Landing pages should be a part of every company’s marketing plan. It’s a focused way to teach people what you do, the benefit of your product/service as well as collect their information so you can deepen the relationship.
You can create landing pages on your website, Facebook, other people’s website, 3rd party platforms, etc.
Some businesses may want to collect emails while others want more detailed information like phone number and address.
Before starting this business I worked for a company that will remain nameless. I worked in their marketing department.
We created a really cool campaign with the local zoo. We were going to have an animal of the month, there would be voting, prizes and just lots of fun and engagement.
The only mistake was there was no customer connection weaved into the campaign.
It bombed.
The campaign was fun and the customers loved it, but it didn’t help us grow.
We didn’t try to collect emails or develop any kind of connection after it was over.
All the hard work we put behind creating the marketing sequence, landing pages and improving our conversion left us depressed.
I was depressed.
I knew that we needed better landing pages, but at the time I didn’t fully understand why.
Now I know.
There are three big mistakes most company’s make with their landing page:
- Lack of Focus
- Clumsy Design
- No Testing
The most important aspect of a landing page is it’s focus. That’s where we’ll start.
1. Lack of Focus
Focus is an overused term, but that’s because it’s so important. People don’t have a lot of time to figure out what you want from them. You have to be exciting, trustworthy and convincing.
Everything extraneous, remove it.
Home Depot vs Lowe’s credit card landing page.
Let’s look at Home Depot’s credit card landing page first.
You can see that Home Depot doesn’t have a definite focus. What are the benefits of signing up for a credit card from them?
If they asked themselves this simple question that could craft a better landing page that promotes what helps their customer.
Home Depot also has too many places to click around. Give them a few key links to click then focus the rest of the page on capturing their excitement around owning a Home Depot credit card.
The next landing page is from Lowe’s:
I guarantee that Lowe’s credit card landing page has a higher conversion rate than Home Depot’s.
Lowe’s gives you three options all geared at a certain type of consumer. 5% off is for people who shop at Lowe’s regularly, 18 months is for smaller projects and 84 months is for those big projects that people can’t afford, but want to do if given the right incentive.
It’s simple, effective and most important of all focused on why a person should sign-up for a credit card.
2. Clumsy Design
In this day and age there is no excuse for clumsy design. You see the benefits of a clean and focused design like Lowe’s. For businesses to do this in today’s era is no excuse. Millions of people are looking for excuses to clock away. If you give them the slightest excuse that’s exactly what will happen.
Nordstrom is a great store, but their online presence needs work.
You can see that Nordstrom didn’t put hardly any design into their credit card landing page. It’s all text.
People need images to help guide them through the page. It builds trust and makes it easy for people to make their next choice.
Sometimes great copy does well on landing pages, but in this case I doubt it.
NORDSTROM BANK is a terrible headline. (They need to entice and build trust.)
Manage Your Account: Easy Access and Convenient Tools (Everybody has these features. What makes Nordstrom’s credit card special?)
Nordstrom Bank offers a variety of options for managing your Nordstrom credit card.
They aren’t selling the sizzle or the steak.
You must deliver smiles in your landing pages or you may as well use your money to light your next fire.
Let’s get back to the design.
They need to create images that inspire trust and excitement. They most certainly will see their conversion go way up.
3. No Testing
The last mistake small businesses make when developing their landing pages are fail to test what is working and what isn’t. Testing is vital to improving your landing page.
You really never know what will work for your customers until you test to see what works and what doesn’t.
In the above screen shot we need more impressions to see what landing will eventually work better, but when we know which one performs better I’ll delete the weaker one and work off of the page that is preforming better.
What are your top 3 most popular pages on your website? (About page, blog post, official landing page, etc.)
1.
2.
3.
Look at the main action that you want your visitor to take. How can you make it even easier for them to want to deepen their connection with you?
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Once you focus in on the number one action you want people to take on each of your high traffic pages then you reach more people.
* If you are visiting because a friend referred you to this page. You should check out the whole Close Your Connection Gaps and Reach More People Course. You can sign-up here.