Landing page: what is it, and what are its advantages and disadvantages?

Many of you have probably heard of such a marketing tool as a landing page. However, not everyone understands how to effectively use landing pages in practice, considering their advantages and disadvantages.

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Let’s explore what an e-commerce landing page is, how it differs from a regular website, its key features, and other intriguing aspects.

A landing page encourages a visitor to perform a certain action. This action can be buying a product, ordering a service, registering for an event, or subscribing to a newsletter.

It is traditionally believed that a landing page is one long page. However, this is not always true, as the number of pages is not the defining factor. The main characteristics of a landing page are: focus on solving the main task (conversion action that the visitor should take), time limitations (often created for an event or sales), and somewhat specific structural elements.

What does a landing page consist of? The basic structure of a landing page includes:

  • headline;
  • call to action;
  • lead form.
the basic structure of a landing page
The basic structure of a landing page

All other elements are optional but can (and should) be used to encourage the visitor to take the desired action. To achieve this, various design and marketing strategies are employed, such as striking visuals, video presentations, detailed descriptions of benefits, customer reviews, discounts, and more.

Examples of landing pages in different niches

Here are some examples to better illustrate what a landing page is.

First on our list is a great example of a page that sells a special pencil for drawing on tablets:

Example of Landing Page
Example of Landing Page 1

Each block of the landing page tells about a specific benefit of such a gadget and the principles of its operation. All the necessary information is located in several blocks that are arranged sequentially. At the same time, the structure of the landing page depends on the specifics of the product or service.

For example, the first block may contain the main message, and all subsequent blocks may contain arguments in its favor. Another approach is to place an attractive offer in the first block and then increase interest.

In our case, a website visitor sees the main offer, gets answers to possible questions, reads reviews, and eventually orders a pencil:

Example of Landing Page
Example of Landing Page 2

Another interesting landing page option is an offer to receive a book by email:

Example of Landing Page
An example of a landing page for new users

In this example, you can see the entire basic structure of the landing page: headline, call to action, and lead form. There is nothing superfluous or distracting. If the site visitor is not interested in this offer, they can simply go to the main information part by clicking on the arrow at the bottom. The landing page itself is hosted on the site’s domain, but it is only visible to new visitors.

One of the most common uses for a landing page is event registration. This is how conferences, webinars, training, and other online and offline events are announced.

A countdown timer is often used for this purpose:

Countdown timer
Countdown timer

Such a reminder encourages the visitor to buy a ticket right away, without postponing the decision. Nowadays, it is common practice to set a flexible price: the closer the event starts, the higher the price will be.

Here are a few examples of landing pages for different types of business that were created by AG.Marketing:

Example of Landing Page
Example of Landing Page 3
Example of Landing Page
Example of Landing Page 4

AG.Marketing is a certified landing page development agency. Our specialists have already developed dozens of successful landing pages that generate profit for our clients.

If you need an effective landing page for your business, feel free to contact us. We guarantee top-quality results!

The main advantages of an e-commerce landing page

As you can see in the trend graph below, interest in such a tool as landing pages is increasing every year and there is a noticeable positive trend:

Growing popularity of landing pages
Growing popularity of landing pages

What drives this growing interest? Primarily, the high efficiency of landing pages. In each case, it can be useful in its own way. However, there are several advantages of landing pages that make them more effective than a regular website:

  • Easy navigation. A landing page is just a page that needs to be scrolled. The visitor, going down, receives a new portion of arguments and goes through the entire sales funnel. At the same time, they can perform a targeted action at any stage of scrolling;
  • One offer. There is no distracting information on the page. Everything is stated only in essence and with arguments. If a marketer knows his target audience well, the offer will be made in such a way that the probability of refusal is minimal.
  • Limited content. The text for a landing page doesn’t have to be a selling one, it has to be convincing. In any case, it cannot be more than a person needs to make a decision;
  • Quick result. A landing page is created, first of all, to get the fastest possible result. This is also related to the peculiarities of its promotion (which we will discuss further). On a landing page, unlike a website, it is much easier to conduct an A / B test and choose the best design.
  • Collecting leads. Thanks to landing pages, marketers build databases of their customers. A user who has left their contact details is much more motivated to receive additional information about a product, service, project, or event.

Disadvantages of landing pages that you should know about

It would seem that if landing pages are so versatile and effective, what are their disadvantages? In what cases will a landing page fail to produce the expected effect?

