Landing Page Copywriting
Ryan Lemos (Turning prospects into consistent revenue)
I help business owners save 10-20 hours per week, a minimum of $2,000-$4,000 per month in salary costs, and earn tens of thousands of dollars more with my automated outreach and nurturing system
Hi there,
I’m back with more reviews on courses from the CRO minidegree by CXL Institute.
This week we cover 'Landing page copywriting – Part 1 & 2'.
Week #11
Course Name: Landing Page Optimization Contd…
Instructor: Michael Aagaard
Total Time: 4h 22 minutes
In this lesson, I’ll teach you the fundamentals of writing copy for landing pages.
This is by no means a full-fledged course in copywriting. Think of it as a crash course in creating landing pages that convert.
You’ll learn:
Let’s get started.
The goal of a landing page should be to meet the following objectives:
Let’s look at a few examples from the real world:
This first one is a good example of how not to write landing page copy. Nothing on the landing page follows up on the promises made by the ad.?
The ad talks about mobile automation and a live demo. But there’s no demo to be found on the landing page; even after filling out the form.
The landing page talks about something completely different and deviates from the one major promise that the ad makes, viz. mobile automation and a live demo of what that looks like. Enough to make you want to pull your hair out in frustration.
Here’s a second example of a “bad” landing page.
The ad has a good hook in the form of $35 off any plumbing repair work.
But that’s nowhere to be found on the landing page. The page talks about all the available services but has absolutely no information on the promised deal related to the $35 off.
The “Contact Us” link is a generic form and does nothing to take you closer to availing of the promised $35 off.
Now, here’s an example of a great landing page experience.
It follows up on the promise the ad makes: “Get more Google reviews, Get More Customers”.
It speaks to user motivation, addresses barriers, and lists customer testimonials, all of which go a long way towards shortening the journey from click to conversion.
Here’s an example of landing page copy that says a lot but does not mean anything.
My reaction after reading the copy was “huh?”?
Another important thing to note is that design and copy should go hand in hand and one should not be sacrificed over the other.
Often it is copy that gets the short end of the stick.
The copywriter and the designer should work hand in hand to ensure that the design leaves enough room for the copy and the copy is able to guide the reader through to the end goal of taking the action the copywriter wants her to take.
The information hierarchy we looked t in earlier lessons starts off by answering these questions:
Whom are you communicating with?
What do you want them to do?
Where is the traffic coming from?
We then start the ‘working backwards’ method.
We start with the conversion goal and find out what the prospects’ questions, motivation and barriers are.
We answer the questions, reinforce the motivation and address the barriers, in our landing page copy.
We do the same thing for the ‘offer’ and ‘brand’ sections of our landing page copy.
The amount of copy we need depends upon the awareness level of the prospect and also on how complex our product or service is.
The more complex the product, the greater is the probability of risk and the need for more copy to address the perceived risk.
Here’s how awareness levels can affect the length of copy:
Problem aware: Elaborate on the problem, introduce your solution, explain it more fully, and introduce your brand after you do that. This helps establish your credibility and sets the customer thinking along the lines of “Yes, this might be the solution to my problem”.
Solution aware: If the prospect is solution aware, they’re already familiar with the other existing solutions; they just don’t know yours yet. You’ll then need to spend less time on describing your solution and focus instead on communicating what the benefits of your solution are. Make sure you introduce your brand as well.
Product aware: When your prospects are product aware, they know you already but are probably unaware of your product.
In this case, you’ll need to offer a short summary of your solution, explain the benefits, and then make them some kind of offer that makes your solution more attractive than that of your competitors.
Most aware: If your prospects are most aware, they already know you, are probably on your mailing list, and know all about your product. They’ll jump if you give them a good offer and clarify the important details surrounding it.
The 5 most important landing page elements:
Headlines: establishes a match between the message on the ad source and the copy on the landing page, captures attention to it, and triggers dopamine by setting the expectation that there’s going to be a reward.
Benefits/features: present important information and emphasize the value of the offer. They focus on the outcomes that people are looking for and contribute to the triggering of dopamine.
Credibility: makes your content credible and helps answer questions, address objections and mitigate cortisol by reducing the sense of fear and uncertainty.
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Expectation manager: ensures your users know what to expect. Mitigates ambiguity and helps them avoid disappointment.
Call-to-action: makes users click and proceed to buy or take whatever action they need to take.
The following snapshot categorizes the different elements of a landing page and will make it easier for you to get your page up and running quickly.
Let’s take a deeper dive into each of these five elements:
Headlines: Here are 3 formulas you can riff on to get off to a good start.
Formula 1: (Do something difficult) in (short amount of time) without problem)
Example: (Build a landing page) in (less than an hour) without (help from your developer)
Formula 2: (Do something difficult) in (short amount of time) and get (something valuable)
Example: (Build a landing page) in (less than an hour) and get (more sales and leads)
Formula 3: Avoid (something frustrating) by (doing something difficult) in (a short amount of time) with (product x)
Example: Avoid (wasting time on development and design) – (build effective landing pages) in (less than an hour) with (Unbounce)
Features/Benefits:
This according to me is the most important piece of any copy you will ever write. Be sure to really understand what your customers and prospects are looking for and incorporate that into your copy, in the form of benefits.
Let me simplify it for you:
Features are what your product or service can do. This by itself does nothing to convince your prospects to buy.
Benefits tell people what your product can do for them and how it can make their lives better.
That being said, people buy with emotion and justify their purchases with logic. It is therefore critically important that your copy is able to trigger people’s emotions otherwise there’s very little chance they’re going to buy.
Here are a couple of examples of landing pages from ‘Unbounce’ that clearly explain the features and benefits of their landing creation software.
Credibility: comes in many different forms: Relevant facts and figures for one. Social proof as well.
When it comes to social proof, it is important that the testimonials be short and to the point, and be able to address what the user is thinking about, worried about, or something that’s relevant to them.
Not ticking any of these boxes is guaranteed to make your prospect indifferent to what’s been written.
The testimonial in the snapshot below is a good example of a testimonial that helps cement credibility for Unbounce.
Expectation managers: make sure users know what to expect.
They help answer questions like “Who, what, where, when, how much?”
Take a look at the snapshot below.
There’s very little expectation management here.
The form is a request for information but it doesn’t do a good job of letting you know what to expect once you fill it in and submit it.
The ‘Thank You’ message says nothing of use either. The phone number they display could have been displayed on the request form or earlier on in the process. It would have helped get information faster and saved us the time spent in wondering who would get back to us and when.
Here’s a click-through landing page by Unbounce that lets users know what to expect when they click through to the ‘pricing plans page’. It does a good job of warming them up before they view the pricing plans.
The following are important questions that your copy must answer, otherwise you’ll run the risk of disappointing your reader.
Call-to-Action Copy:
Your call-to-action copy should:
The following are examples of very generic call-to-action copy that say nothing.
“Click Here”
“Send”
“Submit”
Here is a formula you can use to write better microcopy.
“When I click the button, I’d like to (insert phrase)”.
For example: “When I click the button, I’d like to (get a free quote)”.
Make the CTA copy -> “Get a free quote”
Or
“When I click the button, I’d like to (see plans and pricing)”.
Your CTA could look like -> “See Plans & Pricing”.
Recap:
Learn what copy elements to focus your attention and energy on. This helps you prioritize your copy efforts and write more effective copy.
Get insight on how to use copy to mitigate negative emotions
Get a set of formulas and templates that will help kickstart your writing process and keep you focused on the right elements.
That's all I have for this week. I'll be back next week with a review on 'landing page design'.
Keep your eyes peeled for that!
Sincerely,
Ryan