5 Steps to Crafting a Killer Landing Page: Converts Great

Do you know what it takes to craft a killer landing page? Do you realize that websites with multiple landing pages (say 40) generate 500% more leads? Even having 30 landing pages generates 7 times as many leads. In part, that’s because you must match your landing page with individual target markets you hope to attract and convert. Let’s start with the anatomy of a landing page:

Anatomy of a killer landing page

I recommend that you download the image of a killer landing page to keep it on your desk or tack it to your bulletin board so you can easily compare each new landing page against this anatomy.

A landing page has one job: guiding a visitor toward a single, specific action. Whether you’re hoping to gain email subscriptions, make a sale, or gain a lead, your landing page is a critical element that deserves your best efforts if you hope to ring the cash register. Today, we’ll cover the essentials needed to craft a killer landing page.

Next, we’ll go over the five elements that are essential for every landing page to optimize conversion. Following that, we’ll discuss the steps that lead to a successful launch of your brand-new landing page. So, buckle up!

First, here are the five essential elements needed to optimize conversion:

1. Put your best foot forward
2. Adding social proof
3. Offering clear benefits
4. Other core elements you need on your landing page
5. A great user experience

Tailor everything on your landing page to a specific persona (target market). In an unpublished marketing study, we found that consumers are much more likely to purchase a product they see as “for them”, which means using images and words that resonate with your market. I read one study where an image that included a small piece of a car’s license plate was enough to depress sales among residents of other areas, versus those represented by the license plate.

1. Put your best foot forward

You only have about 3 seconds to capture a visitor’s attention when they land on your landing page. And that includes the time it takes for your page to load. Slow load speeds or wasted valuable space on the first screen of content (termed above the fold, as it appears without requiring the visitor to scroll down) quickly send visitors running for the exit. Your time is even shorter when a visitor is using a mobile device.

Here’s what you should keep in mind as you create the hero section of your page:

• A hero image, such as the one above, for my website. The image is clean, yet it focuses on the key elements of why you should consider using my company to rock your marketing.
• A single CTA (call to action). In my case, it invites you to learn about my coaching program. Other landing pages focus on other services offered and include their own CTA. Don’t try to add a bunch of CTAs, hoping one will appeal to the visitor.
• A value-driven headline. Mine is “A data-driven strategy for an AI world”. You want to focus on benefits, not features.
• Supporting headline that expands on the headline by stressing benefits.

2. Social proof

Social proof is a powerful incentive that makes visitors comfortable in making a purchase decision. It’s the foundation of advertising and influencer marketing, as consumers like to buy based on recommendations from peers. Social proof provides trust (adding credibility to brand claims), and the more closely the consumer identifies with the influencer, the stronger the impact on purchase intentions.

There are lots of ways to include social proof to craft a killer landing page, including:

• Reviews, ratings, and testimonials
• Including the logos of prior clients
• Media mentions
• Data and metrics that demonstrate the return you achieved for others. For instance, on a landing page for my content marketing services, I include the results achieved for one client (1100 visitors per day after one week).

3. Focus on benefits, not features

A killer landing page shows clearly how a consumer benefits from buying your product. A good example of this is the old way companies promoted tech products. For instance, a computer manufacturer might tout the 10 gigabytes of storage on their device. How much storage is 10 gigabytes? Will it hold 1000 documents or the Library of Congress? I’m in tech and I have no idea. Further complicating the ability of a user to translate the storage into something usable, not all content is the same. So, a few videos and a bunch of images might strain the capacity. Who knows.

You should highlight how buyers benefit from a purchase. That’s one of the reasons why you want multiple landing pages, even when promoting the same product. For instance, if you manufacture cookware, you might want to emphasize different benefits for home cooks versus professional chefs. A home cook might care about it being dishwasher safe, easy to clean, and attractive, while a chef is more likely to care about durability, even cooking, and affordability.

Bullet points should build on the most salient benefit for whatever group is the target for your killer landing page. These benefits should clearly articulate your value proposition.

4. What are the core elements of a killer landing page

Every landing page must contain the following elements:

In addition, include lots of white space to make your page more inviting and easy to read. Organization is key, so put the most impactful elements near the top of the page. Your CTA is the single most critical element in developing a killer landing page. Consider ways to improve your text, such as those below:

Colors and fonts, as well as images, are essential for appealing to your target market, as well as drawing the visitor’s attention to key elements of your landing page.