Let’s consider some of the most common cases when a landing page is unlikely to be a good choice:

  • Variety of the assortment. If there is more than one offer on the page, there is a risk of losing a potential customer without receiving contact details. A person may forget about the page when they go to think about it or lose the emotional mood that was needed to make a quick decision. Therefore, it is better to focus on one offer. If you want to tell about all your capabilities, use a regular website for this;
  • Too complex a product. Landing pages are primarily focused on B2C products. B2B landing pages have several features that must be taken into account. However, if the product is very complex, requiring not only the visitor’s qualifications but also additional advice from the seller, the landing page will not work;
  • Building a reputation. To build customer loyalty, it is better to talk about your capabilities, prospects, or characteristics in the format of a regular business card website. The maximum that a landing page can help with is collecting a certain number of contacts of interested visitors. It is better to present your company in a traditional form that is more understandable to Internet users;
  • High cost. Landing pages are not suitable for selling too expensive goods. Where emotions give way to calculation and analysis, landing pages will not bring the desired result. You must admit that no one will buy a car or an apartment just by reading the overview information about the product;
  • Betting on design. People are convinced not by design, but by a unique selling proposition (USP). Even the most beautiful page without a USP will be useless. To create it, you need to know your target audience well. In particular, the ‘pain points’ that brought them to your landing page. Just copying a nice template won’t work.

It is important to remember the purpose of the landing page and carefully select situations in which it will be effective.

Benefits of landing pages for business and when to use them

Having considered the situations in which a landing page will not work or will work with minimal effectiveness, it is also necessary to consider the flip side: in what cases is it best to use a landing page for business?

A landing page can be an effective tool for solving the following tasks:

  • Direct sales. Especially if it is a new, very relevant, unusual product, products of a well-known brand at a discount, or even information (this includes training or webinars, as well as books or exclusive videos). They are great for selling individual products or highlighting promotions, with each page dedicated to a single product or offer.
  • Collecting leads for further work. Having collected your base of loyal users, you can build further communication with them. For example, by exchanging a book for a future client’s email, you get the opportunity to invite them to a paid seminar in the future. Thus, the landing page becomes a tool in a more complex sales funnel.

In addition, a landing page is useful for testing the interest of the target audience in a particular product. If you are not yet sure whether it is worth developing certain software, purchasing special goods, or holding an event, a landing page will allow you to assess the prospects of your idea. The applications left will be a good marker of the target audience’s interest. Based on a few simple calculations, it will become clear whether it is worth continuing in the chosen direction.

Landing page promotion: what are the features?

You can find a lot of recommendations on how to promote landing pages on the Internet. However, when you read such materials more carefully, it becomes clear that many articles contradict each other. This suggests that copywriters and marketers often advise that users will still have to turn to the relevant specialists after a while.

In particular, some agencies claim that landing pages can be promoted by means of search engine optimization (in other words, SEO). In fact, this method of landing page promotion will be ineffective and will not have a quick effect. In fact, an important characteristic of a landing page is lost – its time limit.

Promoting a landing page typically relies on paid advertising platforms like Google Ads, Facebook Ads, and others. To conduct an advertising campaign, you need an appropriate budget and margin calculation. The cost of clicks differs depending on several factors. Therefore, the cost of a product or service that is promoted with the help of a landing page must necessarily include advertising costs.

How to create a landing page from scratch: 2 main ways

Many novice marketers or business owners work with limited budgets and often under constant time pressure. In most cases, questions arise about how to create a working landing page quickly and inexpensively. How to make it?

There are 2 main ways.

  1. Development from scratch.Сreating a layout, layout, filling it with content, and placing it on the chosen domain. This requires a small team or skills in working with the appropriate tools. It may be cheaper than hiring third-party specialists, but without experience, there are risks of failing to meet deadlines or making mistakes in the page structure.
  2. Use of specialized services. There are many interesting services on the Internet whose specialists can help you quickly and efficiently complete all the tasks of creating a landing page.
Services for creating landing pages
Services for creating landing pages

In each individual situation, it is best to assess the risks and choose the way to create a landing page on your own. In-house development may be cheaper, but it will take longer. Outsourcing the task will definitely save time, but it will most likely be more expensive. Although the price issue in this case may indicate otherwise: if a product or service has low margins, it may not be worth creating a landing page.

To avoid disappointment in the future, follow these recommendations when preparing to create a landing page:

  • Study your target audience;
  • Calculate the margin of the project;
  • Formulate a unique selling proposition;
  • Prepare a list of arguments;
  • Select the main and additional content;
  • Choose a way to create a landing page;
  • Provide it with advertising support;
  • Collect and analyze the results.

You should also keep in mind that landing pages are not a panacea, but one of the ways to improve sales performance. You should focus on the sales figures and proceed from what can ensure their growth.

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