Do you know one of the main reasons why your campaigns are not converting like crazy as expected? It could be one of the many landing page optimization strategies that you’ve neglected.
It could be any of these reasons:
- you’re not using a sense of urgency that will compel your leads to take immediate action
- no social proof on the landing page
- detailed headline
- compelling call-to-action button
- great lead magnet
- etc
Right now you might be wasting a lot of ads budget, directing traffic to a landing page that can’t convert up to 10% of your traffic, this would mean low sales, wasted resources, etc
This doesn’t have to be so because, in this post, I will show you landing page optimization tips that will transform your web traffic to paying customers with a conversion rate of more than 35&, so read on, the landing page optimization best practices are only a few paragraphs away. But first, let’s look at what landing page optimization means.
What is landing page optimization?
Landing page optimization is the process of strategically improving all the conversion elements of a web page to increase conversion rates – these conversions can be sales conversion or lead conversion.
These converting landing pages are pages on your website that highlights one specific product offering. This is the page you want people to land on when they are being directed from various media such as newsletters, social media, affiliate links, and others.
Basically, the goal of any converting landing page is to convert leads (for lead generation) to join a mailing list or for direct sales (sale conversion). If you’ve done a really good job, you would awaken your prospect’s desire. But before you can close the deal, you still need to address any objections they might have and remove other conversion hurdles your prospects might have.
A well-optimized landing page would mean results like these:
More email opt-ins: when your lead magnet is compelling and in-line with your leads’ search intent, there is higher lead conversion and email opt-ins.
Higher sales: when all sales conversion hurdles have been removed, through FAQs, social proof, sense of urgency, etc, you can see a higher sales conversion from your campaigns.
Better quality scores: well-optimized landing pages that are perfectly in line with your leads’ search intent drives best quality scores, which in turn rewards your campaign with a lower CPC.
It’s very evident that successful search engine marketing starts from optimizing landing pages for lead generation and conversion, but how do you actually get it right and make sure that all converting elements are all present in your landing page? read on to find this landing page optimization checklist.
7 Landing page optimization best practices
Before setting up any campaign, if you want a much higher result, use these tips and hacks below to optimize your landing page for conversion
1: Write a killer sales copy.
You need to write compelling sales copy that starts with your prospects’ problems and concerns, explains why your product is the solution and makes a compelling offer.
Sales copy is the text you use to persuade your readers to take a specific action. The ability to write irresistible sales copy is the most important marketing skill you can learn. Even for visual channels like YouTube you still need to write a compelling headline to get people to view your video.
Sales copywriting is very important in creating a killer landing page and optimizing for conversion because this is what your leads read to find more information on what you tend to offer, and why they should take the desired action you want them to take. Most agencies that offer landing page optimization services focus on writing good copies as this is the first part of your optimization process that will determine the success of your campaign.
2: Use testimonials
If there is one thing that can actually convince a prospect, it is a testimonial. Testimonials on your landing page boost the credibility of your service or product. For instance, if you sell men grooming kits, the number of successful sales, returned customers, and review on your landing page gives your leads more information about how good your products are since you’ve successfully sold to more customers and had returning customers.
A landing page’s testimonials are one of its most important trust signals. An average prospect wants to know that they can trust the product or service. If they see a trustworthy testimonial, this goes a long way in showcasing your credibility.
If they see a trustworthy testimonial, this goes a long way in showcasing your credibility.
However, when using testimonials on your landing page, use images and videos as they are more convincing than mere words.
Video testimonial for landing page optimization
It’s important that every featured testimonial be accompanied by a photo of a real person. Use testimonials from real people, choose testimonials from people who would be most relevant to your target audience.
[bctt tweet=”It’s important that every featured testimonial be accompanied by a photo of a real person. use testimonials from real people, such as experts are great, but you may not need testimonials from these people” username=”DMSInstitute”]
Social proof gives your brand credibility and presents you as a trusted brand. This is very important when optimizing landing pages for lead generation and conversion as most leads doubt the credibility of your brand. To use social proof on your landing page, consider doing the following:
- Use logos of other brands that you have done business with
- include pages of articles, magazines, or newspapers that have mentioned your brand
- review scores from credible sites
- use testimonials and customer reviews
- use customer quotes about your products, services or brands
Social proof for optimizing a landing page for conversion
These elements can help convince a lead that your brand has authority in its niche, and have successfully interacted with other prominent brands whether for social purposes or business purposes.
4: Define your value proposition
Your value proposition should be also be found and integrated amongst various elements. When it comes to your landing page, this element needs to have pride of place.
The value proposition basically answers the user’s question. Value proposition basically, is the service or feature intended to make a company or product attractive to customers.” When it comes to your landing page, your value proposition needs to answer the user’s question.
One of the best ways to advance your value proposition is through a list of benefits. The benefits should be clearly focused on the users. It’s very easy to drift off the mark with benefits and always think about the user and how he or she will benefit and avoid laying emphasis on your company.
5: Use a compelling call-to-action
Ultimately, the goal of any campaign is to drive your leads to take the desired action, and this would mean optimizing your CTA button to be action-driven enough. To do this, ask yourself, What is that single action I want visitors on this page to take, as a result of reading my copy? CTA placement is a critical component of the landing page.
You can use multiple CTAs on a single landing page, positioning each one at the end of each discrete section of the landing page. You must have a clear call-to-action. It must also be positioned in a prominent place. I suggest the upper-right-hand corner of the page.
According to HubSpot, these are the most-powerful call-to-action buttons to use for your landing page.
