Create Killer Landing Pages That Work

I KNOW you aren’t one of the gazillions of website owners that has sent traffic directly to your home page and assumed that your visitors would find all your promotions on their own.

You can’t be!  Because  you KNOW better.  Right?

Well according to MarketingSherpa’s Landing Page Handbook (2nd Edition), 44 % of clicks for B2B companies are directed right to the business’ homepage, instead of a special landing page.  And since you aren’t doing this – you know that this doesn’t work well.    These businesses are losing out on so many key values by negating to drive traffic to a killer targeted landing page.

The kind folks over at Shebangdesign have spelled out all the ifs, ands, buts, and whatnots regarding the subject – you know in case you should need to brush up on just why a landing page is and should be a fundamental piece of your path.

So … What is a Landing Page?

Good landing pages will target a particular audience, and allow them to download your content offers like ebooks or white papers, (often in exchange for an email address or contact information). A good landing page might also allow for a free trial of your product or a demo or simply give something of value to your audience. Good landing pages help solve your customer’s problems. Good landing pages are the scratch to your customer’s itch.

Here’s a great looking landing page from Apple where customers can download itunes in exchange for their email address. Actually, email address is not even required for the download – hooray, for Apple!

Scratch An Itch, Repeat Your Appeal

Let’s say you’re a dentist and your services include placing dental implants – and you would like some new customers. You might create a pay-per-click campaign that focused on keyword phrases that your potential customers would type into a search engine: “cost of dental implants”, “dental implant”, “dental implants in Fort Lauderdale” etc.

Then you could point your ads to landing pages on your site that address the specific needs of your customers. In this case, a landing page that echoes the ad is best. If a customer is looking for “dental implants in Fort Lauderdale”, they would see the ad below, and click on it, and land on a page that echoed the keyword phrase they searched for. Hey – “Dental Implants in Fort Lauderdale” … I must be in the right place!

Be Concise

Have you ever seen those landing pages that seem to go on and on about a single product, with tons of images, testimonials, and videos? Sometimes those pages work … sometimes short and sweet is best.

Here’s a great example of a landing page from Hubspot where you can download an ebook to help you “crush your social media competitors.” Huzzah! The top navigation on this landing page has been removed, and there is a good deal of data that says eliminating the top navigation on landing pages reduces bounce rate and increases conversion.

Don’t Forget to Share

And don’t forget to let customers share the page with their social circles by including social sharing options. People who find the page useful are more likely to share it to others.

Build Trust, Give Enough Information to Persuade, Chunk It Up

Providing sufficient details to garner a positive response from your audience is key, as is “chunking” your information into bite sized pieces. Bullet points are easily scanned and allow your prospects to slow down to review the information that you have garnered as important enough to break into … eye-catching bullets! Wow!

Check out this chunky example from MarketingSherpa – it has tabs at top that contain extra information for less committed folks who may not be ready to purchase yet.

More is Better

Data from HubSpot’s study of 4,000 businesses, 2012.

No matter the business, killer landing pages will always be an effective tool to ramp up your lead generation. And data shows it’s not only important to have landing pages; if you want more leads, it’s important to have many landing pages.

Businesses with 31 to 40 landing pages got 7 times more leads than those with only 1 to 5 landing pages. Those with over 40 landing pages got 12 times more leads than those with only 1 to 5 landing pages.

Are you ready to build some landing pages?

Original article:  shebangdesign.com  Author:  Asa Shatkin