and convert it. 

Although the reason for your landing page may differ, your aim of converting traffic into paying customers remains the end goal. Whether launching a marketing campaign or posting a blog about your product, the action you want a visitor to take will vary depending on the nature of your business.

Some goals you wish the customer to action from a landing page campaign can include:

• Buying a product or service
• Subscribing to a newsletter or adding their name to an email list
• Contacting your company via email or telephone
• Registering for an event or educational course
• Downloading a digital asset such as an eBook

As you continue reading this landing page guide, you’ll learn how to accomplish these tasks using a combination of best practices and accurate tests to measure your landing page’s success.

What to include on your landing page

A landing page needs to contain certain elements to convert traffic effectively. Below is a list of the elements you must include:

• Headline – A headline needs to be concise and gripping. It needs to clearly tell your visitor what you are actually promoting, what value it has to them, and the offer you’re making.
• Compelling Copy – Copy that is well-written and to the point will drive your visitors to keep reading and boost conversion rates. Less is more when it comes to writing effective copy: get your point across clearly to explain how the reader will benefit from what you’re promoting to them. 
• Varied Media – You need to include a form of media on your landing page rather than just text. This can be in the form of a product image, an infographic or a short video describing why they should opt-in to a list or buy a product. This can separate the text on the page, making your reader feel less intimidated by the blocks of text and be more likely to read on. Everyone absorbs information in different ways: ensure you are using a mix of media such as visual, audial, and written so every person is catered to. 
• Social Proof – Customer testimonials and case studies illustrate the results real people have had using your product or service. These are effective forms of social proof to boost opt-in and conversion rates by helping visitors trust your brand.
• A Lead Form – The lead form is your main point of conversion. This is where you will capture your lead’s information to drive them through your marketing funnel. A lead form should be visible without having to scroll down the page. Make sure the form is quick and easy to fill out and only asks for the information you need. When deciding on which fields to include, think about what information you really require, and the value of that information versus what a visitor will receive in return.
• Call-to-Action Button – Your call-to-action button should be placed where visitors can see it and redeem whatever offer you gave them. A call-to-action button should be large enough to stand out from the rest of the copy and clearly state what you want the reader to do. Ensure that you use action copy on the button to help encourage users, e.g. “Book a Demo” or “Download Free Copy”.

How to write your landing page copy

Landing page copy should be short, persuasive, and persona focused. While you need to mention the features of your product or service, your focus needs to be on how it will benefit your prospect. You need to address your reader’s relevant pain points and how your product or service solves that problem better than others. 

Landing page copy should reflect your company’s personality. Some companies, especially B2B companies, will have a more professional formal tone. Companies that are B2C may have a more conversational tone depending on the prospects the company is trying to attract. 

Make sure your copy is easy for readers to scan using short paragraphs, bullet pointed lists, and subheadings to quickly find what they are looking for. 

Top tools for creating your landing pages

There are many tools available online to help you create landing pages for your business. There are different landing page builders like WordPress and Unbounce that can provide you with templates for creating your landing page and making it look visually interesting.

These landing page builders help you easily add multiple elements to your landing page. Some of these landing page builder tools also allow you to run A/B tests to see how effective your landing page is.

There are also tools such as HubSpot, InstaPage, ClickFunnels, and LeadPages that provide you with valuable tools that use collected data to break down your landing page and let you see your current conversion rate and how to improve that rate.

How to test your landing page and measure success

To test your landing page, you should perform a split-test (A/B test). You do an A/B test by splitting your traffic between two different landing pages. The two versions shouldn’t be drastically different, only change one element at a time, or do small tweaks between the two pages. There is various software available that can facilitate this and track your results.

When you test your landing pages, there are several metrics you should pay attention to. These metrics can include:

• Page Visits – The number of  people visiting your website indicates if your current strategy is working for getting people to your page.
• Traffic Source – In most cases, people aren’t finding your page randomly. Traffic sources will show where people are coming from to get to your page, so you have a clear idea of where to focus your efforts.
• Submission Rates – The submission rate shows the actual effectiveness of your landing page. It can be calculated by taking the total unique visitors and dividing this by the number of unique form submissions you’ve received. This number allows you to compare different landing pages as well as compare pages in A/B tests to determine the winners 
• Bounce Rate – The bounce rate shows how many people are coming to your page and immediately leaving it. If your bounce rate is high, it could be a sign that your copy isn’t compelling enough or doesn’t align with the messaging used to drive a visitor to your page.
• Form Abandonment – Form abandonment measures how many people began filling out your form and then didn’t finish it. If this metric is high, it might be that your form is too long or it isn’t clear enough. 

When you are setting goals for your landing page, you should be realistic. Make sure you research the industry norms so you’re aware of the expectations of your landing page’s performance. Different metrics should be measured daily, weekly, monthly or at the end of your sales cycle. It’s good to familiarise yourself with different metrics to learn how often you should reasonably measure them.

With a well planned landing page, and a solid understanding of everything involved in creating one following the steps outlined above, your next landing page is bound to be a success.