Increase Conversion – The Top 10 Landing Page Tips.

If you are reading this then you are most probably an internet marketeer who is investing both time and money in your website.  Let’s face it, the cost of PPC traffic is rising and the golden days of “build it and they will come” are just a dim and distant memory.  In these times of economic misery it is more important than ever to make sure any visitor to your site is pointed in the right direction, that direction being the make you money direction!

What is a landing page?

For the newbies amongst us I think the landing page warrants an explanation.  The landing page is the webpage that your user lands on from a navigation route on the web be it a PPC ad, banner or affiliate link.  This page is not necessarily your home page and 9 times out of 10 shouldn’t be your home page but a page that is relevant to the original user’s search term.

Most people sadly do just point their ads to their homepage, your home page may be brilliantly written and look great but it will murder your chances of conversion.  Below are the top 10 tips to make that visitor a customer just by pointing them in the right direction.

As a marketeer any page of your site is technically a landing page and attention and time should be spent optimizing these for conversion as much as possible, but this post is geared towards a landing page built specifically for paid traffic, such as adwords or email marketing.  These landing pages will almost be like a mini site giving a user added benefits, further information and a clear route to subscription or purchase.

Your customer has done you the honour of visiting your website through an advert of some nature, you now have a captive person ready to buy.  It is now your duty as a webmaster to sell to him or her.  They want to be sold to so why so many people make it so difficult for them I have no idea.  Read the tips and hopefully you will be able to increase your conversion in one hit!!

Top 10 Landing Page Tips

1. Relevancy

Ensure that your user lands in a place that is relevant to the advert headline they have come from.  You need to form a familiarity with them as soon as they arrive.  Your page title ideally will be the same as the one in the advert they have come from.  Your visitor instantly knows they are in the right place and are encouraged to read on.

TIP 1 IS A VITAL ONE IF YOU IGNORE THE OTHER 9 PLEASE JUST FOLLOW THIS ONE

2.Tell them what to do, A call to action.

A call to action is your opportunity to push your customer in a certain direction. Tell them what you want them to do. Some people use graphic buttons others use headlines.  Test this out.  Change things around and see what improves conversion and what people don’t like.

3. Page Layout & Size

Before writing your body copy consider size and the space you have available.  You don’t want people having to scroll below the fold if possible.  The ideal landing page puts everything they need to see on the one screen.

4. Message – Be concise and not too clever!

Be concise and not too clever?  We have all been there, trying to think of the coolest, witty, sometimes unfathomable and indecipherable marketing campaign or tag line for our product or company.

If you’re selling bikes, put a picture of the bike you’re selling on the page, not a weird take on selling bikes like a picture of a puncture repair kit with a tag line like “we don’t let you down”.  This sounds straightforward but you would be amazed how many people think they stand out from the crowd by being different.  Stand out from the crowd by giving your customer what they want.

5. Write in the correct person – The second one!

I have read varying opinions on this one and I am in the “You & Your” camp.  The customer is only interested in how you can help them. They don’t want to read “I started selling bikes when I was a lad” they want “You can save 15% by purchasing your bike from us”

6.Keep to the point – Make them follow your route

It is very easy to lose your way when writing sales copy.  Think of writing a sales piece as a journey (I know that sounds corny as hell).  The headline is the start and the sale is the destination.  It is very easy to go off on tangents such as “we also sell this and that” – this diverts your route to sale and should be avoided as it will cost conversion.

7.Formatting – Yes there is a recognised structure!

Most people read the beginnings and end of things to assess whether,
A: They are in the right place
B: Whether they want to use their time reading your page.

Your top and bottom messages must be perfect.  Experiment with them but always have your important info in these positions.  Paragraphs should be kept short and sweet with no more than 7 lines in any one paragraph.

8. First Paragraph – Short and Sweet.

The first paragraph should be short and to the point – no more than 2 lines.
Get your message across quickly.

9.Your Message

List or bullet points are a great to convery your message.  They make skim readers pause on the page and read each line of your message.

.  Bullets work exceptionally well.
.  They slow the reader.
.  The mind ensures you read each line in case you miss something.
. Make the last line a call to action.

10. Make them go where you want them to

You only want them to follow the journey that you have pre-planned for them.  Remove all the unnecessary gubbins from your page.  Navigation that goes to places they don’t need to visit, extra ads etc…  You are spending this time and effort to produce an outcome that you have pre-planned so be careful what choices you give the user.

10a: Test it – there is a science.  Sorry – couldn’t fit them into 10!

Test your page within an inch of its life. The copy is just one small part of a massive puzzle.  Different colour ways, shorter forms, brighter buttons, imagery, adding of video all have a massive impact on the effectiveness of your page.  Get your tracking in place and then notate all your changes.  It is easier to change one thing at a time and see what effect that has rather than wholesale changes and knowing what has really made the difference. You can use testing techniques to get really good stats from the smallest of changes. Check out Multivariate Testing. This allows the use of software to get the info you need.

Good luck guys, let me know if you see an increase in conversion.