Your landing page is, without question, the hardest-working page on any website. It provides the first impression for your site. It sets the tone. It can either compel a visitor to stay and explore your site further, or cause them to bounce away from your site in favour of your competition. It serves as a roadmap to the rest of your site, through links. It communicates the main message of your website and invites the reader to know more. That’s some heavy lifting for one web page, right? Creating a great landing page for your blog is important if you plan to engage in blogger outreach services. When a blogger links to your site, it’s that page that they will likely want to link to, so make it great. If it’s not, if it doesn’t tell the whole story of who you are and why you are a good fit for that blogger, they won’t likely want to link to your site. Let’s look at some of characteristics of the best landing pages.
Clean, uncluttered design
The overall feel and design of your landing page will have a profound effect on its effectiveness and its ability to create conversions. Your landing page should be designed in such a way as to make it very easy for your site visitors to convert. All the page elements should conspire to achieve the ultimate goal of conversion. The landing page should compel site visitors to answer your call to action, whether that is signing up for your newsletter, downloading an e-product, or making a purchase.
Use colours, fonts, layout, and images in effective ways to drive conversions. Whatever colour you choose for your site’s buttons, for example, be sure there is a high level of contrast between those buttons and the background of your website. Your choice of layout may involve a bit of trial and error to find out what works and what doesn’t, but it’s important to keep things clean and uncluttered, not only so things are easy to find, but also so your site’s message can take centre stage without getting lost under too much design.
Embrace minimalism
When it comes to the design of your landing page, a minimalist approach is best. Create your page with the end user in mind. Avoid popups (which most site visitors will find annoying) and utilize intuitive navigation design to encourage visitors to explore your site past the landing page.
Break up the text
We live in an instant-gratification society. To allow visitors to digest your main landing page message quickly and easily, it’s a good idea to break up the text so it can be easily and quickly scanned. Large blocks of text will likely be ignored. Use headings, numbered lists, and bullet points to break up the text into more manageable bites so your readers don’t get bogged down.
Consider the fold
“Above the fold” is an old newspaper term that refers to the most important information in the front-page story being display on the top half of a folded newspaper cover, or “above the fold.” That’s because this is prime real estate for the story; it’s what people see first when the see a newspaper. Translated into website terms, the “above the fold” content is what the website owner deems to be the most important information, the stuff that the reader needs to see first and foremost. If the above the fold information is compelling enough, website users will scroll down or click through to read more. Be concise above the fold; explain in more detail below it.
Take advantage of your headers
A solid landing page will present an effective “offer” to the readers, something they will get from you. A thing of value. The best landing pages utilize headings and subheadings to tell a site visitor loudly and clearly about this offer. You only have a few seconds to convince a reader to convert, so be clear with your message.
Establish trust
One of the biggest things you can do to help your landing page do its conversion job is to establish trust between you and your readers. With so many choices for companies to deal with, it’s important to most buyers that they feel they can trust. How do you establish trust? By utilizing what is referred to as “trust signals,” those site elements that tell a reader, whether explicitly or implicitly. One such trust signal comes in the form of testimonials. These are essentially votes of confidence for your website and they can go a long way toward inspiring other site visitors to trust you, too. Trust badges are another effective tool for establishing trust, too, as they indicate professional recognition, endorsements, etc. that you are earned, or groups or organizations to which you belong.
Create a responsive page design
Because so many people go online from their mobile devices these days, it’s crucial that your landing page be mobile friendly if you want to get the most conversions possible.
Customize your landing page to your target audience
When you create your landing pages, it’s a good idea to customize them based on the source that leads the reader to your landing page. Customize your content to appeal to a Facebook or Twitter user or a user that arrives on your page by way of a pay per click campaign.
Finally, it’s important to test out your landing page. Find out what works and what doesn’t. Monitor your site’s analytics to assess the movement of your conversion rates and bounce rates. If you find that visitors aren’t staying on your site and that they are navigating away from your landing page quickly, you’ll need to make some changes. To a large extent, creating an effective landing page is about trial and error, so you can find out what works best. And always bear in mind that your website isn’t a static thing. It’s a living organism that needs to change and adapt as the needs of your audience change. Be sure to check in periodically to find out what changes need to be made, and adjust accordingly.
IntelligentHQ Your New Business Network.
IntelligentHQ is a Business network and an expert source for finance, capital markets and intelligence for thousands of global business professionals, startups, and companies.
We exist at the point of intersection between technology, social media, finance and innovation.
IntelligentHQ leverages innovation and scale of social digital technology, analytics, news and distribution to create an unparalleled, full digital medium and social business network spectrum.
IntelligentHQ is working hard, to become a trusted, and indispensable source of business news and analytics, within financial services and its associated supply chains and ecosystems.
