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How to Use Landing Pages to Get More Business

A “landing page” is a webpage on your site created to achieve a specific result by using a focused message. An example of a desired result would be to have someone join your email list, request some sort of free information, or purchase a product or service online. Proper use of landing pages can increase conversions and help you track the effectiveness of advertising and marketing campaigns.

Landing Page Basics

The structure of a landing page is what differentiates it from other “normal” pages on your website. An effective landing page will have a very clear objective (get the sign-up or make the sale, for instance) and the copy on the page will be targeted to accomplishing that “MDR” (most desired result). The page should have the call-to-action (“Call today!”, “Request our free report!”, “Buy now!”) prominently displayed near the top of the page and at the bottom. If the sales copy is long, the call-to-action should also be repeated a few times throughout the middle of the page to make it easy for a visitor to act at any time.

The length of the page generally corresponds to the “cost” of the desired action, from the visitor’s perspective. If your MDR is a product sale, your landing page for a $20 product could be much shorter than for a $2,000 product. Similarly, requesting a name and email address will require a bit less sales copy than requesting a full mailing address and phone number from your prospect. The job of the copy is to convey to your prospect the desirability of completing your MDR, so use as much text as necessary to accomplish that.

You should make the copy easy to read, especially if it is lengthy. Break up long copy with subheadings, bullet lists, and images, if appropriate and closely related to your message. Use strong testimonials if you have them, and bring attention to compelling phrases in your copy with bold and italic formatting.

These days, many landing pages use audio and video as well. Feel free to integrate these elements if they add to your message and keep the prospect focused on the benefits of your offer.

Creating a Landing Page Campaign

If you would like to start using landing pages, I recommend you being with a simple campaign first, then you can tweak your campaign until it is performing optimally and create other campaigns based on what you have learned.

The first step is to decide what your MDR (most desired result) is and figure out what needs to be set up for that to be accomplished. If you need to set up a shopping cart or email sign up form, get that done first.

Next, think about who you plan to target with this campaign. Become very clear about this since having focus is important and will guide your sales copy and traffic strategy. For instance, are you targeting your existing customers and people who know you already, or are you reaching out to people in a certain industry, with a certain interest or who are experiencing a specific problem? This campaign target might be a small slice of your overall business target market.

Decide how you will drive these people to your landing page. An email? Adwords? Social media? Advertising on a certain website, blog, or e-zine? A YouTube video? An offline (magazine, billboard, radio, etc) advertisement? Draft the message or keywords you will use to get people to visit your landing page.

Create the sales copy for your landing page. Keep in mind your target market and the message or keywords used to drive the traffic. Your copy should support the message which brought the prospect to you for instance, if you made a promise in the message, repeat and elaborate on the same message in your landing page copy. If you use certain keywords to drive the traffic, repeat those keywords in the text to reinforce the relevancy of your landing page to the audience. Follow the guidelines in the “Landing Page Basics” section.

Construct your page and publish it on your domain. You should use a concise page name that is easy to spell (ex: www.MySite.com/specialoffer.htm). Another option is to purchase an additional domain name and have it redirect to your landing page (ex: www.MySpecialOffer.com). Test that the forms and buttons work properly on your landing page.

Finish setting up your campaign and launch it. Keep an eye on your traffic and conversions. Tweak your landing page as necessary while the campaign is active.

Advanced Landing Pages

Once you are comfortable with the process of creating a landing page campaign, you might want to build in some split testing – where you have two landing pages with only a small difference between them (for instance, the headline used) and you use software to show one page or the other alternately to your visitors. You can then track which version of the page converts better and improve the quality of your campaign by implementing the “winning” change, then test something different (for example, the position of your product image). The key with testing is to have a reliable way to keep track of which page resulted in which sale/signup, and to only test one thing at a time.

Web Action Steps

  • Decide what your MDR (most desired result) is and how your prospect will complete it on your landing page (for instance, a buy now button, or email sign-up form)
  • Create a profile of your target market for the campaign
  • Choose the method you will use to bring people to the landing page
  • Draft the copy for your page
  • Set up your page on your domain
  • Launch your campaign
  • Set up split-testing to improve your conversions

Using landing pages can increase your sales and leads. It isn’t difficult to do, as long as you keep these best-practices in mind. If you need a website for your business which supports things like online sales, email sign-ups, and landing pages, contact me today.