How and Why Landing Pages Work for Inbound Lead Generation

You need to know what converts before you can determine what sells.

You’ve gone through all the trouble and effort of cultivating a killer mailing list. You’ve spent hours (okay, maybe even days!) laboring over the perfect subject line and honing the message so it’ll resonate with even the most diehard TLDNR eyeballs.

And the link is going to send them to your website’s homepage? At the risk of casting aspersions on your decision-making process, haven’t you heard? Landing pages should be the heart and soul of your inbound lead generating effort. Here’s why they work.

First, a definition

To understand the effectiveness of landing pages, it’s important to agree on what one is. So, let’s start with this: A landing page is a single web page where you will capture information about visitors with a lead-capture form.

Landing pages that work do so because they speak only to a specific audience. Often, a landing page is created for a single email campaign or online ad. The offer is specific and refers to the message which brought the visitor to your website in the first place.

Just one thing

Here’s the most important thing to know about landing pages. They’re one-trick ponies. Appropriately named, too. When you land on one, you pretty much can do only one thing. You learn about a specific offer that you can take advantage of in exchange for your contact information. 

There are no options to navigate to other areas of the website. There are no links to read about further information. There is nothing to distract the visitor from doing what you brought them to your website to do. Declare their interest by providing you with information to convert them into a customer. 

In some respects, a landing page flies in the face of what we’ve come to expect from the online experience. We go to a website and wander as far and wide as we wish. Sure, a certain experience might have been cultivated for us—but we can bop over to the “About Us” page or check out some testimonials whenever we like. Not so with a landing page. It puts the blinders on us. If it’s successful, there’s only one outcome. We provide our contact information and turn ourselves into leads. 

As such, these single-function sales machines offer the following benefits:

• Landing pages are killer lead-generators: They are the ultimate collections tool. You get qualified leads because these people have declared their interest. They’re not going to give you contact information if they’re uninterested. Those people bailed.
• Landing pages give your offers a proper place to dwell: While it’s true that your entire website is a marketing tool, landing pages shine the spotlight on what it is, right now, that you want people to know about—and to buy.
• Landing pages measure engagement: Hey, you’ve seen that email address before! Landing pages are excellent ways to generate new leads, but they also let you track existing leads. If they’re back for more, you’d better be getting back to them to close the sale. 
• Landing pages offer insight: You likely have several main products or services that you market in a variety of ways so you can determine the most effective way to sell them. The single objective of a landing page means you can track and analyze metrics that can help you determine the effectiveness of the offer. You need to know what converts before you can determine what sells.

No bells, no whistles

Landing pages can be deceptive. There’s not much to them, and yet they’re often a marketer’s most powerful conversion tool. Most landing pages have just these elements:

• Headline: It answers a simple question— “What will I get in exchange for my information?”
• Brief copy: Compelling, clear takeaway benefits—usually in bulleted chunks.
• Social sharing: If it excites a visitor, they’ll want to share it. And you want them to be both excited and generous.
• Hidden navigation: Where else is there to go until they decide whether or not to act on the offer? The more navigation options you provide, the more likely they are to leave. You want them to stay and convert.
• The lead-capture form: Only what you need to begin a dialog, of course. 
• An image: One of the supreme tenets of marketing—show the product or service. It’s best to portray it in the end state. Get it out of the container and show what it’s capable of doing.

You can never have too many landing pages

More landing pages = more opportunities to convert visitors into leads. It’s a simple equation, and it’s virtually impossible to overdo it. Ultimately, a people may come to your website hungry to devour the breadth and depth of its content. They don’t need that distraction yet if they’re not a customer. 

What they need first is a landing page. So put the blinders on and help them help you sell to them. 

Want help creating the perfect landing page? ContentBacon understands how to maximize conversions and take your relationship with prospects to the next step. Talk to us today.