Landing pages are one of your main anchors when it comes to claiming those conversions. We all know the journey – a customer follows your call to action, gets directed to your landing page, and instead of getting that conversion in the hag – they bounce.
The average conversion rate for a landing page is just shy of 10%.
Whether you’re hitting that average or falling short, it’s always beneficial to up your landing page game so you can enjoy higher conversion rates. We take a look at 10 ways you can optimize your landing pages for better results.
1. Identify technical issues
Take a good look at your landing page and see if you can figure out what is and what isn’t working. Taking stock of your page and even getting third party input can help identify potential issues.
Using tools and visual data reports, such as a heat map, can also help you to see where your visitors are clicking, scrolling, and spending their time on the page which can help you deduce where they could be bouncing and why.
2. Work on a solid load speed
One of the major reasons that customers bounce? Slow page load speeds.
A whopping one to four visitors will leave a landing page if it takes more than four seconds to load – and for every one second delay, this drops customer satisfaction by 16%.
That doesn’t leave a lot of room for error, and means that getting your page up to speed should be a top priority.
3. Have a clear direction
A good landing page should focus on an overall message and have one clear, compelling call to action.
If there are multiple calls to action and too much information collected in the same place, this could lead to customer overwhelm and confusion, which isn’t great for landing page success. Having one clear call to action helps the consumer take the next step in their journey.
4. Put your offer before the fold
Don’t make people hunt for your offer. Instead, place it center stage so your customers understand clearly what it is you have to give. By putting the offer above the fold, you aren’t asking anyone to scroll to find out what you want to say.
Space on the page is prime real estate and you shouldn’t throw any of that away with lengthy intros about your business. By adding the offer first, potential customers can decide if they want to scroll down to find out who you are and what credentials support your expertise.
5. Make a visual impact
An ideal landing page is a place where people want to stay, and for this it needs to be visually interesting too. To keep people engaged and on the page, you want to avoid big chunks of text and break it up with short and snappy paragraphs and visual interest.
Infographics and well-chosen images can help. Video content can also increase your landing page success by up to 86%. Don’t go OTT on the images and videos though, as this can lead to overwhelm and will also negatively impact your page load speed.
6. Make your landing pages mobile friendly
In today’s modern world with more and more users accessing landing pages outside of the confines of their desktop, you should be ensuring your landing pages are mobile friendly.
Mobile friendly landing pages have even been found to have a higher conversion rate than desktop based versions, with the former coming in at 11.7% as opposed to 10.7%.
How do you make your landing pages mobile friendly? Keep them simple and short, make sure they have a fast load time and a singular call to action, and strip any sign-up forms right down to the bare minimum (more on that below).
7. Give it great copy
Content is still king, and while landing pages shouldn’t overload on the text or information point, you do want to make what little text you have leap off the page.
You want your content to be short and snappy – and also one hundred percent on brand. Stick with your brand tone of voice and talk to your audience directly. You also want to make sure that your copy is genuine rather than too salesy or too vague.
8. Keep sign-up forms short
People aren’t super keen to hand out a load of information about themselves, especially in the online space. If you’re asking your customers to form fill, you’re best keeping it stripped right down.
Of course, one of the major reasons to have landing pages is for that all important collection of data, information, and emails for further marketing efforts. By taking your landing page sign-up form down to four fields, you can boost your conversion rate by 120%.
9. Include testimonials
Your consumer could get 90% through the process of filling in forms and may stutter when it comes to actually clicking the confirm or commit button.
At this last stage, testimonials can help to seal the deal. Around 90% of customers will check reviews before choosing your product or service, so by adding testimonials to your landing page you’re adding even more value and saving them time.
You can add a couple of well-placed testimonials in relevant places on the page, or even pick a carousel to display reviews in a non-invasive, clean, and concise manner.
10. A door to more
It’s truly important that your landing page serves as a door to more and delivers something of value to your customers.
Ebooks, guides, webinars, masterclasses, great offers – if you’re asking your customers to impart information or spend time on your landing page, you really need to ask yourself if you’re making it worth their time.
When imparting your offer, be as clear as you can. No one wants click-baity landing pages, shifting goal posts, and a famine or feast offering below their nose – they want clarity, confidence, and something satisfying. When they get that, they are more compelled to go through the conversion process.
If you need help designing great landing pages and optimizing them for best results, reach out to our team for a consultation.
