Creating Digital Assets: A landing page

👉 This is part of the Creating Digital Assets series.

A landing page is a stand-alone page on your website, separate from your homepage.

It’s sole purpose is to get someone to take one particular action you’d like them to take. In BrandPocket’s case, it’s to buy an account. On the landing page to subscribe to this newsletter, the only action available is to subscribe.

Of course on any page, the option to do nothing and leave is always there, and as obvious as that is, it’s a boundary we need to respect.

Marketers are famous for not respecting it. Folks who don’t need your thing shouldn’t be tricked into thinking they do.

For folks who will benefit from your thing though, good copywriting is how you’ll show them.

It’ll explain the benefits of your thing, and ideally answer any questions they have. There’s a good chance they’ll have questions right from the moment they start reading, as well as while they’re reading… which you’ll answer as they continue to read.

• Good copywriting that speaks to the exact problem your product solves;
• Explains how someone who’s experiencing the problem will benefit;
• And offers one single action to solve that problem;

Makes for a strong landing page.

Good copywriting is a learned skill, so a way to shortcut that learning is to follow a formula.

There are a few I tap into regularly:

• 5 key elements of high converting landing pages by Copyhackers
• A 7-step framework by StoryBrand
• Building the perfect sales page by Jonathan Stark
• Every copywriting formula ever, also by Copyhackers

On the whole of that landing page, there is literally just one action – a link or a button – that someone can take.

That means:

• No links to other pages – for anything that’s relevant, keep it here on the page
• No navigation across the top – you don’t want to do all the work of getting someone in front of your landing page, then ushering them away to some other page. The rest of your site is not relevant right now
• No “contact us for more info” – put any info they might look for right here on the landing page.

This is how I like to do it, but of course there are always exceptions, including on BrandPocket’s landing page.

How I manage the exceptions:

• As of today there are 5 links to other pages from BrandPocket’s landing page. 3 of them answer a specific FAQ.
• In each case, the ‘external’ page contains a form to ask specific questions related to the FAQ.
• Since they’ll take a step away from the landing page, in these cases, they’ve essentially taken a step towards buying, so the communication that follows will keep them in that flow, while respecting their space and not being pushy (👈 critical).
• For the other two, one opens a demo of a BrandPocket account which I just think needs to be there, so there’s no clear path back to the landing page other setting it to open it in a new tab
• The last one is a link to a contact form to enquire about a different service, buried in the last FAQ, which is actually more a part of the building-to-sell aspect, rather than me trying to sell something else (happy to go into that in more detail if it’s interesting)

Basically, if I have to link away from the landing page, I try to keep the visitors’ next steps to things that lead them where the landing page was leading them in the first place.

Side note: Marketers are famous for exploiting landing pages to trick folks into buying stuff they don’t need (look out for expiring clocks, unbelievable claims, ridiculous discounts and impossible promises). Not what we’re doing here.

Keep the copy compelling enough that someone who needs it will strongly consider it, but someone who doesn’t will simply walk away.

It’s easier than it sounds – just stick to facts 😉

Tomorrow: Target sale numbers.

(Agree? Disagree? Just reply).