A landing page is a web page that’s designed to attract visitors through the use of effective marketing techniques. It’s usually short, simple, and to the point, and it uses catchy headlines and eye-catching images to draw people in.
Landing pages are especially important for businesses that sell products or services online. They help increase leads and convert more visitors into customers by providing them with easy access to information they need. They also allow you to test different copy and images to see which ones are most effective in attracting attention and converting clicks into dollars.
If you’re looking for a way to improve your website’s SEO (search engine optimization), then creating a landing page is a great way to do it. Landing pages are also a great way for small businesses to get started with online marketing. By using effective landing page designs, you can increase website traffic and conversion rates without spending a lot of money on advertising
In this article we discuss what are landing pages, what are they used for, how to design a landing page, and 10 different examples of landing pages.
Table of Contents
What is a landing page?
A landing page is a website or an online form that is designed to convert visitors into leads or customers. The main purpose of a landing page is to convince people to take action, typically by signing up for a newsletter, downloading a white paper, or making a purchase. Moreover, the page is used to capture email addresses and other contact information from potential customers as quickly as possible.
Landing pages are commonly used by businesses in order to collect valuable leads and sell their products or services. They’re also effective at driving traffic to your website, which can help you reach your target audience more easily.
No matter what kind of online presence you have, be it as a social media marketer, paid marketer, or even just a blogger, we all utilize landing pages. At times you may even ask yourself why do I need a landing page? Landing pages will help increase conversions, attract new leads, and ultimately drive traffic to different products and services that you have been marketing for.
Landing pages are often designed with the goal of converting as many visitors as possible into leads or customers. This means that they usually have a simple design and are focused on providing clear and concise information about your product or service. They also use high-converting headlines, images and other unique features that make it easy for people to take action.
What are the differences between a landing page and homepage?
A landing page is a special type of website design that’s specifically for attracting leads and converting them into customers.
Most landing pages are built using a few key components: a headline, an image, and some text. The goal is to capture the visitor’s attention and get them to click on the link in the headline. From there, you want to provide useful information that will convince them to convert (sign up for your email list, download your free report, etc).
Unlike homepages, which are optimized for exploration and finding information, landing pages are meant to drive conversions. This means that everything you do on a landing page should be geared towards getting people to take action (join your email list or buy your product).
Landing pages have become very popular because they work really well when it comes to generating leads and expanding your customer base. Let’s look at this way, a normal webpage presents as a single page in a website. It focuses on introducing your brand and consists of information related to your brand. Basically, it invites users to explore your brand.
Whereas, a landing page is an independent page that serves and focuses on a single purpose. It is a follow-up to any promises that were made in your content. Your landing page lets you make a transaction, special deals, or piece of information, in return for providing the user’s contact information.
If you’re looking for a quick way to increase your business volumes or reach new heights in terms of conversion rates, then landing pages might be the perfect solution for you!
Why are landing pages important?
Landing pages are a great way to increase conversion rates and drive more traffic to your website. They’re especially useful when you want to capture leads or sell products.
Landing pages work great as a conversion tool as it focuses on one goal and CTA throughout the page. It helps you to increase website traffic, improve SEO and build your brand. Additionally, they also convert because they target a specific audience, customers and offers.
Approximately 68% of B2B businesses use landing pages to generate leads for future conversion. Landing pages help to a specific service, product or deals that persuade them to take action. Hence, this is your opportunity to build your customer base and increase conversions.
Here are a few things you need to keep in mind when designing a landing page:
- It needs to be easy to navigate. This means that the page should be designed in a way that is simple and easy to understand.
- The page should clearly state what you’re offering and how it benefits the visitor.
- The page should be formatted well so that it looks professional and impressive.
- The landing page should also have an attractive design that will draw attention.
What is a high converting landing page?
A high converting landing page is one that gets people to take action (either signing up for a free trial or making a purchase).
There are a few things that you need to make sure your landing page is effective. First and foremost, it needs to be easy to navigate. This means that it should be laid out in an easy-to-read format with clear instructions on how to proceed. It should also have clear call to actions (CTAs), which will help you get people’s attention and encourage them to take action.
Another important element of a high converting landing page is the design. The layout should be simple and straightforward, with no distractions or advertisements. In addition, the CTA buttons should be big and eye-catching so that people can’t help but click on them. Finally, the content must be well written and informative, so that people can understand what you’re offering without difficulty.
