Ray L. Perry Consulting

12 Unconventional Landing Page Strategies to Increase Conversions

We often discuss creating landing pages that convert well, getting traffic that converts, and making use of your conversion points.

There are many strategies you can use to increase conversions on your landing page that are often overlooked.

Banner blindness is when people don’t notice banner ads. Brand blindness is when people don’t notice your brand because you’re being too predictable.

What follows are 12 unconventional landing page strategies that go against what most visitors expect, making them more receptive to what they find on the page and leading them through a flow on your site.

It is important to consider where the visitor is coming from and what kind of conversion you would like to take place when using these strategies. If you’re not careful, you’ll end up creating extra space without getting any results.

1. Headline & Value Proposition

When a person visits your website, one of the first things they notice is the headline. However, did you know that on average, only two out of ten people read what comes after the headline?

Talk about do or die!

Your headline should make your visitor feel like they need to read the rest of the text.

Here are some tips for landing page headline testing:

Here are a few ideas to get you started. You will need to be creative in order to test different types of headlines as they all produce different results.

No matter what you’re writing, be sure to make it interesting, honest, and leaving the reader wanting more.

2. Custom landing pages for guest posts

This landing page has a similar principle to the last two pages. When guest posting, it is better to link to a custom landing page designed for the visitors of that site, rather than to your homepage, in your bio.

If you mention a lead magnet in your bio that solves the problem your guest post explores, this tactic can be especially useful.

3. Add Testimonials & Reviews

This is saying that if you have positive endorsements on your website, it will make visitors more likely to trust you.

There is no more powerful marketing than word of mouth, and client testimonials, reviews, and endorsements are the closest thing to social proof.

A lot of firms have testimonials on their landing pages that are far too vague and feeble. They’re simply not believable. Stuff like:

“Great work!” – John A.

“Wow!” – Vicky H.

Frank Q is excited because their income has increased.

And my favorite…

“Thanks.” – Ricky B.

Although these testimonials are extremely short, they seem inauthentic.

Who is Vicky? And who the hell is Ricky?

Testimonials from clients describing how they have benefited from something you have helped with are effective. The greater the level of detail, the more “human” they appear. And the more human, the more believable.

4. “Thank you” page with entry-level offer

Missed opportunities online are often due to a lack of thank you pages.

You can encourage users to sign up for your email list by leading them through a series of steps. But why stop there?

Now that a user has committed to getting a free thing, it’s much easier to sell them a paid thing. If the paid thing has a lower cost and is a logical extension of the path your visitor took to get there, they will be more likely to buy it.

You can increase your profits by experimenting with different pricing strategies or combinations of products.

This page could also be used to convert higher priced offers if that offer acts as a shortcut (e.g., free 20-week course on Facebook marketing with an offer for a private hour-long consultation).

5. “Thank you” page with “Refer A Friend” call to action.

Nextdoor encourages freshly subscribed visitors to invite others in their neighborhood:

The email link then takes users directly to a landing page where they can invite others, or even import email contacts:

Research by marketing professors Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein suggests that for something to go viral, three basic criteria must be met:

  1. Right message;
  2. Right messengers;
  3. Right environment.

The “refer a friend” thank you page is an opportunity to encourage new subscribers to share your content with their friends and increase your viral quotient.

Make the deal more appealing by offering a discount for referrals.

6. “Thank you” page with a survey

The best way to learn about your customers is by asking them a few questions after they convert.

The feedback from this survey can be used to improve conversions by creating new offers or addressing design flows.

7. Put Landing Page Visitors in the Isolation Tank

One theme you see with strong PPC landing pages is that they are isolated from the rest of the website.

The only focus on the page is the form, with no header links or anything else that might distract you from filling it out.

This method of isolating the visitor helps to prevent the Zeigarnik Effect. This can lead to feeling anxious and stressed. Your brain feels dissonance from uncompleted tasks, which can lead to feeling anxious and stressed. You will remember the tasks you did not complete better than the ones you completed.

With only a single task present on the site, it is simpler for visitors to focus on that and finish the conversion. Remember to keep this in mind when designing your landing pages.

8. Button Color, Shape, and Size

There’s a reason that the buttons on Amazon, Apple, and Target’s websites are all rounded. How a button looks is a significant part of conversion psychology.

The most important thing you want visitors to do on your site is to click the button.

Your button should be a different color from the rest of the site so it stands out. Make sure your button stands out from the rest of the elements on your site by choosing a color that will contrast well.