Note, call to action buttons have to be in-line with the action you want your leads to take. It will be less powerful if you use “Sign-up” where your lead magnet and the desired actions you want your leads to is to “download a copy of {your lead magnet}”.
You must understand how well your lead magnet will work on your leads to drive them to take actions, and this will bring us to the next of many landing page optimization tips.
6: Use a powerful leads magnet
Before you choose a lead magnet, you need to understand the core concept of a lead magnet and what it means for different businesses. Most landing pages are either designed with a less powerful lead magnet that doesn’t interest the lead or have powerful leads magnets that are not for the right audience.
Take, for instance, a search who is intentionally searching on Google for “sales call script” will most likely want to give their vital information (Email address, phone number, and name) in exchange for a “sales call script” template.
But unfortunately, some landing pages might not have this as their lead magnet, instead, they would use “signup for our email newsletters” as their leads magnet.
Using the searchers’ intent, “a sales call script” will be more rewarding and handy for their searches as they are actively looking for a script they can use for their sales calls.
So more of your traffic can be driven to take action and signup and download the sales call script more than they would want to signup for mere newsletters.
Also, it’s important to note that you can have a powerful leads magnet for the wrong set of audience, and this is how:
For instance, if a searcher is actively looking for a “business lawyer”, a powerful leads magnet like a “detailed checklist for businesses to avoid a lawsuit” might not be compelling enough when compared to a lead magnet like “10 minutes free call with our lawyer”.
The searchers intent, in summary, should determine the kind of leads magnet you make use of, and because of that, here is a checklist of things to do before you design your leads magnet, according to Impact Plus:
- know your customers
- choose a name for your leads magnet
- choose the type of leads magnet to offer
- run an A/B split testing
These few guides are powerful in choosing a leads magnet, also note, for conversion sake, you have to really spend time to find out the most-performing lead magnet you have designed and tested, otherwise you will continue to drive quality traffic to your landing page and miss all chances of converting them to leads.
7: Choose a well-expressive headline.
A headline is where everything begins — interest, attention, and understanding. The headline is your first and most critical action on a landing page. Having a strong, compelling headline is an essential component of a converting landing page.
Nothing else on your page is more important than this. If they aren’t drawn in by the headline, they won’t see everything else. So be cautious about the headline.
In writing a headline, follow this strategy:
- make a promise. Eg. “Free digital marketing class”, this will drive your leads to continue reading your landing page
- keep it short and clear
- use empathy
- talk about their pain point
Again, a headline should be what it is – a headline. It shouldn’t be too long to start explaining what the landing page is all about, there is space for that where you can give a brief explanation of what the landing page is all about, and that will bring us to the next landing page optimization best practice.
8. Write a great sub-topic
Sub-topic is very key, it should be an integral part of your landing page. The explanation you give on your landing page should be integrated with your headline, explaining your product or service, as well as benefit-oriented.
We make websites” is a functional explanation, but it lacks the user-focused orientation. To even make the explanation more compelling you could angle it towards the user to show them the value.
9: Use a sense of urgency
In optimizing landing pages for lead generation and conversion, every single conversion hurdle has to be eliminated including the urgency at which your leads take actions.
One thing is certain, your leads might see the need to take action and buy your product or signup on your email list, but if they don’t see the need to take the action right away, they might “keep the action for later”.
In driving actions using a sense of urgency, you can make use of an everlasting timer, a limited offer, a discount, limited space, etc, to drive your leads to take immediate action.
This will drive your leads to take immediate action as the fear of missing out (FOMO) will work on them.
If you can, make use of pop-up forms as well with a limited offer.
A pop-up form that says “download this last copy” would be as powerful as possible in driving sales.
According to Sumo,
“the top 10% highest-performing pop-ups averaged a 9.28% conversion rate. And, by conversion rate, we mean someone who saw a pop-up and took action”
This means an additional 9.28% conversion rate to for you when you make use of pop-up forms.
10. Eliminate Distractions
A landing page should be what it is – a landing page. This means that it should be void of any distraction.
Distractions like:
- navigation buttons to other pages
- multiple CTAs that are not leading to the same goal
- company information and unrelated landing page goals
- etc
You can lose a good number of leads if you don’t eliminate these distractions from your landing page.
What’s the difference between a landing page and a website?
There is a very thin line between a landing page and a website, and this is it.
A landing page is a web page which is set up specifically for a campaign, designed to lead your traffic to a page so that they can perform one particular action. This is why it is not advisable to run ads campaigns to a website because a website in the other hand is a combination of web pages that have multiple goals – to sell a product or service, to give insight on a company profile, etc.
The goal of a website is not confined to one objective, rather it is set up for many objectives, while a landing page is designed to drive leads to take a particular action.
Does landing page affect SEO?
Landing pages can affect SEO positively because an optimized web page for SEO can help other pages to show up on Google. This means that while designing your landing page, it is also important to pay attention to common SEO practices that will help the page to rank on Google.
Landing page optimization checklist
Practicing these outlined strategies while optimizing landing pages for lead generation and conversion would give you a higher conversion when running any campaign. It is important that you continue to perform A/B split testing to find out what works better for you and keep optimizing to get even better results.
As a way to make sure that all practices are checked, here is a landing page optimization checklist to keep you in track while optimizing for conversion
- Write a killer sales copy
- Use testimonials
- Use social proof to drive credibility
- Define your value proposition
- Use a compelling call-to-action
- Use a powerful leads magnet
- Choose a well-expressive headline
- Write a great sub-topic
- Use sense of urgency
- Eliminate Distractions
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