1. Define Your Calls to Action
Be clear about what you want people to do. Do you want them to buy, sign up, contact you etc.? Limit yourself to one or two calls to action.
If you are going to have two, make sure they complement rather than conflict with one another. For example, if your primary call to action is “buy now”, your secondary action could be “sign up to our newsletter” to capture people who are not ready to buy.
2. Understand Your Audience
Clearly understand your audience persona so that you can tailor the messaging accordingly. What are their goals, pain points, questions and objections to buying?
Understand their tastes and attitudes to establish the right tone in your copy and design.
3. Outline Your Messaging
Make a list of the critical messaging that the page will need to communicate. These should include:
Benefits – How does your product or service help people achieve their goals or overcome their pain points? For example, a fitness app will help you live longer and remain more active.
Features – How does your product deliver on the promises it makes in its benefits? For example, a fitness app would have features like calorie counting and a pedometer to ensure you meet your goals.
Objections – What are the reasons somebody might not buy, and how do you plan to address these? For example, people might think your app is expensive. How will you address that?
Social Proof – How can you reassure people your product or service is well-loved by existing customers? How can you show it is trustworthy?
4. Draft Your Content
Draft your copy as content chunks, where each chunk explains a feature, raises a benefit or addresses an objection.
Each chunk will need a headline, copy and potentially an image. Keep the chunks only a few sentences long and link to another page for more information if required.
5. Design Your Content Flow
Consider the flow of content and how you will draw the eye to essential page elements.
Start with a strapline that summarises the offering.
Focus on the benefits, before moving onto features.
Address objections throughout the copy but especially alongside critical calls to action.
Include the calls to action multiple times down the page and associate social proof alongside each to give the user confidence to act.
Use imagery and other stylistic elements to draw the eye where you want it to go. For example, have a person looking at your call to action.
6. Elicit the Right Reaction
Add design styling to elicit whatever reaction you need from users. For example, introduce a lot of white space and natural images to elicit a sense of calm and tranquillity.
Review your copy and inject some personality into what you have written. What tone of voice do you want to communicate?
7. Launch, Monitor and Iterate
Launch your landing page and monitor it carefully.
Use session recorders like Hotjar or Microsoft Clarity to watch how people behave on the page. That will help you identify potential improvements.
For example, users may click on a non-clickable screen element, or scroll past a critical piece of content. Once you find these problems you can fix them.