What makes a bad landing page?
A bad landing page is one that doesn’t offer enough value to convince a visitor to stay on the page. It may be poorly designed, or it may not provide the information that visitors are looking for.
First of all, the layout should be easy to navigate. The layout should be simple and the buttons should be user-friendly. It’s also important to have clear and concise text, so that people can understand what they need to do to complete their purchase.
Secondly, the landing page should provide interesting content that is relevant to the audience. If the content isn’t relevant, then people will likely bounce away from it quickly.
Thirdly, the pricing information should be clear and concise. People want to know how much they’re going to have to spend in order for your product or service to be worth it, and you need to make this information as easy as possible for them to find.
Fourthly, the conversion rate (the percentage of people who convert on your landing page) needs to be high enough for you to make a profit. This means that you need to make sure that you’re providing people with what they need and getting them down payment ready as quickly as possible.
To summarize the components above, in order to make sure your landing page is effective, you need to focus on three key things: content, design, and conversion:
- Content: The most important part of a good landing page is the content. This should be well-written and engaging, and it should provide valuable information that will persuade visitors to stay on the page.
- Design: Landing pages need to be easy to navigate and look good at all times. They shouldn’t be cluttered or difficult to read, and they should use clear and concise language.
- Conversion: Landing pages need to convert visitors into customers as quickly as possible. This means that you need to make sure that your site’s conversion rates are high enough so that you can earn money from each visitor.
What are the biggest landing page mistakes?
There are a few big landing page mistakes that you should avoid if you want your page to convert successfully. Here are five of the most common ones:
- Not targeting the right audience
- Making too many assumptions about what your visitor wants
- Failing to provide enough valuable content:
There are a few major landing page mistakes that businesses make all the time. By understanding and avoiding these mistakes, you’ll be able to create pages that convert better and generate more leads.
1) Not targeting the right audience:
Landing pages should be designed with the target audience in mind. If your page is not targeted towards a specific group of people, then it will not be effective. For example, if your page is meant for sales executives but none of them are on your email list, then your page will not convert well.
2) Making too many assumptions about what your visitor wants:
Most visitors don’t visit landing pages for fun – they’re there to find out about a product or service, so make sure that you have something concrete to offer them. Don’t assume that they know everything already or that they’ll just take whatever you say at face value. Make sure that you clearly explain why you’re offering this information to them and how it will benefit them.
3) Failing to provide enough valuable content:
Landing pages should be filled with high-quality content that’s relevant to your target audience. If the message is lacking in quality, or is confusing in any way, website visitors will leave. In order to avoid this issue, make sure you are writing content that’s both interesting and useful – something that will keep readers coming back for more. If you can pack your landing page with enough good information, then you will be able to convert more website visitors into customers, and keep them coming back for more!
What makes a good landing page?
A successful landing page is the foundation of effective online marketing. Your deals and offers may be exciting and ads pieces might be optimized to perfection, but your business is bound to suffer without a good landing page. Therefore, if you’re planning to drive leads to your sales funnel, a landing page needs to be flawless.
It is essential to create a persuasive landing page that grabs the attention of users and drives them to complete a conversion. Learn how you can create an effective landing page with these simple steps below:
1. Clean and Organized Design
When it comes to landing pages, looks cannot be deceiving! The overall look and feel of your landing pages will have a huge impact on the effectiveness of your page and conversions. Your landing page must be easy so as to increase conversions, so it is essential that all elements of your landing page work towards driving conversions. For example, filling out a form, downloading a free book, or subscribing to a newsletter.
Additionally, it is also important to make use of subtle colors and images. For instance, it is believed that colors like green can increase landing page conversions but whatever color you use make sure to contrast between your button and your background. Also, to ensure that you have a good landing page you can test the color, size and placement, to learn the most effective landing page layout for your website.
2. Minimalism is Key
A good landing page is designed to be as simple and minimal as possible. This not only makes the page easy to understand, but it also maximizes the chances of converting visitors into customers.
There are a few key principles that need to be followed when creating a landing page:
- Keep it simple and focused
- Use white space effectively
- Use clear and concise copy
- Keep your design clean and modern
In addition, you should make sure that your landing page is optimized for Google search. This means that you ensure that all elements of your page can be crawled and indexed by Google. If you can get your page ranked high in the SERPs, then you’re guaranteed more traffic and higher conversion rates.
