How to Create Landing Pages that Convert

by Lynn Ventimiglia-Lobit

December 23, 2019

in Marketing, Sales & Marketing, Web Presence

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Seven Best Practices to Boost Your Conversion Rate

A landing page is a website page that has been designed for a specific marketing campaign. Its purpose is to receive and convert traffic. Landing pages are created for a variety of reasons and below are just a few examples of the actions that can take place on them:

Buy a product or service
Make a charitable donation
Download a piece of collateral such as a white paper or infographic
Subscribe to a newsletter
Register for an event
Request a quote

No matter how visitors reach this destination – through organic search, online ads, social media or email – it is critical to engage them. The objective is to ensure these visitors take action. However, not all landing pages are equally effective. The goal of converting visitors into leads can be achieved by implementing proven methods.

Landing Page Best Practices

1. Create a Headline Geared for Your Target Audience

The average bounce rate for landing pages runs anywhere from 70 percent to 90 percent. With this type of bounce rate, the headline on your landing page is of utmost importance. As the writer of the headline, you must be aware of who your audience is and why they are on your landing page. For your visitors, they need to understand in seconds of arriving on your landing page what is in it for them; therefore, writing a well-crafted headline critical.

2. Include an Appropriate Image

As we all know an image helps to ensure content is noticed and read. An image is critical on a social media post, an email campaign, a blog and a landing page. It can be just as important as your headline. The image should be relatable to your target audience and convey a desired feeling. Often a stock image is sufficient.

3. Write Compelling Copy

So, your headline and image did their job and engaged your visitor to want more. Make sure that more includes compelling copy, which is clear and concise. Consider it your elevator pitch for the page. It should let visitors know what exactly is in it for them. Speak directly to your visitors by using words such as “you” and “your”.

4. Make Your Call-to-Action Prominent

Your call-to-action (CTA) is the most important element on your landing page. It needs to be obvious and straightforward in order to encourage conversion. The CTA should be designated by a special button or image, larger lettering and/or a bold color. Attention needs to be drawn to it. And, just like other content, it must be clear and concise. The desired action must be conveyed to visitors within a few words. Words such as submit, download, sign-up, try or donate are just a few examples to use. Lastly, your CTA must be located above the fold.

5. Remove Other Navigation

The key goal of your landing page is to convert visitors into leads; therefore, any other distractions should be removed. These could include links to other pages on your website, other external website pages and your social media pages. You should direct all your visitors’ attention to your CTA.

6. Ensure Your Landing Page is Mobile Ready

According to the World Advertising Research Center (WARC), approximately two billion people currently access the internet only using their smartphones. This number equates to 51 percent of today’s 3.9 billion mobile users across the globe. It is critical that your landing page is mobile responsive. The text must be readable without horizontal scrolling. The tap targets, such as CTA buttons and links, or contact us forms should have enough space. The user experience must be consistent across all types of devices. You want to provide every opportunity to convert regardless of the type of device used.

7. Optimize for Search

With over three billion searches per day on just Google, it is in your best interest to optimize your landing page for search. Even though you may think that you are driving them already to your landing page with email campaigns or so social media posts, it is still key to optimize it for keywords. You do not want to miss out on opportunities that come through paid campaigns or organic search. Below are a few best practices for optimizing your landing page for search:

Include keywords in the headline and sub-headers. These two areas have the greatest weight with search engines.
Write supporting content using keywords but make it sound natural and not out of context. Google will penalize your landing page for keyword stuffing.
Develop a URL with the primary keyword incorporated.

Make Your Next Landing Page High-Performing

If developed properly, a landing page can produce many new leads for your company. These best practices will help you to experience a high conversion rate on your next landing page.

If you would like to discuss best practices for landing pages further, we would love to hear from you. Contact us at info@diamonddogmarketing.com or 847-269-1422.