5 Landing Page Mistakes That are Killing Your Conversion Rate

You’ve got a great headline, strong images and targeting that’s on point. When it comes to click through rates, your ads are crushing it.

What could go wrong? Your conversion rate must be through the roof, right? Heck, you’re probably already clearing your emotional plate for all of the praise that’s going to be heaped on you when your CEO opens the report.

Not so fast- a high CTR is nice, but if your audience is getting lost on your landing page, a low conversion rate will haunt you like that questionable hairstyle choice from fifteen years ago. Don’t let your next big client get away: Here are 5 landing page mistakes that are killing your marketing campaign’s conversion rate, and how to fix them:

Your Landing Page Offers are Ho-Hum.

“Please, tell me more about your free consultation offer.” – No One Ever.

Consider your campaign’s offer from the prospect’s standpoint, and then consider a root canal. If it’s a toss-up as to which is more appealing, you’ve got work to do in the incentives department on your landing page.

When developing your landing pages, consider how you can differentiate your offer from the rest of the noise surrounding your prospects. Too many marketers never bother to actually conduct searches and click on the ad campaigns of their competitors. How does your offer compare? How much information is required to obtain the incentive?

Marketers that offer stronger calls to action receive stronger returns on their investment into the campaigns. If you’ve optimized your landing pages for performance and you’re still not seeing results, gauging how you can improve or further differentiate the incentive is a great place to start.

You’ve Sentenced Potential Customers to Death by Choice.

“When people have too many choices, they make bad choices.” – Thom Browne

This is a common problem when Fidelitas inherits an old digital marketing campaign from a new client. Some marketers figure that by placing more calls to action, links, and forms on the landing page, that they’re increasing the odds of prospective customers taking action on at least one of them. Unfortunately for them, the exact opposite is true. Countless studies have proven that landing pages that boast a clear, singular call to action produce better results than their fluster-cluck counterparts.

That said, it’s not a bad idea to offer the same call to action on a landing page two or three times – once above the fold, once in mid-scroll and once again at the bottom below your copy. After all, you’re still communicating to the prospect that this ONE OFFER is right for them and will solve their problem, you’re just allowing them to sign up without having to think twice.

You’re Scoring an F When it Comes to A/B Tests.

“A/B Testing is about letting the customer do the talking, without actually talking.” – Siddharth Deswal

If your marketing team is taking a “set it and forget it” approach to your PPC spend or television buys, odds are they won’t be your marketing team for long. So why is it acceptable to use the same, so-so, landing page over and over? Ideally, your marketing team should always be testing something on a landing page- there’s no such thing as a perfect page! Some shops may boast of having a well-established formula, but not every audience segment perceives and reacts to information in the same manner.

The bottom line: Marketers that test more, win more.

Your Page is Loading Sloooooooowwww……

“You should be worried about site speed; half a second is costing you 20% of your audience.” –Tim Ash

No one likes a slow website. Suffice to say, pages that take a minute to load haven’t been cool since your computer needed a dial tone to connect to the internet. Statistics show that 50% of site visitors will leave immediately if the page doesn’t load in the first three seconds. That means 50% of your PPC budget is leaving with them. Leverage tools like Pingdom, GTMetrix, and Google to test your page’s load speed.

Once you’ve discovered the cause of your speed issues, your development team should be able to help you navigate through image compression and bloated code, but you may have to take a hard look at your hosting, too. The development team here at Fidelitas recommends WP Engine for landing page hosting, not to mention any other WordPress site you may be managing.

Your Copy is Anything but Clear and Concise.

“Clarity affords focus.” – Thomas Leonard

Your landing page copy should tell a story. Not a story about how your brand’s widget is the latest and greatest, but how it solves your prospective customer’s problem. How will the customer feel after they use your widget? Will they be relieved of stress, sleep easier, or have more energy? Will they feel empowered to accomplish their goals? It amazes me that in 2016, most people still focus on selling tools instead of selling results.

Further, you should provide social proof within the landing page copy. No one wants to be the first one, or only one, to purchase your good or service. Referrals from friends, even if they’re friends we haven’t met yet, are the top sales source in so many industries. We trust our friends and put more value into their opinions than any white paper or sales pitch.

When developing your landing page, look for ways to insert more value into your copy through case studies. Legitimizing your offer by showing how customers have been able to find success with your product or service, you will enjoy a far greater conversion rates on all of your landing pages.
What’s ironic is that you can avoid most of these mistakes with a little extra effort and thought into each landing page and the campaigns that they’re a part of. Hopefully your marketing teams are putting in the time and effort to drive results and profit for your brand’s campaigns.

Just remember not to throw the baby out with the bathwater- a bad landing page doesn’t necessarily mean that the ad copy or targeting is bad, and vice versa. Be sure to locate the cause of any frustration and lack of results before scrapping a landing page. That said, you can rest assured that by avoiding these 5 landing page mistakes, your campaigns are on the right track.

Are you looking to improve the ways that your brand captures customers online? Contact Fidelitas Development Today.