3. Use Headers to Announce Offers
An effective landing page is incomplete with strong offers and deals placed in the heading and subheadings. It also must be able to explain why the offer is valuable in clear terms. Majority of the successful landing pages use the headings to promote the offer and use the subheadings for further explanation of the offer.
Remember, on average you have only 8 seconds to make an impression on your visitor, so make sure its worth-while!
4. Make Your Page Mobile-Friendly
With smartphones available in everyone’s palm, it is crucial to make your landing pages mobile-friendly. In the fourth quarter of 2021, mobile devices (excluding tablets) generated 54.4 percent of global website traffic!
With Google’s latest update on increasing user’s page experience, it has become more obvious that mobile-friendly websites can also help to double your conversions. Your landing pages must feel and look great on mobile devices – easy navigation, quick page load and clickable.
5. Tailored Landing Pages for Your Target Audience
If you have been promoting great offers, it’s likely that you are getting traffic from many different sources. Hence, how about customizing your landing page for different audiences? For instance, you can tweak your landing page differently for users that arrive from a FB or Twitter post than from a user arriving from an ad link and or a subscription link.
Moreover, a good landing page is one that’s tailored specifically to the needs of your target audience. It should be easy to navigate and use simple, concise language that’s easy to understand. It should also offer a clear call to action, as well as a strong incentive for visitors to take action.
To create a good landing page, you’ll need to consider a few things:
- Know the source of the traffic arriving on the landing page
- What are the main goals of your page?
- What are the most important features or benefits of your product or service?
- How can you hook your target audience in with compelling content?
- What are the unique selling points of your page?
- How can you make sure that people see what they’re looking for without having to scroll too far down?
6. Short and Sweet Forms
It is natural that as an online marketer you would want to collect data from your users. However, creating a minimalistic landing page is key so that it is easier for the user to fill out a few form fields. Users are more likely to leave when you present them a long list of field forms and complete your desired conversion. It is essential to note that, only ask what you really need and always ask for more information on the thank you page.
7. Don’t Forget to Test Your Landing Page
The last and final attribute of a good landing page is to test it! A successful landing page cannot be created without proper trial and error. Constantly testing and tracking outcomes are important to analyze what your landing page is doing right and wrong. Therefore, the more you test the more you are likely to get success from your landing page!
A great way to test your landing page is to do A/B testing and monitor the data in case you need to perform landing page optimization. A great way to monitor the performance of your lead generation page is to use Google Analytics. This will help you monitor the website visitor’s journey once they arrive on your page.
The 10 types of landing pages & how to pick one for a campaign
There are multiple types of landing pages all with different objectives. It may be difficult to keep them all straight and know exactly what each one should be used for. Therefore, we have narrowed it down and provided an example of 10 different landing pages. While going through the examples of landing pages, make sure to check the designs of each landing page to understand how they have different uses.
10 examples of landing pages:
- Squeeze Page
- Splash Page
- Lead Capture Page
- Click-Through Landing Page
- “Get Started” Landing Page
- Long-form Sales Landing Page
- Paid Advertising Landing Page
- “About Us” Landing Page
- Pricing Page
- “Thank You” Landing Page
1. Squeeze Page
79% of B2B marketers say marketing by email is the most effective channel for demand generation. Therefore, it is no wonder that squeeze pages have topped our list. As far as landing pages go, squeeze pages can help you drastically retain your traffic over the long term if done correctly.
Squeeze pages are landing pages that have the objective of capturing a visitor’s email address in order to develop that visitor as a lead. By gaining their email address, you now have direct contact with the individual and can slowly begin providing them with relevant information and materials that can help push them further into your sales funnel.
A great way to utilize squeeze pages is by using ‘gated content’. By developing various content such as: newsletters, ebooks, whitepapers, or other such content, you can provide it to visitors for free in return for their email.
Best practices suggest that the squeeze page is simple, concise and has an enticing call to action (CTA) on it in order to tempt the visitor into giving their email address for your content. Additionally, make sure that the page is easy enough to navigate out of and to the content that initially brought them to your site.
