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The Best Way to Create an Effective Landing Page

Your landing page is the online version of a first impression–your chance to tell potential clients who you are and what you do.

A well-crafted landing page can greatly impact your conversion rate. It filters out people who may not be your target audience and convinces potential clients to continue reading.

Marketing Sherpa says that 68% of B2B companies will use landing pages in 2019 to generates new sales leads. To keep up with this ever-growing trend, you need to learn how to create an effective landing page.

What is a Landing Page?

A landing page is often the page first-time visitors see after clicking a link. The link could be from a SERP (Search Engine Result Page), a PPC (pay-per-click) ad, or an email marketing campaign.

No matter how users reach your landing page, it should always have a single goal. Common landing page goals include asking users to:

• Fill out a form
• Provide their email address
• Answer a survey
• Download free materials
• Sign up for a free trial
• Purchase a product or service

It is important to have a single goal–not many–in mind so you can streamline the content of your landing page.

Users are used to getting information quickly nowadays. Maximise the limited time you have to convert them through your landing page’s copy and visual elements.

Let us say your landing page’s goal is to get users to sign up for a free trial. You can write about how long the free trial lasts along with how it can benefit them in the long term.

Elements of an Effective Landing Page

Headlines

The headline is the most important element of your landing page. It grabs users’ attention and whets their appetite for the rest of the page.

If your headline is ineffective, all the effort you put into the rest of your landing page will be wasted. Users will not read the rest of your copy, because the headline failed to convince them to do so.

To be effective, your headline needs to have the following qualities:

• Clear – Users should know right away what your page is about and whether your offer is for them or not. This ensures all you don’t just generate leads. You generate the right type of leads.
• Interesting – It needs to convince users to continue reading. You can include a promise, statistics and other elements.
• Concise – Your headline needs to be clear and interesting without being too long. It needs to deliver your message in as straightforward a manner as possible.

If you want to see an example of a great headline, visit CoSchedule’s homepage. Their headline is clear, concise and makes you want to learn more.

Features and Benefits

Before we proceed, we need to make one thing clear. Features and Benefits are not the same, but they do work hand in hand.

• Features are the main characteristics of your product or service.
• Benefits are the multitude of ways features can improve a user’s life.

This landing page element requires that you get to know your target audience. Ask yourself the following questions:

• How old is he?
• Where is he located?
• What does he do for a living?
• What are his pain points?
• How does your product or service resolve or alleviate those pain points?

Carefully think about your answer to the question about pain points. Once you have a list of pain points, match the features of your product to each one.

Let us say you want users to sign for a gym membership. Yoga classes are included in the membership, so that can be your feature.

If users take yoga classes, they will improve their health. They get to live longer lives, do more things with their loved ones, and save money on hospital bills. The previous examples are a bit extreme, but they can be considered your benefits.

Social Proof

Before purchasing something, it is only natural that you do a bit of research. You read reviews and see if previous customers liked the product or not. These reviews often have a huge impact on our purchasing decisions.

The same principle applies to your landing page.

Social proof is evidence that other people worked with you before and like your product or service. It could come in the form of:

• Numbers
• Written testimonials
• Video testimonials
• Logos of businesses you’ve worked with
• Media mentions

CoSchedule is excellent at displaying social proof on its homepage. You will see that they’ve worked with prestigious companies like Microsoft, Yamaha and Expedia.

If you scroll down further, you will see testimonials from directors of different marketing companies.

Attempt to replicate this on your own landing page. Not everyone is lucky enough to work with Microsoft, but a testimonial from a pleased client could make a world of difference.

Call to Action

Earlier, we stated that your landing page should have one clearly defined goal.

The call to action tells users what to do next after reading your copy. It should coincide with your landing page’s goal.

• If you want people to register for an event, use “Register Now” as your call to action. (Storybrand)
• If you want people to sign up for your service, use “Sign up with Email.” (Pocket)
• If you want people to sign up for a free trial, use “Start free trial.” (Shopify)

Your call to action should be two things:

• Clear – Users should know right what will happen if they click on your call to action button. Do not be vague. Instead of saying “Sign Up,” say “Sign Up for a Free Trial.”
• Prominent – You also have to think about how your call to action button looks. Does it stand out from the rest of your page? Is it easy for users to spot?

Conclusion

Do not waste the opportunity to make a great first impression. Create an effective landing page with a singular goal in mind.

Convince users to keep reading with a headline that is clear and interesting.

Do not tell users about your business. Instead, tell them how your business can help them.

Even in the digital, word of mouth is still as important as ever. Use social proof in the form of testimonials and statistics.

Achieve your landing page’s goal with a call to action. It has to be direct-to-the-point and easy to spot.

Need help creating a landing page? Contact Cornerstone Digital at (02) 8211 0668 or email us at info@cornerstone-digital.com.au.

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Darlyn Herradura

A self-professed book and digital marketing nerd, Darlyn Herradura focuses on building trust between customers and businesses with the written word. She understands that creating valuable content is the best way to get found online and happily spends her time doing that.