10 Landing Page Best Practices for Boosting Conversions

Did you know that some companies have achieved a 100% increase in their conversions by implementing some landing page best practices? Yuppiechef, an online store that specializes in kitchen tools, was able to achieve this by just removing their navigation menu. The reason? It was too distracting for visitors landing on the page, and prevented them from taking an action.

If you run an online business, you should know that your landing page is the most important factor governing your conversions. It is the first thing that your website visitors will see when they land on your site. So the more you distract them from responding to your call-to-action, the more you hurt your conversions.

However, the good news is that with a few simple tweaks, you can actually make them do what you want.

In this article, I’m going to share 10 landing page best practices that’ll help you boost your conversions. These are just a few of the best practices for landing pages. I’ll share more insights in another post soon. So let’s jump right in, shall we?

10 Landing Page Best Practices

1. Minimize Distractions

There’s something known as the “attention ratio,” which is a crucial piece of your landing page optimization puzzle. Oli Gardner, defines it as the number of options that visitors have on a page to your conversion goals. Simply put, it is the ratio of the number of things people can do to the number of things you want them to do.

One of the most important landing page best practices is to maintain an attention ratio of 1:1. So your landing page must include only what you want your visitors to do. Everything else would be a distraction. Everything that does not get them to take the intended action, that is.

In the example we spoke about earlier, Yuppiechef found that their navigation menu was distracting visitors.

With Navigation — Image via VWO

They wanted to increase signups on their landing page for their Wedding Registry. By removing the navigation menu from that page, they found that their conversions went up by 100%.

Without Navigation — Image via VWO

2. Use Catchy Headlines

We’ve talked about how you should focus on making your landing page less distracting from your goals. Now let’s talk about how to catch your audience’s attention so that they take an action.

Catchy headlines are extremely effective in driving conversions. Your headlines should not only motivate your visitors, but also give them a good enough reason to take an action.

Protalus, a seller of insoles, made changes to the headline on their website. The new headline mentioned the option of upgrading to free expedited shipping in the headline. This gave them a 145% increase in conversions.

Image via Moz

3. Place Important Elements Around the Fold

A study of how visitors scroll through landing pages found that the most viewed part is just above the fold. 80% of people view the area on landing pages at around 550 pixels.

Image via Chartbeat

The same study also showed that most of the engagement from visitors happens just below the fold. So one of the landing page best practices is to place your call-to-action just above or below the fold. It need not be the call-to-action only. You can place important elements like attractive offers or benefits there too.

For example, Elegant Steps, a seller of women’s shoes were looking to boost their conversion rate. One of the changes made to their landing page was to mention their free shipping offer just above the fold. Their bounce rate dropped by 50% and conversions went up 3X.

Image via VWO

4. Include a Clear Call-to-Action

This is one of the most important elements of a landing page. Without a call-to-action, your visitors will be at a loss for what to do next, and will soon leave. So you definitely need to include a call-to-action (CTA) on your landing page. And you need to also make sure that it is placed in an optimum position so people don’t miss it.

Another very important consideration is the background and font colors you use for your CTA. Contrasting colors are the best because they make your CTA button easily visible. If it blends into the background, it’s easy for people to miss it…

Read the full article on Shane Barker’s Digital Marketing blog.