The purpose of the landing page is to be marketer and sales person combined. It needs to attract the customer to the product, capture their interest, and push them to take some sort of action. While reading through SEOMoz’s Blog I picked up some tips and put together a short list of Dos and Don’ts for landing pages.
Do
1. List Resources and Testimonials
It is important to establish credibility. Allowing prospects to see past clients and their testimonials will help to create that. Putting a well known source on the page is a great way to set up trust between you and your prospect. Just knowing you have worked with a highly respected company in their industry will give them more confidence to work with you.
2. Conduct regular quality checks.
When you pick up a moldy bag of lettuce at the grocery store, you never want to buy from there again. The same situation applies to a landing page. It is your one shot to convert a prospect and if they see misspelled words, broken links, and distorted images they are not going to give you a second look, so be sure to take time and make your landing page as professional and polished as possible.
3. Be Consistent
From graphics to language make sure that everything shown throughout your website is the same on the landing page. You want all eyes that view both to know that they are promoting the same product. *Make sure your best “ad” is on the landing page, “One year free trial” will mean nothing to a prospect if they do not see it.
Don’t
1. Have long forms
The purpose of a form on a landing page is for a salesperson to be able to contact the prospect. Don’t let the form do their job. As long as enough information is gathered for them to make contact, all of the extra required info will just discourage the prospect. If the form is too long, there is a reasonable chance that they will not complete the form, leaving you with no prospect at all.
2. Visual Distraction
Having a few pictures or banners is fine, but too much will take away from the page’s purpose. Just remember, less is more.
3. Ramble on
Prospects on the landing page want to see what you are offering and how it will benefit them. Emphasize benefits, not features. It should be short, simple, and to the point.
