20+ essential factors to build a high converting landing page

So, before diving deep into some of the best practices, let me address this evergreen question "What is a landing page?"

I see a lot of beginners mistaking landing pages to a web page/homepage.

Let me tell you what exactly a landing page means;

A landing page is a web page which has been created specifically for a particular marketing campaign.

Landing pages are made, keeping one specific goal in mind. Remember just ONE GOAL.

This goal can be anything from getting leads for your business, subscribers for your newsletter, registering people for your webinar/workshop or getting someone to purchase your product.

In technical terms, this goal is called a conversion.

In some cases, where you might have more than one goal, you should either build one page for each goal or upsell the other in the 'Thank you' page.

The number of goals per page is inversely proportional to the conversion rate.

Let me be honest. It’s hard to drive people to your landing page and even harder to keep their attention once they get there.

You only have a few seconds to engage your users. So make it count :)

Below are some of the important factors that you should keep in mind before building a landing page

Define the objective

Like I said earlier, your landing page should have just one goal.

Try and be very clear to yourself on what the objective is.

The clearer you are, the better the landing page is going to be.

Avoid having landing page clutter

Always keep your landing page clean & clear.

Distractions should be nill.

To achieve this, do not use too many elements in one section.

Avoid having multiple call to action with a different objective

This statement is self-explanatory.

Just in case in you don’t get it right, here’s what it means.

Having more than one call to action is completely fine provided all of them propel the visitors to one particular marketing objective which you defined earlier.

Delete any internal & external links that are present

Never have any internal & external links, CTA link being an exception here.

Both your header and footer should be clean with no navigational link.

The best way to address this is to have a logo and CTA in the header.

Footer can contain a logo and copyright credits.

The King: Landing Page Copy

The copy is the most crucial part of the landing page.

In order to achieve a high conversion rate, your landing page copy must be relevant to the ad copy or the copy from where the user has come.

Put yourself in the visitor’s shoes

Understand how much the visitor knows and how much more information would they need in order to convert.

Break the Monotony

Don’t put all that you have on the landing page.

Nobody wants to be bombarded with information.

Make each section look different.

Even if the copy is big it's your duty to break them down into digestible chunks.

Listing out the solutions/benefits/features in a focused box design always helps.

Avoid Jargons

Some sentences might sound smart but might not be meaningful.

Using simple sentences and articulating them better can keep your visitors in the page without them having to hop out to know what it means.

One of the best quotes I have come across when it comes to landing page copy is;

“If you’re trying to persuade people to do something, or buy something, it seems to me you should use their language, the language they use every day, the language in which they think.” –David Ogilvy

Pro tip:

Read your landing page copy out loud, if you can read out loud and still sound meaningful, then it means your copy is good to go.

Talk about Benefits & not Features

Talk to your visitor about the benefits that your product/service is going to provide.

Just don't keep them hanging by telling them the features.

Visitors would want to know how a particular feature would solve their use case.

Format it right

Use bulleted lists, short paragraphs and sentences, font formatting such as bolding and underlining, pull quotes, add headings and subheadings, increase line height and letter spacing.

Make your copy results-oriented

Talk numbers.

Data is god. Use data to convince visitors to buy your product/service.

Use colors and designs with respect to the objective

It's always good to use brand colors to keep the branding intact.

Colors can depend on your audience age and profession.

If you're selling an online course, use professional colors (Eg. Light blue) and designs.

If you're promoting a lead magnet for creatives, then you could use funky colors (Eg. Red, orange, etc.) and design.

Create a robust 1st fold of your landing page [Hero Section]

This section of your LP is vital.

You should try and spend most of your time here. The more time you dedicate to this section, the better it will turn out to be.

From my experience, this section should consist of 3 things, powerfull headline, visually appealing graphic (Image or Preferably video) of your product/service and a CTA.

A picture is worth a thousand words

Try and include as many pictures, videos, infographics of your P/S.

Pair it nicely with the text; this will help in engaging the visitors for real.

CTA is where the visitors take action, which is why it should stand out

Most of the times, your CTA might be overlooked; hence a bigger UI element will always make it more noticeable; in other words, make it look prominent.

Don’t just hyperlink your CTA, instead make it look like a button.

I prefer buttons with round edges or rectangles with curved edges.

Use colors like dark red, bright green or any other color which would be in contrast to your background color.

And most importantly, the size of the button should always be bigger than the other elements in the same section.

Do not use generic text like 'Register' 'Submit' on your CTA button

CTA is to get your visitors to take action and hence the text should always start with a verb.

Examples: "Download your free eBook now!" or "Start my Free Trial"

A study from Hubspot showed that generic text on CTA is not compelling enough.

Source 1 is mentioned in the comments below

Speak Directly to the Reader

Use language to speak directly to your reader.

User words & phrases like “you,” “your,” and “yours.”

Write your CTA button in the first person. For example: “Reserve my table” instead of the more traditional “Reserve your table” or “Make a reservation.”

79% of web users scan the page instead of reading it in depth

Source 2 is mentioned in the comments below

Hence make your page look better on each scroll. This again comes to the fundamentals of the clean and clear landing page structure and design.

Increase the trust factor by adding privacy guidelines and social proof

Adding privacy guidelines information makes it look more professional and builds trust with your visitors.

Adding testimonials/user reviews will give your visitors more reasons to buy since they’ve already seen the other users who have been benefitted by the P/S.

Consider adding a Video

Videos are always more engaging than text. If you have an introductory video of the P/S, do use it in the 1st fold.

Also, use video testimonials to boost your trust factor.

Create Scarcity

Deadlines. Give your visitors a deadline or create a "no point of return" situation.

They are what cause the visitors to take action.

Adding a countdown timer will address this in your landing page.

A sticky header with a CTA

I haven’t seen this feature with all the landing page builders out there, but they do exist with Elementor, Beaver Builder, etc. for WordPress.

This header section will always remain on the top of your visitors’ screen never letting your CTA button to go out of their vision.

If you have long copies which are preferred by most of the marketing experts out there, try adding a sticky header with a CTA in it and see the increase in conversion rate.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, no matter how much effort you have put in to build a landing page, you can never predict how a visitor will walk through it. So, once the page is deployed, it's a must to test it.

Install plugins or use online tools that give you the flexibility to check scroll maps, heat maps and analyze where the user is losing his focus. This will give you a fair idea of what changes need to made in order to increase the conversion rates.

A/B testing is a must too

Make decisions based on data.

Try and test your page with different visuals and copy. You never know which might work better.

Some of the elements you should consider split testing are

• Headlines
• Different variants of your hero section
• Different colors and texts of your CTA buttons
• Forms
• Landing page copy
• Layout

I took a lot of time crafting this for you. So, don’t forget to hit the like button in case you liked it.

I would also appreciate your comments if any.

I’m also guessing this is too much information for you. To make things easier, do you want me to make a summarised version of this? Preferably a checklist with a good number of screenshots for your reference.

Comment “ABSOLUTELY!” if you want the checklist on how to build a high converting landing page.