What Is a Landing Page? [Landing Pages Explained 2021]

Everybody talks about landing pages.

They say you should use them for your business otherwise you’re missing out.

Or maybe you’ve just heard the term “landing page” countless of times without much explanation, or a clear one.

It’s time to shed a light on this “mysterious” topic and get clear about the real value of landing pages.

via GIPHY

 

 

What is a landing page in marketing? 

A landing page is a stand-alone, simplified version of your webpage that has a single point of focus.

Simply put, it is your branded page that is often part of your main site, but it has much less visual clutter, and it has a singular goal. The goal can be anything – from collecting newsletter signups and ebook downloads to receiving job applications and new leads or purchases.

Any element, visual or text that doesn’t support that goal, is removed to have as little distractions as possible. Therefore, it creates a highly relevant experience for the visitor.

The simplicity of the page helps to maximise the possibility that a person visiting your site will perform your preferred action. And that’s the reason it’s often used in online advertising or email marketing campaigns.

The three must-have elements of the landing page are:

• value proposition aka text
• hero image
• lead capturing form

We’re not going in detail about each of these elements, but just make clear that a landing page only has elements that add value and support to your goal.

Here’s an example from Bolt, a cab-lifting service provider.

Bolt’s drivers landing page example

 

What is the difference between a landing page and a homepage?

The nature of a homepage is to be informative by containing all the details about a company.

It needs to cater to everyone’s needs who come to the site for different reasons: some have no idea about your company, some want to read about page or blog, some others research your products or services… you get the idea.

So, whilst the homepage encourages visitors to discover various pages, people brought to the landing page are interested in a specific offer or promise.

Hence, the landing page has just one goal or call to action (CTA, for short). It focuses on bringing you leads such as email subscribers, inquiries about your services or job applicants.

Below you can see the homepage of WordStream where above the fold, you can notice the call to actions: Grade My Google Ads Account, Start My Free Trial and Watch Video To Learn More. At the top of the homepage, there is a navigation bar with all the different possibilities and contact information.

WordStream’s homepage

Now let’s look at the WordStream’s landing page. As you may notice, it has much less distractions, no navigation bar and clear call to action.

WordStream’s landing page

This doesn’t mean that some of your website pages can’t act as a landing page. As a matter of fact, we recommend you to test it. For example, Backlinko has added two email newsletter signup forms on their about us page.

Backlinko’s signup form example

Thanks to these forms, their conversion rate is 4.49%. It’s not significant, but it’s infinitely higher if they didn’t use any form at all.

 

What are the benefits of using a landing page?

If you’re wondering if building a landing page is still worth the time and the investment, keep on reading.

We’ve summed up 10 reasons why you should start using them for your next marketing campaign.

 

1. They generate leads easier

They have a single focus and are fairly simplified. That makes it easy for a visitor to focus on the most important information and take your desired action. As a result, they are an effective tool for generating new leads for your business.

Before adding any element you should ask yourself “How is it going to help the visitor to perform my desired action?”. If the answer is “It isn’t”, then that element doesn’t deserve a space on the page.

 

2. They help you to learn more about your audience

By using many landing pages with forms, you can get to know your leads better.

Let’s say you have a landing page for capturing newsletter subscribers where you ask their name and email. And then you have another one for downloading educational content such as an ebook. Here, you may ask also their phone number and occupation. This way you can get to know your lead better and evaluate its quality for your business.

 

3. They display a focused and targeted message

The best practice is to create a new landing page for each campaign, educational piece, service or segment.

Let’s say you sell cars and car parts and want to set up some PPC advertising. Whilst it’s easy to have one landing page and make the visitor find their way out, the stats show it doesn’t yield in results.

A better way is to create two different pages, one for cars and one for car parts. This way the visitor interested in car parts sees products that he/she wants to see, hence making the message concise and to the point.

 

4. They increase conversions

Landing pages don’t have distractions like a regular website. It doesn’t have navigation or footer with all the links, making a landing page visitor more likely to convert.

