Can’t get conversions on your website even though the traffic is right? One of the reasons why many page visitors fail to take the desired action could be your landing page.
In online marketing, too, there are many ways to Rome to achieve a specific action by the visitor. Even if it is often treated marginally, there are only a few instruments that are more important for the optimization of the conversion rate than the landing page, since the homepage of a website is not always suitable as a target for a particular advertising medium.
It is not uncommon in this context to observe that page owners leave potential unused since the majority of the importance of this instrument is not clear. With just a few simple steps, it is possible to improve the conversion rate noticeably. Therefore, the first step to a successful landing page is to recognize that such a page is required.
This blog post should help you to recognize the need for a customized landing page and give you useful tips for optimizing your page.
Landing page – what is it?
You’ve heard it countless times, but still can’t tell exactly what a landing page is?
So do many. Basic terms from the field of online marketing such as social media or the like are now part of the standard vocabulary for most advertisers. However, as soon as it goes into depth and comes to specific questions, there is often a need to catch up.
One of these gaps is the landing page, which is sometimes very inflationary and therefore misused. Hence a brief explanation of what the primary task of such a page is.
In principle, the landing page can be described as a specially designed website on which visitors “land” by clicking on an advertising medium or an entry in a search engine.
The landing page should be optimized for both the advertising medium and the relevant target group. That means a clear presentation of the respective offer with a clearly defined call for action – the so-called “Call to Action”.
This can take various forms, such as visiting a further website, filling out an application form, calling, or buying a product.
If the visitor carries out the desired goal that is to be achieved by the landing page, this is referred to as conversion.
10 Steps To Make Your Landing Page More Efficient – Landing Page Optimization
However, there are some basic things you should consider when creating or tweaking. In principle, a landing page is made up of various elements that only work through carefully coordinated and coordinated work.
To help you, we have prepared 10 useful tips and insights for you on the structure, content, and advertising of the landing page.
1. Test the site in a controlled manner: A / B tests and multivariate tests
Instead of turning several digital adjustment screws at the same time, you should test the individual elements of your page one after the other and in different combinations in your landing page optimization. Because too many changes at the same time water down the picture and do not give you a clear answer to the question of which elements work best in which interplay.
A / B testing
With an A / B or split test, you can play out several variants of your landing page to the visitors to find out which version ensures more conversions.
You can compete for the original version against a version in which you have changed a particular element: CTA, images, headings, text bodies, and the general arrangement of elements on the landing page can be tested gradually with this method.
However, if you want to check several variables, this will take time – also, A / B tests do not give you any information about the interactions of different elements on your landing page. Therefore, you should supplement the split testing with multivariate tests.
Multivariate tests
Multivariate tests use the same mechanisms as the classic split test. The difference is that here several elements of your page are tested simultaneously to find out how they influence each other.
The aim is to determine which combination of variants achieves the best result. The traffic is divided into smaller segments according to the number of combinations or variants played, which requires a relatively high number of visitors.
2. Simple landing page structure
Lack of clarity is one of the most common reasons for leaving a website. To convince the potential customer with your landing page optimization and at best direct it directly into your sales funnel, you should rather rely on a simple structure without distraction, such as pop-ups triggered directly during the visit.
Too much text, competing for CTA buttons, and several offers placed side by side will also confuse your visitors rather than support them. Instead, you can do without elements that are not necessary and create a visual hierarchy through the coloring: Your call-to-action, for example, should be clearly emphasized by size, central placement, and a contrasting color tone.
3. Remove the main navigation
To ensure that the visitor to your landing page performs the desired target action, you should not offer them any opportunities for diversion. This also includes the main navigation: This can have a distracting effect on your potential customer, as it prompts him to look around and leave the landing page, including the offer.
4. Position important content “above the fold.”
The meaning and content of your landing page should become apparent to visitors in the first few seconds. To ensure this, the most important content can be placed “above the fold,” ie, in the immediately visible area of your landing page:
- The central call for action (CTA),
- Your promise of performance,
- the main arguments (e.g., in three to five bullet points) and
- visual impressions of your offer.
5. Give visual information
Offering visitors what they came for should be your top priority in terms of customer orientation in landing page optimization.
In order to support the user in his search, you should set up clear visual signs on the landing page. This can be, for example, a photo of a person who is looking towards your CTA button, or an arrow pointing to a CTA or headline. With this optical support, you can direct your visitor’s attention exactly to where the next action or relevant information can be found.
6. Integrate live chat
As Drift.com found out in a large-scale study, the first five minutes count when contacting a new lead. If your potential customer has a question, the best thing to do is to react in real-time so that you don’t miss a valuable opportunity.
At this point, live chat is a good option to be available as a direct contact for visitors to your landing page during normal working hours. Any questions and doubts that arise can be cleared up immediately and give the customer additional security. This is advantageous in terms of customer orientation as well as for lead acquisition and sales.
7. Meet user expectations
If your landing page has a lot of traffic, but a high bounce rate and suboptimal conversion rates, this could be because visitors’ expectations are not being met. If your page ranks for the wrong keyword, for example, you may attract a lot of interested parties who, however, cannot find what they are looking for and will quickly disappear accordingly. Therefore, you should optimize your landing page for the right keywords.
Google Analytics provides important starting points for this. The general rule is: offer your visitors what they are looking for. When advertising your landing page, you should also make sure that the advertising promise and the actual content or your offer coincide. Otherwise, your visitors go back confused – possibly directly to the competition.
8. Use Fear-of-Missing-Out (FOMO)
If your landing page visitors are afraid of missing out on a good deal, they are more likely to convert: in 2016, scientists found that the time limit for offers had a positive effect on willingness to buy.
And the shortage of product inventories also fuels this concern: You can keep this deep-rooted fear-of-missing-out in mind when optimizing your landing page and use it in a targeted manner by using the Create an impression of scarcity and thereby a sense of urgency. If you offer an e-book or a demo on your landing page, you should limit the offer and communicate this. Because next to your CTA is the information “only three pieces,” that motivate your potential customers to buy or convert.
However, caution is required at one point: this strategy should not be used excessively, otherwise, you will lose credibility. However, there is nothing standing in the way of occasionally using the method as a booster for conversions.
9. Effective words in the CTA
Your landing page optimization stands or falls with the call-to-action. If the call for action is unclear or unattractive, this reduces the chance of conversions.
Formulations such as “secure your free template now” work particularly well because they contain a clear call for action and use an activating verb. At the same time, they emphasize the advantage (“free”) for the lead.
On the other hand, you should avoid bland formulations such as “submit,” as these arouse exciting little associations. Another point in this context is the coordination of your CTA button with your headline and the form button: Not only should the layout and design be adjusted here but also the language register used and the choice of words should harmonize with one another in order to give a uniform picture.
10. Short forms
If you want to keep your bounce rate low, you shouldn’t torture your visitors with detailed forms. Because too many fields tend to deter potential leads. Instead, it would help if you only asked for the most important information in your form.
Only query data that you absolutely need for lead generation and subsequent nurturing or subsequent lead segmentation.
For a newsletter subscription, for example, querying the e-mail address may be sufficient. If you do not have a job title, company size, telephone number, fax number, you can reduce the number of fields in the form. You should also design the form in two columns in order to give the impression of brevity. So your leads are more likely to fill it out.
