A simple, no-nonsense, beginners guide to Landing Pages

A simple, no-nonsense, beginners guide to Landing Pages

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In today’s fast-paced, fine-tuned, “every detail counts” world, it can be easy to lose yourself in all the details and stray away from common sense. Often times when you’re starting out on a new project there’s so much “advice” out there that it’s easy to become overwhelmed by all the how-to guides and the hundreds of people wanting to give you their every little tip towards success. Trying to figure out the necessary components of a stellar landing page is a perfect example of this – type “landing page” into Google and you’ll get about twenty-eight million results, each one pushing a different path towards the perfect landing page design. Sure, all this information could be helpful, but where do you get started? We’ve put this “geek-free” guide together for those of you interested in the “base ingredients” of the landing page cake rather than the finer points of icing styles.

Make it obvious. This one seems like a no-brainer at first, but you’d be surprised at how many people overlook this, well, obvious step. The people arriving on your page are probably eager to check out whatever product or service you’re providing, but that enthusiasm will quickly diminish if your landing page feels more like a hall of mirrors than a well-marked walkway towards conversion. Make sure your call to action is big, bold, and most of all explains what you want the visitor to do. You can’t go wrong with “Sign Up Here!” or “Get Yours Today!”

Keep it simple. The expression “less is more” doesn’t hold true in a lot of cases (think dessert), but when it comes to landing pages, the less distractions you have on your page the better. Sure, I’d recommend removing any irrelevant photos and the automatic “background music” that your heavy-metal band recorded, but I’m talking about the copy itself. Make your sentences short, friendly, and to the point – this isn’t the time to tell your life story.

Don’t take more than you need. Yes, we all like to be nosy sometimes. And knowing as much about your customers as possible is certainly a good thing – who doesn’t love data? But take a second and flip the perspective around – no customer will be happy about a registration form that has twenty fields to fill out. Of course, some information is absolutely necessary, like an email address and a name, but do you really need to know their work phone, their company, and their favorite color? Keep in mind that a registration form with too many fields can discourage even the most gung-ho of customers.

Okay, you’ve got me – there are plenty of other things you can do to make your landing pages better. But if you follow these three big ideas you’ll be well on your way, and, to be honest, well ahead of most of the competition out there. When in doubt, just put yourself in a customer’s shoes (not literally, of course) and try to see things from their point of view – would you be converted?