According to the Omniture, the act of using a landing page to target your campaign traffic results in an average 25% increase in conversion rate. Impressive, right?

However, baffling 48% of the marketers build a new landing page for each marketing campaign (Source). That means half of the marketers don’t take advantage of this conversion increasing tool every time.

 

5. They are part of an effective PPC strategy

Matching the message of the landing page with your advertising campaign results in a highly relevant on-page experience. And that can improve results.

As you may know, a highly relevant landing page experience often results in an improved conversion rate and lower cost-per-click and advertising expense. Now, who doesn’t want to see their PPC cost go down and return on each euro spent raise?

 

6. They improve SEO 

An optimised landing page, specific about a certain topic, that uses targeted keywords and follows search engine optimisation (aka SEO) best practices will drive more organic traffic to your site. That can improve your domain authority and overall position in search engines. 

 

7. They leave a good first impression

As a vital touchpoint between your brand and potential lead (often initial one) landing pages help you to build your brand in the minds of the visitors.

It will speak your brand’s language, both verbally and visually. So, use that chance to make a good impression.

 

8. They help with segmentation

If you offer a wide range of products or services to various target audiences, you can create a specific landing page for each separate segment.

Let’s face it if your customers are generation Z and baby boomers, they most definitely need a very different approach when it comes to messaging and offer.

 

9. They make results measurement simpler

Due to the single focus, it is easier to track if a user completes your desired action. Whilst we’re all about tracking each button click and complex customer’s journeys on companies’ websites, we’ve noticed it can be a headache for marketers or business owners.

Landing pages make it so much easier.

For example, if the goal of the page is to drive newsletter signups, then you simply track form completions.

 

10. They make testing and optimisation easy

You can run tests fast and smooth on almost every element of the landing page.

There are several things you can tweak and tinker to discover the version that brings you the most engagement and conversions. Thankfully by using A/B testing we can fine tune elements (yep, change the colour of a call-to-action button or number of fields in a form) to find an optimised solution.

There are various landing page builders out there that can make editing a landing page hassle-free. Contacting your web developer about making any small changes (you know, changing that text or the background image) is in the past. Phew.

 

How does a landing page work?

1. You attract a potential lead to your landing page with an attractive offer.
2. On the landing page the visitor fills out the contact form in exchange for something valuable for him. That means a visitor becomes a lead.
3. You store the information about that lead in your customer relationship management (CRM) system or similar system.
4. You use these information to qualify the lead for your marketing and sales purposes and keep them in the loop.

Let’s look at an example.

Shopify provides companies with eCommerce website solutions that helps them to find customers, drive sales and manage their day-to-day activities.

Shopify created an advertising campaign for people interested in starting their own dropshipping business. For this, they run Facebook Ads,  but they could also use any other channel – Google Ads, Instagram Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Reddit etc.

On the ad, they combined eye-catching, bright and simple visual with a message about saving time and energy by using their platform to open an eCommerce business.

Shopify’s Facebook Ads

The ad leads to the landing page with a consistent visual and message. Above the fold, you can notice a form that captures leads. Shopify has made this process very simple for visitors, by just asking their email address.

Shopify’s landing page

 

What is a good conversion rate for a landing page?

The average conversion rate across all industries is 2.35% (WordStream). That means out of 100 people that visit your landing page just two will perform your preferred action. But this doesn’t mean that you cannot see a much higher conversion rate.

The same study by WordStream showed that 25% of landing pages are converting at 5.31% or higher, and the top 10% have conversion rates of 11.45% or higher. Now that sounds better right?

So, it all comes down to quality.

What about conversion rate in a specific industry? Below you can see a breakdown of median conversion rates for landing pages across 16 industries.

 

Conclusion

I hope you enjoyed our article about landing pages and on your next marketing campaign, you take advantage of them to generate leads and increase conversion.

A/B test landing page elements to figure out the most optimised solution, so you too can enjoy a conversion rate of 11.45% or much higher.

If you need a hand with building a high-quality landing page for your next campaign, reach out, we can help you.