All too often, marketers make the mistake of sending campaign traffic to a website’s homepage, and not a dedicated landing page.
First impressions are everything, and a well designed landing page is the best way to generate new leads directly from paid marketing campaigns. Below, we’ll explain a few key reasons why you should use landing pages in your paid marketing campaigns.
What is a landing page?
A landing page is a single dedicated page containing ONE call-to-action for the visitor. The call-to-action (CTA) is what we want the visitor to complete.
The CTA can vary based on your campaign goals. Popular examples include signing up for a newsletter, submitting a form to receive more information, or scheduling an appointment for a service.
We love landing pages because they box users in, and produce measurable and testable results. Results that you can show your boss and take home to your Mom.
Here are a few reasons why we like them so much:
1. Focused lead generation
Because a landing page only focuses on one goal, the visitor is more likely to complete the call-to-action. While conversion rates on a website are generally lower than 2%, landing pages can often have conversion rates of 10% or higher.
Whether it be signing up for a free proposal or scheduling a demo, the moment they complete this call-to-action you have secured a new lead.
Most businesses are going to have a longer sales cycle than a single interaction. You wouldn’t expect to sell a user on a several thousand dollar software subscription on the first visit right? It’s better to capture their name, email address and phone number so that you can follow up with them directly.
2. You control the messaging and the CTA (call to action)
While your website is meant to appeal to all types of visitors — current customer or not, a landing page is designed to have specific messaging and a specific conversion goal aligned with where the user is in the buying process.
This is your first opportunity to capture their attention and help them understand the benefit they get for subscribing to your product or service.
Giving something in exchange for a lead is a great way to maximize your conversion rate. A PDF download, e-book, or access to a free webinar all are effective ways to do this.
3. You can improve your results with A/B testing
One of the best things about landing pages is that you can easily A/B test them to see which one drives more conversions. This can make a significant impact on the performance of your campaign.
We recommend testing from ‘big to small’. Work on the biggest differentiators like two different CTAs (call to action) first to determine a winner. Then focus on smaller things like button color and text positioning.
Ongoing A/B testing over time will lead to the best campaign results. We use Unbounce to A/B test and set conversion goals for our landing pages.
In summary:
Once you have found an effective landing page + campaign formula, it’s time to scale up your campaign budgets. There are a lot of technical implementation steps involved so reach out to us before you get started to avoid pitfalls and save time.