2. Splash Landing Page
Splash landing pages don’t always focus just on lead capture. This type of lead generation page is typically used for visitors that are arriving from social media links. You can think of a splash landing page as an intermediary page, that shares an announcement for your online business or even presents an ad to the visitor (pro tip: these ads can be monetized as well to generate some extra revenue for your website. Make sure not to go too far with these ads though!).
We believe the splash page above represents a good use of the opportunity to create a landing page for two reasons. One, it clearly states when the ad will end and how to proceed to the desired content. Two, it has a clear purpose: to show the visitor an ad.
3. Lead Capture Page
Lead capture pages and squeeze pages are very similar. However, lead capture pages usually sources more information. A few pieces of information they could seek to earn from the visitor are: name, business name, email address, job title, and industry.
The information that is being sought after could vary depending on the overall objective of the page as well as the sales and marketing teams overseeing them. Depending on where the visitor is in your sales funnel, you will want to change what you are requesting. A good rule of thumb is, if they are at the top of the funnel, request less. If they are closer to the bottom though, you can ask for a lot more information.
Also, when determining how many lines of information to ask for, you should also consider the other actions the person has taken already on your website. If they have downloaded multiple pieces of content, they are obviously interested in what you are offering and you should ask for more information.
4. Click-Through Landing Page
As marketers, we all know that before we can ask a business or person for money, we need to provide some sort of value to them first. Click-through landing pages do just that: help with your click through rate. It provides relevant information or other value to the visitor before you start hitting them with ‘Buy Now’ buttons.
More times than not, this means the landing page will share and demonstrate the benefits of the products or services that your company is offering with a CTA button to encourage them to enroll or try a free trial. Once they click through the first page, you can present them with another landing page that showcases your pricing details and asks for payment information in order to begin the free trial.
A key thing to remember is that once they land on the page with the offer, they have already been primed and educated on why they should proceed with your online business, and engage with you for the free trial. Below we give you an example of how these two landing pages might look:
5. “Get Started” Landing Page
Get started landing pages should contain whatever your specific offer is above the fold. For example, look at the page below from Mailchimp. It explains their offer and the benefits of engaging with them: tools that turn audience data into insights.
Think it’s worth your time? Perfect, because they have an easy to see, well contrasted ‘Get Started’ CTA. On the other hand, maybe you are not completely sold yet. Don’t worry, as you continue to scroll past the fold, you will gain more information about their offer.
6. Long-Form Sales Landing Page
A long-form sales landing page is used for providing as much information as you can think of to the person arriving on your landing page. You should come up with every question, every barrier or roadblock a customer may face during a purchase and detail every benefit you can when it comes to your product and service.
Check out the page from Seth Godin’s altMBA as an example:
It begins with an informational video that provides you with what you need to know and why right now is the perfect time to apply. After that comes the companies names and pictures of students that have applied and benefited from the course.
Next comes the quotes, and various calls to actions like joining mailing lists, learning more about the course, and even a CTA to read testimonials. Finally, at the very end of the page, there is a CTA button to apply for the course and some program dates to add a sense of urgency to apply.
Sales landing pages should have significant breath and have as much information as possible. It should be completely different in style than a squeeze page, because a sales landing page has one objective: close business.
7. Paid Advertising Landing Page
If you are not connecting paid ads to the right Paid advertising landing page, you are simply throwing money away. Leads from your paid ads are typically used to generate leads and not necessarily sales.
An example of this can be seen in the two images below. The first one is an ad from Airtable and the second is of the squeeze page that it took me to.
When I clicked on the ad, I was taken to this squeeze page:
The initial ad didn’t direct me to a pricing and plan page or a page loaded with their services features and benefits. It took me to a well planned and strategic page that requested one thing: my email address.
Additionally, it provided me with a demo of the tool that showed me exactly what it was for and what it could do, instead of just telling me why Airtable is different and valuable.
8. “About Us” Landing Page
An online business ‘About Us’ page doesn’t always have to result in a dead end. You can develop the page to be a lead generation page as well!Take this example from makeup company Glossier.
And at the bottom of the page:
The page is absolutely packed with information about the history, vision and mission of the company. Additionally, and most importantly, they inform the reader about how to move forward. Another great thing the ‘About Us’ landing page does is that it places a reminder and links to shop, follow, email, email subscription button and join the company button at the bottom to generate leads.