This leads us directly to the next element that’s essential for a killer landing page to deliver results.

5. User experience

Nothing you do to your landing page will generate results if your website doesn’t create a great user experience. Not only does a poor user experience encourage visitors to exit before making a purchase, but it also creates a poor brand image that engenders distrust. A poorly performing website says unprofessional. Here are things to consider when creating a great user experience:

• Fast load speed – a wait of more than two seconds on mobile or three on a computer can cost you big time. Lazy loading images and videos is one way to speed page loading. Another is caching your page so it doesn’t have to reload every time a visitor accesses it. Those old-fashioned image sliders and more modern galleries are death to load speeds.
• A mobile-first design – something we’ve discussed for the last decade, since smartphones proliferated. In fact, in some areas, mobile is the only way for users to access the internet. Not only does this mean you need a responsive design that turns navigation into a hamburger menu, but one that spreads buttons far enough apart to avoid accidental clicks and images that don’t fill an entire screen.
• Don’t force visitors to create a login to check out as a guest. Set up easy ways to log in, such as using Google or similar, as your login, and allow users to set up biometric verification, such as a face or fingerprint, rather than having to remember or save login information.
• A conversion process that’s easy and straightforward. Don’t request unnecessary information. If you want additional information for future marketing efforts, collect it via a thank-you email or similar device. Each additional element on a form or required click to convert lowers conversion rates significantly.
• Conversion isn’t the end of the user experience. You need to follow up with customers by providing answers to queries (a well-trained chatbot is great for this), up-to-date delivery information, a thank-you email, and a request for review after delivery. Remember, your ultimate goal for a killer landing page is to create repeat customers.

Final steps in crafting a killer landing page

Creating a landing page isn’t the end of the process. You should do a lot of testing before and after deployment to ensure your page is optimized for its target market. Monitor to ensure the page continues to deliver results, as you might need to adjust it over time. Also, you need to have a high degree of coordination between your landing page and any promotions designed to draw traffic to that page.

How to launch your landing page

You should never simply publish a landing page once you’ve designed it according to the recommendations shared above. You need to thoroughly test various elements by soliciting feedback from your target market. The steps in the process might involve:

Reviewing your copy
Testing user experience
Ensure your form functions effectively
Set up analytics and tracking

Review your copy

Here, you’re evaluating the appeal of the page, as well as whether it clearly articulates your offer to the target market. Among the elements to test are:

Headlines to ensure they align properly on various screen sizes
Your CTA is clear with no extra links to pull visitors away
The copy is free of spelling or grammatical errors
The page is scannable with key takeaways bolded, in contrasting color or font, text involves short paragraphs with clear headings, and has lots of white space

Test your user experience

Test your landing page with various screen sizes to ensure it looks and works as designed
Ensure the CTA stands out and is far enough from other elements to avoid accidental clicks
Are all elements legible against the background with contrasting colors? Older consumers have difficulty reading white text on a dark background, for instance.
Images are compressed to load quickly (for instance, a jpg versus png) to load quickly and contain an alt text for visually impaired visitors

Functional issues

Does the form request only the required information? Does it perform properly?
Does submitting the form send visitors to the correct page, such as a thank-you page that matches their order?
If your form offers a lead magnet, does it deliver this quickly?
Are there any broken links that land visitors on your 404 page?

Set up analytics and tracking

Tracking the performance of your page is what makes it a killer landing page. You must:

Ensure your site is connected to Google Analytics to track KPIs (key performance indicators) such as the ones above. Set up event tracking in the platform.
Add tracking pixels for Google, Meta, and other ad platforms you might use. This allows you to do remarketing to visitors who didn’t make a purchase or to market to prior customers.
Test the load speed
Add legal and other disclaimers, such as a privacy policy, terms of service, and cookies as required by law

Conclusion

Designing a killer landing page (or, more likely, pages) is essential for the success of your business online. If you follow the advice shared above, you should see results quickly. Let me know how it goes using the comments section below. Also, use this section if you have specific questions or would like to see future posts on other marketing topics. I always answer these comments quickly.

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Hausman and Associates, the publisher of MKT Maven, is a full-service marketing agency operating at the intersection of marketing and digital media. Check out our affordable coaching programs to help your business thrive into the future.

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