[VIDEO] Digging deeper into landing pages with startups in 2020

Class nine has started in the SpinLab, and with that, we’re once again going back to some basic business focus areas to make sure our new startups are getting everything right from the start.

Today we’re going to focus on a common marketing topic - What is a landing page?

I see a lot of new founders in Europe throwing this page around, and realized that a majority of them don’t actually know what this phrase means in the online marketing world.

If you're not in a reading mode today, feel free to just check out the video below. It summarizes this entire topic with visuals and examples.

What a landing page is not, in online marketing terms

Sometimes it is actually easiest to visual what something is, when you actually first learn what it is not.

A landing page, in the online marketing world, is NOT:

• The homepage of your website
• A blog
• A category page of your eCommerce shop
• A social media post
• The about us page of your site
• And many other things are also not landing pages

What a landing page actually is, in the online marketing world

Ok, so that last description on what landing page is not might leave you a little confused. So let me try to break this down in one sentence:

A landing page is a page on your website that focuses on ONE specific goal, and minimizes distractions for a user.

Examples of landing page goals

In the online marketing world, you hear the term conversions thrown around a lot. Conversions are good, those typically translate to new leads or revenue being generated for your startup! Yay!

So by nature, a good landing page goal should reinforce conversions. Common examples of this may be:

• A product page where the one goal on the site is to add the product to the cart and checkout.
• A demo page with a form where users can request a demo.
• A product page with a form where users can begin their 30 day free trial of your product. (Very typical for SaaS companies).

But it can be really anything, the main takeaway here is that you understand that a landing page, by online marketing definition, should do everything it can to reinforce that one goal on the page being submitted.

Why do we make landing pages?

Because people are lazy, and there’s a ton of distractions out there on the internet.

The majority of people will not have time, nor the interest, to navigate your entire site to find what they are looking if they’re on it for the first time.

So WE have to do the work for them, and serve up efficient landing pages so they can find exactly what they are looking for.

Landing page best practices

Ok, so you understand the concept now, but what should you do to make sure your landing page is as effective as it can be?

Easy, just keep it focused! Both from the content on the page, and also from the technical setup.

Keep all the content on that page in support of your one goal that you have determined. If you’re selling organic orange juice, every single word, picture, and video on that landing page better be talking about your organic orange juice and why it is awesome.

If you also have awesome grape juice, you should create an entirely separate landing page for that!

But remember, be concise and get to the point! For new first time users on a site, you’ve got on average 3 seconds to keep them on site. If you hit them with huge blocks of text, they’re likely not going to take the action you desire.

Make the goal/action easy to find Don’t make the user work! The action button should be prominently displayed consistently on the page.

Technical landing page optimization tips:

• Minimize links on the page, remember, we want the user to take one specific action.
• Home page logos, navigation links, unnecessary footer links, external links, etc should be removed.
• Speed is key here, make sure your page loads fast. Avoid large size images, and host videos on YouTube or Vimeo, not natively on your servers.

A quick side note on landing pages in analytics software

For those of you using an analytics platform to track website performance such as Google Analytics, a landing page in these instances means something entirely different.

In most analytics platforms, a landing page is the "first contact page" after a source. So for example, if you Googled "Nike" and then nike.com came up in the results, and you clicked on it, nike.com is now counted as landing page with an organic search source in Google Analytics.

Long story short, the definition of landing pages changes depending on the content.

Excellent landing page examples in 2019

Of course, reading about something helps, watching a video about it helps, but sometimes a person just needs a pair of good old fashioned examples to really put this together in their head.

We broke down one of the latest landing pages from the well known digital marketer, Neil Patel, in this article. Check it out if you’re looking for a deep dive into one of the landing pages of one of the best in the game.

Wrapping it up, how are you going to move forward with your startup’s landing pages?

Did this information help? Landing pages really are a crucial theme of any marketing campaign, and something you need to get a plan around sooner than later.

What are your startup’s struggles with landing pages? Let us know in the comments below, we want to hear what founder’s are doing these days to maximize these essential tools.