These are my notes for a SIPA Roundtable discussion on landing page optimization.
The visitor to your landing page is asking these questions:
- Am I in the right place?
- Can I trust this site / company?
- What do I do next?
Am I in the right place?
Consider how the visitor arrived at your site and make the transition from the previous page as smooth as possible.
The visitor has a goal in mind and wants to know if this page is relevant to completing that goal.
Can I trust this site / company?
Any kid and his mutt dog can make a web page, and web visitors know that. You have to win credibility with your visitors with …
- A professional design
- A guarantee
- A good brand name
- Transparency (“About Us” and “Contact Us” links)
What do I do next?
Your page should be goal-oriented. Goals might include …
- Browse news articles
- Sign up for an e-mail alert
- Buy a product
- Watch a video
- Get more information
Whatever goal your page is directed towards, make it plain to the user how to achieve that goal and avoid unnecessary distractions.
However – don’t try to herd your visitors, and do provide links back to your homepage. (It helps with your page rank on Google.)
To optimize conversion rates, focus on usability
Keep it simple
- Make links speak for themselves
- Make the structure of your website predictable
- Provide clear feedback to user actions
- Make it hard to commit a serious mistake
These are just guidelines … and I’m not sure they’re all true!
Think of these concepts as you come up with ideas for your landing pages, but always test them.
For Discussion
- Reaction to these guidelines?
- What’s worked for you?
- What difficulties have you faced?
- Have you tried …
- Cool effects (Ajax, jQuery, etc.)
- Video
- User ratings, testimonials
- Other?
- Do you test your landing pages?
- What do you use?
- Any problems?
- Any successes?
Resources