What is an Effective Landing Page?

At Adpearance, we refer to landing page as conversion pages, because essentially, that’s all they are. Conversion pages are meant to convert. A common mistake is to think that a homepage will convert; its primary focus is to inform the visitor about the company and let us know what to expect on all the other pages of the site. When you drop visitors into the homepage of your site, it’s akin to asking them to fend for themselves. They arrive and spend a couple seconds confusedly trying to figure out the next step before giving up and hitting their back button, moving onto your competitor. A homepage is not meant to convert; landing pages are.

Every element on the landing page supports the intent to convert. Extraneous content is stripped away and the remaining items are targeted and compelling. At the heart of the page are the visitors themselves; you should be using motivating messaging, relevant imagery, a focused message, contextual content, and no extra distractions. In this post-click world, the visitor never has to ask, “What now?”

8 Elements that Make a Landing Page Effective

1. Clear compelling headline that ties directly to the incoming ad. If the ad the visitor clicked used language about “buying red shoes,” then your landing page had better have a large headline that says, “Buy Red Shoes at Our Store.” By using a template, you can generate multiple pages with slightly varying content, so one ad group would have a destination landing page that speaks about “blue shoes” and another could have its own unique page about “green shoes.” The more specific your landing page can be, the higher chance the visitor will convert.

2. Succinct text that focuses on features and benefits. A landing page is not the place to write your company philosophy. Keep paragraphs to under three lines and uses bullet points when possible. Vocabulary should be simple and readable, so avoid jargon or lengthy constructed sentences.

3. Clearly visible and strong call to action. Your visitor should know within the first two seconds of visiting your page what the next action step is. Use large, contrasting buttons to emphasize your conversions. Avoid using the default “Submit” on as the button on forms; instead use language like “Get approved now” or “Schedule your free consultation.”

4. Relevant images or video. A picture speaks a thousand words, so make sure you’re speaking the right thing. Avoid cliché stock photography (smiling woman at a computer theoretically happily filling out your request info form). Instead use product photos when possible or imagery that supports the content of your page.

5. Trust indicators, like testimonials or association icons. Trust indicators have been known to increase conversions by up to 3x. Testimonials or association logos signify that your company is a trusted business and is recommended by others.

6. Minimum number of links on the page. Don’t include the full navigation of your website on your landing page. It splits the attention of the visitor into clicking on a non-converting page instead of following the intended steps of the landing page to a desired conversion. Don’t include a link unless it is absolutely necessary.

7. All relevant content appears about the fold. “Above the fold” refers to the visible space of the page seen on a standard monitor before the user must scroll down. Similar to its newspaper counterpart, above-the-fold content contains the most important information. This is where your headline and your call to action should be.

8. A/B or multivariate testing to optimize pages or conversions. However well your landing page is performing, it could do better. Create variations of your page, testing items like button color, headline language, imagery, or call-to-action language and discover what combination works best for your group of customers.