When it comes to the world of digital marketing, SEO, SERP, and social media advertising, you are probably hearing a whole new set of words and concepts that may seem confusing. It can be incredibly frustrating as a business owner to send resources towards something not completely understood. We hope to rectify the mystery surrounding digital marketing.
A landing page is any standalone page, separate from your website. Your website is most likely a wealth of information about your company, whereas a landing page will serve a single, focused purpose. It serves an incredibly important function in a streamlined marketing funnel. It will be a follow-up to any promises or offers made in your content, such as a promoted social media post.
While traffic to your website is a good thing, a landing page is more likely to convert. Busy websites or product pages have the potential to muddy the waters, but a landing page drives toward a singular goal. If a visitor reaches your website with a single goal in mind, they may bounce if they have to look through other products or pages to find what they are looking for. (Bounce is the term when a visitor leaves your site. They bounce away. Therefore, the longer a visitor stays on your site, the lower the bounce rate. A low bounce rate is a good thing.) Think of your website as a wealth of general information, presenting all the options your company has to offer and more, and a landing page as focused and specific.
Depending on the goal of the campaign, the landing page can serve different purposes. Whether you want to generate leads, have visitors sign up for your mailing list, generate registration for an event, or sell a product, any landing page should only do one of these things at a time. Not to fear though, as the development of landing pages is much less complex than what the construction of your website may have been.
The ease of construction and deployment is not the only benefit of a landing page. Another benefit is the increased insights into your targeted audience and A/B testing. (A/B testing refers to deploying 2 very similar ads, with one difference to see which has more success. Imagine two identical ads geared toward pet owners, one using a dog picture while the other using a cat picture. The metrics will easily indicate early in the campaign which picture is more successful, so you can focus resources on that.) By developing various landing pages with specific offers and subtle differences, you can track which version has the highest conversion. This can give you valuable insight and information with other campaigns and content. Landing pages don’t only tell you what content your audience likes best, but which channels they are coming from the most. If you ran content on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn, and 80% of your conversions came from a specific channel, you can target future campaigns with increased targeting.
Let’s look at how a landing page might fit into your conversion funnel. Define your goal and work backward. While sales and profit are always the overarching goal, it is important to realize that this goal is achieved by smaller goals. Brand awareness, audience and follower growth, and sales are all examples of specific goals. When we refer to sales in regard to landing pages though, remember – one page per specific offer.
You decide you want to generate some new recipients for your mailing list. An ideal campaign would begin with a piece of content that makes an offer. (In the ‘Paid vs Organic’ article we discuss leaving this type of content out of organic posts and reserving sales and offers for paid promotion.) You create your Facebook post with an offer of 10% off all of your products or services. It’s a good idea to be upfront about this offer, as it will require a trade of some information. “Sign up to receive future offers and get 20% off your first order!” When a user clicks on the content, it takes them to your landing page. It’s a simple but pretty page, describing the trade. Sign up to receive future offers, and as a thank you, we will give you 20% off your next order. The page zeros in on the offer, not the company, and is focused and distraction-free. The form should be short and unintimidating. Not only has somebody been added to your mailing list, but you know they are interested in what you have to offer.
Different campaign goals will require the funnel and page to be developed similarly but with some modifications. Building multiple different landing pages for multiple different offers and goals is relatively easy.
Landing pages are an important part of any digital marketing campaign and funnel, and we hope some of the mystery has been lifted for you. We are also happy to ask any further questions you may have about landing pages, or any other aspect of digital marketing do not hesitate to reach out to us. Visit Wise Roots to get a free report on social media statistics with all the numbers you need to shape your strategy. Or just call. We love to talk shop and love to help!
