Not all landing pages are equal. For example, one that’s built for a Google Adwords campaign may work fine for people who arrive on your website from that source, but it could fail miserably on Facebook. But still, you need to create a landing page for everything.
Email marketing is no different. For a landing page to work in this form of promotion, it needs to continue the journey and brand experience set out in your original message.
It also needs to drive sales and do so in a way that delivers on the promise outlined in your campaign.
In this blog post, we’re going to offer eight quick-fire best practices for creating email-centric landing pages.
1. Work on urgency
If you’ve been following our tips on email marketing, your campaign will already focus heavily on creating a sense of urgency.
That’s great, until the recipient clicks the CTA and ends up on a non-urgent landing page. To avoid, this, use the same language featured in your email; “ends soon”, “hurry – last few left” – that kind of thing. Learn from your own subject line.
2. Avoid big forms
What data do you need from the person who’s clicked through to your landing page?
If you want them to download an eBook or add themselves to a new product announcement list, just ask for their email address. Long forms will put most sane people off.
3. Don’t waffle
Short, sharp sentences – that’s what your landing page copy needs.
A bit like the one above. And this one.
People don’t have time to read waffle about your company or hear how fabulous your new product is. They’ve demonstrate a degree of trust already by clicking through, so reward it with simple instruction.
4. Retain consistency
Take a look at the last email campaign you sent and the corresponding landing page.
Do they look similar? Or are could they be from two separate companies?
You’d be surprised by how many businesses make this mistake, and if a landing page does feature a look and feel that’s consistent with the email, you’ll lose that all-important trust factor almost immediately.
The same goes for your messaging – don’t try and get clever with your copy or the offer once people hit the website. They’re too smart for that.
5. Use just ONE call-to-action
It’s fine to have multiple calls-to-action (CTAs) on an email campaign, but on a website landing page, any more than one will usually result in a pretty terrible conversion rate.
Think about it – there really is just one thing you want people to do. Don’t confuse them by offering multiple options.
6. Create a landing page with a big red CTA
Historically, we’ve always been told that red is bad in marketing.
That may have been the case some time ago, but research has shown that red attracts more conversions than any other colour.
Have you been using green all this time and cursing your ability to increase leads? Try a red CTA instead!
And finally: make the CTA clear
You have mere seconds to retain the level of engagement you’ve already won with your email marketing campaign when someone lands on your website. Don’t waste them by either hiding the call-to-action or making it unclear what they’re supposed to do. Think transparency when you create a landing page.
Put your CTA within the top third of the screen (otherwise known as ‘above the fold’) and rely on just one sentence to explain what they need to do with it.
