What is a landing page and why does it matter? A successful landing page is one that’s designed and developed with a clear purpose in mind. It’s not the same thing as a homepage, which typically serves as an introduction to your business.
It matters because a landing page is the place where conversions occur. It has an identifiable call-to-action to encourage visitors to take the desired action. Once you develop an understanding of what a landing page should be and what it can do for you, the next step is to continually make improvements to boost results.
What Is a Landing Page?
What is a landing page exactly? In basic terms, it’s the page of a website a visitor “lands” on when they click a link for your site. For marketing purposes, a landing page is the specific page of a website where conversions take place. It can sometimes be a homepage if your site consists of a single page, but it’s usually another page on a standard website. Unlike a homepage, which presents an overview of your business and what you have to offer, a landing page has a single objective.
Click-through and lead generation are the two types of landing pages. Usually used is e-commerce funnels, click-through landing pages provide enough information to encourage a conversion. Such pages often lead to a separate shopping cart or registration page. You’ll have a lead generation landing page if your goal is to collect information from visitors, such as name and email address.
Who Uses a Landing Page?
Anybody with a website for the purpose of enticing people coming to visit to take some type of action is likely to use a landing page. Landing pages are primarily used by any business looking to make a sale. Charities may also use landing pages to solicit donations or raise awareness by encouraging visitors to request additional information.
If you frequently use pay-per-click or other forms of paid or inbound advertising, you’ll definitely want to use a landing page to encourage conversions once someone clicks one of your ads. A website you may use for your occupation could also feature a landing page to generate sales or solicit orders for services you may provide.
Ways a Landing Page Can Help Your Business
What is a landing page in terms how it can affect your business? And what is a landing page in terms of your potential ROI? For many businesses, it’s the page where all the action takes place. That’s just one of the ways it can help your business. Having a page that’s geared for conversions is more likely to encourage people to take the desired action. Many businesses make the mistake of still thinking that a homepage is the most important page of a website. In most cases, that honor goes to the landing page.
A landing page may act as an instantly available source of the information needed to convince a visitor to convert. If a good chunk of your business is online, you’ll appreciate having a well-designed and optimized landing page. As for your return-on-investment, paying attention to your landing page could have many potential long-term benefits with your revenue stream.
6 Tips for Improving Your Landing Page
What is a landing page going to mean for you if it’s not generating conversions? There are many reasons why landing pages don’t live up to expectations. Knowing how to continuously improve yours will boost your odds of seeing meaningful results. Here’s how:
1. Provide compelling content. First and foremost, there must be something on your landing page that clearly indicates what a visitor is supposed to do. The presented content must also give them a good reason to take action, especially if you expect them to fill out a form or make a purchase.
2. Limit distractions and navigation. Minimize navigation as much as possible so visitors don’t have an easy exit. Avoid bells and whistles such as auto-play videos or excessive images that may prevent someone from completing the preferred action.
3. Keep it short and sweet. The more content stuffed onto your landing page, the longer it takes for conversions to occur. Keep content as tight and direct as possible. If you’re presenting a contact form, make the form the main focus of the page. And don’t reference anything likely to direct visitors’ attention to another part of your site.
4. Encourage sharing. Use share links on your landing page to encourage visitors to share what they’ve discovered with friends. Social media share buttons are especially useful for encouraging a visitor to share their purchase with their friends, which also means more free word-of-mouth for you.
5. Test and test again. There is no magic formula for a landing page. What works for one of your competitors may not be as effective for you. Landing page creation tools can be used to test various page designs or you could try different page designs for a short period of time to compare results.
6. Carefully choose links. Links on a landing page need to direct visitors to others areas of your site where they can quickly access a bit more info or lead to authoritative sites likely to enhance your credibility. Any link that’s not tied to your conversion goals somehow will take away from your message.
If you’re going to work hard to drive traffic to your website, drive them to the right page. As with the rest of your website, landing pages aren’t set in stone. Tap into your data via Google Analytics and other stat-tracking sources to check traffic patterns and conversion rates. Even when there are no major changes in important stats, you’ll still want to keep your content fresh and relevant. Keep distractions to a minimum and the focus on conversions.
Now that you know the answer to “what is a landing page” and how to improve yours, what are your thoughts? Your feedback is always welcome and encouraged.
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