Best practices for a successful landing page
The landing page is a web page that can be reached by clicking on a link. Its url can be posted on social networks, relayed, shared... As part of a social media or digital marketing strategy to showcase products, it's an essential tool. How do you create a good landing page? What are the tricks to increasing leads?
A marketing lever
Lead generation
The aim of any marketing action is ultimately commercial. If you want to increase your number of customers, or your sales per customer, you can set up a prospecting campaign, including hard canvassing: this is known as the outbound approach. With digital technology comes its counterpart: inbound marketing. The aim is to create inbound leads.
A conversion goal
Newsletters, mailings, landing pages: all opportunities to get prospects to discover your offer. Arouse their interest so that they click. And, through this click, the lead advances through your conversion tunnel: the funnel of stages during which he'll go from prospect to customer.
Set an objective
Every marketing campaign must start with a precise objective. From a growth hacking perspective, it's best to think in terms of a single action, underpinned by a single goal. You need to break down your main objective - "gain 1% market share", for example - and translate it into a one-off goal, such as "get 50 more customers through this campaign".
Structuring your message
The importance of what's at stake
Setting a quantifiable objective is all the more important when the action taken represents an investment, such as Google AdWords campaigns that generate traffic on a cost-per-click basis. So it's best to maximize the benefits, with a quality score that gives a good ROI (Return on Investment).
In what situations?
The objective can be of various kinds:
- Encourage purchase: by highlighting a promotional offer, for example, discounts - sales or specific products;
- Collect contact details: this is known as a squeeze page. It's a "follow up" logic: the recipient will be contacted again at a later date.
The landing page can also be used as part of preliminary market research for the launch of a new concept, a new product or even a start-up. In this case, the aim is to attract early adopters or unite a community around a project: a focus emphasized by Launchrock, which specializes in early customer acquisition. For email campaign management, ActiveTrail is currently one of the most powerful email marketing tools on the market. It manages :
- Creating and sending emails;
- Construction of landing pages, forms, surveys and popups;
- SMS sending;
- Marketing automation scenarios.
Plezi, a marketing automation platform, is also an excellent B2B inbound marketing tool, with the ability to manage :
- Download forms - especially for ebooks;
- Blogs and tracking of visitors, views, conversions, etc.
- landing pages;
- Social networks;
- Email campaigns.
What call to action?
Once you've determined your objective, translate it into a CTA (Call To Action). This involves creating a button or clickable link that prompts a clear action, such as adding to the shopping cart, downloading documentation or linking to a form. Limit yourself to one CTA per landing page. After all, if you try too hard to convey too many messages, you'll end up communicating none at all. It's better to create several landing pages, with appropriate segmentation.
Form and content
Web design
The ergonomics and visual appearance of your landing page must be carefully considered. Give preference to responsive templates, for a campaign that's readable on all devices. And structure your layout well: use bullets, tables, directional shapes such as arrows... As for the main element, the CTA, make sure it stands out!
Light content
Use beautiful visuals, why not infographics? Videos are also very popular. Be careful, however, to keep it light in terms of weight: if your landing page takes more than 2 seconds to load, 47% of Internet users will close it first.
Your arguments
Put forward reassuring arguments for the reader: customer testimonials, reviews, number of likes or certifications if you have any. Your landing page should be thought of as a mini-sales pitch, and your value proposition should be clearly stated to elicit the desired action from the reader.
Relevance and SEO
Think SEO (Search Engine Optimization). For traffic from search engines, take care of your natural referencing, and sprinkle your texts with keywords. This applies to both the body of the landing page and its snippet (the two-line excerpt used as a catchphrase to entice people to click).
Optimizing the performance of your landing page
AB Testing
AB testing, or multivariate testing, is a useful way of checking the quality of your landing page. They allow you to test different versions to deduce the best performing combination. Test similar versions, modifying the parameters one by one. This way, you'll be able to identify the best option every time.
Internet user behavior
Thermography" type analyses allow you to visualize the most clicked areas of the page. Make sure their dispersion doesn't hinder conversion. Channel the reader's path, even if it means reducing clickable zones, to optimize the impact.
Measurement indicators
AB Testing is a good way to get rid of our preconceptions and rely on empirical evidence. One of the key indicators is the bounce rate. Google Analytics analyses, connected to your website's back office, or referring clicks, visible on Wordpress for example, are also interesting for your analysis.
Tips for increasing your conversion rate
The landing page is a key element of your marketing campaigns. Properly constructed, it can generate qualified leads at a low cost. It's up to you to optimize its design and content.
Article translated from French