Internet Advertising Report
What is a Landing Page

Any page on your site that has been created to interest a specifically targeted public is a Landing Page.  The purpose of a landing page is to increase conversion rates by giving the visitor exactly what he or she wants in the shortest amount of time. 

In some situations your entire website can be just a simple landing page.  We have seen this work extremely well for many small local businesses like a piano tuner or chimney sweep.  It can also work well when the public you are trying to interest does not need a great deal of enlightening.

A few fundamental concepts must be kept in mind when writing and designing such a page.  

Remember you have only a small fraction of a second to capture the attention of the visitor.  It is even easier to click away from a website than it is to walk to the trash and throw away printed promotion. 

The closer your headline can match the ad copy the visitor came from the more likely he or she will be to stay and convert into a call, email or sale.  When they see the targeted headline you are providing proof that that visitor has come to the right place. 

Your ad copy must include a “call to action” with a link.  Decide what you want your prospect to do.  Do you want them to call you?  Sign up for a newsletter?  Buy a product?  Fill our a survey?  Fill out some other kind of form?  Whatever it is you must tell your visitor what you want them to do and provide an obvious way for them to do it.  Since many people view the hyperlinks on a web site before they read the text, your call to action must be a text link, such as “Download your free Online Promotion Tutorial”.  Never have the linked text read “Click Here”.   

If there are several choices within a specific category give the public a quick way to click into their exact interest.  Let’s say your landing page targets a public interested in dancewear.  Have an obvious place to click for “tap shoes”, “leotards” or “tights”.   

Before you go “live” with your landing page look at it from the point of view of a visitor who knows nothing about whom you are or what you do.  Everything on the page should be clear, obvious and concise.  And check all your hyperlinks to make sure they work.  Nothing frustrates a visitor more than to find a link to exactly what they’re looking for and then have the link not work. 

Keeping these suggestions in mind you should be able to create landing pages that convert at a far higher rate than ever before.