9. Pricing Landing Pages
Pricing landing pages can be useful when rolling out new pricing or product tiers on your website. No matter if it is a landing page or not, your pricing page should always be one of your most optimized pages on your site. Wistia is a good example. In the image below, it clearly shows the three different tiered packages that they offer and provide links to gain more information about them.
To add even more excitement to their page, Wistia offers a ‘choose your own adventure’ option as well. Having this extra option will allow potential customers to gain more information and build a package that might be better suited to their needs.
The option gives your online business an extra chance to retain the potential customer, provide them with more information, and an opportunity to convert them into a sale even if they don’t like the initial offers. No worse thing than locking in your prices and losing a potential customer before you even get a chance to talk to them.
10. “Thank You” Landing Page
More times than not, a thank you landing page serves no purpose and goes unoptimized. Ultimately, it just gives you information you already know: you have completed an action with us – thank you.
Thank you pages can offer you additional opportunities to provide more value to your visitor. You can add additional offers and deals to them as a recent customer. Remember, they have just purchased something from you and are already a highly motivated and already-interested customer. Don’t waste the opportunity!
Below is a great example from Hubspot. After downloading a guide from their website, the ‘Thank You’ landing page offers the individual with an additional offer to receive free advice.
By targeting people that have just engaged in a certain activity on your site, you will be able to further target them and gain more valuable information about them. With the additional data, you will be able to develop more targeted messages and offers for them next time you send them an offer.
How to Choose the Right Landing Page for Your Campaign
Now that you have a general understanding of the most commonly used landing pages, we will move into: How do you pick the right one for your next campaign?
First you should start by asking yourself and your team the following questions:
- What are my business objectives? What do I hope to achieve with this particular landing page?
- How do my competitors achieve these same objectives?
- What do my potential customers want? What are their objectives by arriving on this landing page?
- Where did this traffic come from? What actions brought my audience here?
- What is the end goal from getting my traffic to this landing page?
After you know what your objective is, you need to figure out which landing page you should target and if it is a short- or long-form landing page.
For example, short-form landing pages are usually correlated with squeeze landing pages and ‘Thank You’ landing pages. Whereas, these landing pages require a small ask or provide a small service to the visitor.
On the other hand, long-form landing pages are usually correlated with click-through landing pages and pricing pages. Whereas, if you are looking to gain a lot of information, or want them to sign up for a product or service, you should design a long-form landing page.
What does this look like in reality? For example, let us say we are creating a brand-awareness campaign for a new startup company that offers door to door repairs of motorcycles. Thus, the objective of the campaign is to gain new leads and drive impressions of people owning motorcycles – i.e. email addresses.
The leading competitors are currently conducting social media campaigns on Facebook to drive traffic back to their website’s sales landing page. However, as our campaign is to drive leads and not purchases, we may choose to use images of motorcycles getting repaired at people’s homes to conduct a social media campaign instead.
When a potential customer interacts with the ad they are wondering about the motorcycle repairs happening in front of a bunch of houses. Therefore, we may want to take the visitor to our ‘About Us’ page to inform them about the new startup. Additionally, since we are looking to generate new leads, we may want to include a link to our newsletter that showcases the most recent historic motorcycle repairs.
Now that you have a robust idea about different landing pages it’s time to start developing your own. As we did above, go to some of your favorite well known online companies and check out their landing pages to come up with new creative ideas for your landing pages. You can also check out our various landing pages we have and utilize any of the styles and ideas we have!
Key takeaways: Landing pages
What makes a good landing page? Anyone can create one, but it doesn’t mean this will make you sales. First of all, if a website is redesigning its marketing strategy, it might be time for them to implement new landing pages.
To understand how to design an effective landing page, you just need to follow the steps mentioned above. This also means that making use of powerful marketing techniques can make all the difference. That’s why you should focus on innovative and creative ways to attract new leads online through landing pages.
n every external marketing campaign it will be important to develop a lead generation landing page to assist the site visitor in completing a desired action. By showcasing your value proposition clearly and incorporating an easy to see action button, you can be sure that your landing page design will help in your digital marketing needs and convert customers.
At Clear Door SEO, one of our core values is creating engaging content and understanding what drives people’s behavior. So, if you are looking to increase your conversion rate with landing pages, contact us today.