I like coffee. I can remember having coffee with a friend on regular occasions a few years ago. We would just sit around talking about things going on in our lives, our country and our world. Sometimes we disagreed, but it was fun.
We would lose ourselves in conversation. We would lose track of time.
Do you ever do that?
As much as I love coffee, buying coffee in the grocery store can be problematic.
Have you seen how many different kinds of coffee there is?
Now, I am the kind of person who likes good coffee. I have a certain taste for coffee and I am not interested in the standard, off-the-shelf cheapest kind of coffee.
This can make it harder.
So, basically, I stick to about six different brands. 🙂 (I really like to drink coffee from my favorite local coffee shop)
Our focus becomes limited when we have too many choices.
Too many choices
When it comes to websites, there is one major thing that can affect a user’s ability to make a choice.
Building a page with multiple options, multiple calls to actions, can cause a “paradox of choice.”
We become paralyzed when presented with too many things and it causes a distraction.
Landing pages help us reduce distractions, curb the “paradox of choice” when it comes to our websites.
When it comes to compelling our visitor to make a choice, landing pages help immensely.
There are several reasons to use landing pages, but here are six obvious reasons that will help you improve conversions.
So, what is a landing page? Well, According to the Landing Page Course:
“A landing page can be any page that someone lands on after clicking on an online marketing call-to-action. Dedicated, promotion-specific landing pages are what we’ll be focusing on. Dedicated landing pages are standalone pages that are designed for a specific marketing campaign.”
But, what about my homepage? Can’t I do what I need to the home page?
Nope. Not really.
Your home page is a bucket with holes and will distract your reader.
“Think of the links on your page as leaks. Each link on your page that doesn’t represent your conversion goal is a distraction that will dilute your message and reduce your conversion rate.”
https://thelandingpagecourse.com/landing-page-101-intro/
Increase conversions by using landing pages and you can help your clients make more money.
Improve Attention Ratio
Attention Ratio is a term coined by Oli Gardner, Co-Founder of Unbounce. It is the idea that one’s attention is affected by the ratio of various links on a landing page.
“The ratio of links on a landing page to the number of campaign conversion goals. In an optimized campaign, your attention ratio should be 1:1. Because every campaign has one goal, every corresponding landing page should have only one call to action – one place to click.”
According to Gardner, “One Page. One Purpose. Period.”
Thus, the ratio should be 1:1. A landing page helps with the attention ratio when you can keep the links and calls to actions minimized.
Landing pages can do this by eliminating the navigation menus and the footer links as well as any sidebar links, etc.
A bevy of links can lead a user to move down a “rabbit hole” of clicking different links to see where they lead.
Capture leads
All businesses, regardless of the nature of the business, need to capture leads. How much do you pay per lead? What if you could capture leads when people visit your website?
Landing pages are one of the best ways to do this.
As a business owner, you can capture a lead with a form to request a quote, to be added to an email list, download an ebook, or any number of different requests. A landing page helps accomplish this much more succinctly.
Example of a lead capture page:
Sales Page
Are you selling something on your website? Maybe you are selling a service such as WordPress maintenance.
Sales pages are one of the most important ways to use a landing page.
After you have convinced the user they need to use you for your WordPress maintenance service, you create a landing page where you direct your user that helps to “close the sale.”
On a sales page, you can identify and answer any objections and take away all of the various risks and point them to the “buy now” button.
Example page:
PPC Campaigns
Not using a dedicated landing page for a Pay Per Click (PPC) campaign is one of the biggest mistakes that companies make. I have made this mistake too.
If you are investing money in an ad campaign, you will want to direct targeted traffic to a landing page that speaks to that audience compelling them to take action.
For our WordPress Maintenance Service, you can set up a page for that PPC campaign. You will direct them to your landing page with a call to action to sign up to learn more or make a purchase.
Opt-in Conversion
Are you building your email list? There are many reasons to build an email list and different ways to do so, but regardless of how you build your list, you have to get someone to opt-in.
A landing page can be one of the most important ways to create the process.
You may use an opt-in page to get someone to sign up for your email newsletter by downloading an ebook or subscribing to an e-course.
Example:
Following a presentation
Do you give presentations at WordCamp or other technology conferences or business networking events? A landing page can be invaluable to capture some of these leads.
Offer a follow-up gift such as a book, a consultation or video, create a landing page, give it an easy URL and give that URL to participants.
You can let them know they can get that offer by clicking on the link.
I helped a client do this earlier this year. He spoke to a conference and offered the URL to the participants to download a copy of his new ebook.
Special Content
Do you have a series of posts about one topic? Have you created an ultimate guide? Do you have certain posts that form the cornerstone of all your content?
These provide users with special content that need to be easily accessed.
A landing page can help curate all content in one place so that a user can find the content within the series he or she wants to digest.
Example of a special content page:
Wrapping it up
There are many ways to use a landing page. Landing pages are an important way to capture leads online.
Nevertheless, it is important to note that landing pages, while are effective, are not for every visitor at every point in town. They exist to nurutre those that are interested which is not necessarily a first-time visitor.
It is the end of the trip or journey, if you will, that a customer takes toward your product or service.
I think that Viktor Nagornyy says it well at his site Inbound Method:
Part of why landing pages work well is the segmented nature of traffic you send to them. When you send traffic to a landing page using PPC ad, social media update, email, banner ad, etc., you allow user to pre-qualify themselves. When they click on the link to go to the landing page they raise their hand and say I’m interested in the value you’re promising me. There are a lot of different elements that will prevent them from converting, but when they do initially come to a landing page you piqued their curiosity with your value proposition.+
How do you use landing pages?
Comment below.
