Landing Pages: Get Your House in Order!
Think of your landing page as your storefront. The quality
and layout of your landing page will either attract or prevent your ad from
being clicked upon. The old adage “if you build it, they will come,” is not
true for websites. There is too much competition and optimization occurring to
just build a site and expect visitors to pour in.
Your website has to be attractive, professional, trustworthy
and easy to navigate. Surfers have become sophisticated enough to move from
site to site to find what they are looking for. It’s like window shopping at
light speed. They see a site that is half built, full of links to other pages,
incongruous images and other unattractive choices, they will click away
quickly.
When building your site, consider the following tips when
creating your landing page. These suggestions can help improve your click
through rate, your cost per click, and conversion rate.
Make the words fit
the action. Your ad copy (the descriptive writing used to sell your
product), images, video, etc., should all help support your landing page’s / product’s
message. You are selling something that could potentially make a persons life
better or easier, so your landing page has to reflect the benefits, and why
your service is irresistible. You won’t do that by constructing a landing page
that will immediately be passed on. Stay on message.
Seal the deal.
One thing I have learned over the years is that you do not offer choices to a
person, because that gives them the option to say “no.” Instead of a question,
make a statement. This can provoke a visitor to perform an action on your site.
This is why this phrase is termed as a “call to action.” If you refer to the
example, you’ll see how this can raise the stakes for the visitor and get them
to become involved.
As you can see, this is a statement that provokes action.
Make it simple.
Too often I see websites that you have to scroll through, click through, read
through and pick through to find what they are trying to offer me. I see a ton
of writing, links to other pages, contrasting messages and other distracting
items. Your visitors do not have the time. They need it now. Don’t belabor them
with the task of trying to interpret your site.
You can do this by simplifying your offer into a single
button that can be placed on the first page of your site. Using bright,
contrasting colors and a large sized button, you are more likely to get a
better click through rate. As you can see in the example, the offer can be filtered
down to a strong, short message.
So keep it strong, simple, and professional. The time you
spend now on increasing the quality of you site will be well worth it in the
long run.