What’s the best practice? Orange is a popular color for website buttons because it is associated with purchasing and is seen as energetic. Both Unbounce and SiteTuners use a conversion rate optimization technique on their websites. As companies who specialize in this area, they should know what works best!

Red buttons create a sense of urgency which could work effectively, or even better than orange buttons. Do not make assumptions about what will work best for you, test it out to be sure.

You’ll never find one color that makes everyone happy. You will find a design that makes the majority of people happy and that is the one that is best for your landing page conversion rates.

The shape of a button can affects its conversion rate, with sharper corners often performing worse than rounded ones. Here’s why:

  1. Rounded corners are easier for the eyes and brain to process.
  2. We’ve been conditioned to be wary of sharp corners, as they can pose a threat. That also applies to buttons (crazy, right?).
  3. Sharp corners also tend to act as arrows, directing attention away from the button and not toward what’s inside, the call to action.

Think about using a combination of shapes instead of just one regular shape.

Your button size is also important and easy to test. The size of your text can affect your conversion rates, so make sure to experiment to see what gives you the best results. (Hint: Bigger is usually better!)

9. Create Explainer Videos & Sliders

Some of the white board animated videos you see on websites are 1 to 3 minutes long. Those are explainer videos.

Video explainers are videos that go into detail about what your company does. Animated videos could increase your conversion rates by 30% or more if done correctly.

The amount of time we spend focused on one thing online has been gradually decreasing as we’ve gotten faster at retrieving information. We don’t want to read books that are too long. We don’t even want to read a newspaper! Explainer videos are easy to consume and understand because they’re visual and can arouse more emotions than reading.

Explainer videos can be a bit tricky, so here are some tips:

  1. Explainer videos can be very expensive and hard to A/B split test since you’ll have to create uniquely different videos to do so. Plan things carefully.
  2. You might think the idea is all in the animation, but really it’s in the script. Spend some time creating a killer script.
  3. Think about voiceovers too. You want someone who meshes with your business identity. Do you sell saddles? Talk like a Texan. Do you rent out bouncy dragons? Talk like a kid.
  4. Include your best features/benefits and direct viewers with a call to action at the end of the video.
  5. Keep it as short as possible. Anything after a minute and a half will be hard to watch.

10. Social media hub page

At some point, you’ve probably heard the phrase “curate interesting content.” However, merely doing this through social media channels will do nothing to improve your email subscription rate.

If you include email newsletters as part of your overall strategy, having a hub page which includes everything you’ve found to be share-worthy will increase your credibility as an editor and industry authority.

11. Stop Hoarding & Remove Your Clutter

You may believe that it is essential to give a visitor every advantage and all that you can provide on your landing page.

It’s not.

If you remove unimportant paragraphs, it can make it easier for people to understand what you’re saying, which could lead to more sales. This means that you need to be more concise than ever when communicating.

Look closely at your website and say goodbye to the paragraph you’re most proud of; it’s time for it to go.

12. Email signature page

If someone clicks on the name in your email signature, you can send them to your website or another specified page.

For most people, the link takes them to the homepage. What if you saw this opportunity as a chance to introduce yourself and what you’re passionate about? This person has your email, so you are at a different point in the relationship than someone who is just passively looking at you on social media.

Now is the perfect time to include a more personal touch to your communication in order to appeal to those at the bottom of the funnel.

Bonus Landing Page Conversion Rate Tips

  • When you do make changes to your site, make sure you test one major thing at a time, i.e. redesign, layout, headline etc. (If you change too many things at once, some of the changes might have improved conversion rate while others didn’t, and you won’t know what worked and what didn’t.)
  • You want to reach statistical significance with at least a 95% confidence level. (To be on the safe side, make sure your increase in conversions is actually from the change you made, not some external reason you can’t control, like seasonal variance.)
  • Fancy it up & be ridiculous. We’re living in an age of visual eye candy. Social sites like Pinterest and Instagram are not popular because people loved pinboards before they were digital or photography before there were filters. People love these sites because they can express themselves and be unique. Don’t try to fit in. Try to stand out.
  • Remember that getting the sale doesn’t end on the landing page. Look at your approach in terms of how you talk and communicate, and mystery shop your competition and your own employees. Even if you have a 42% lead gen conversion rate on your landing page, your real conversion rate could be much lower when it comes to actually sealing the deal.

You can increase conversions and reach by thinking about where your visitors are coming from.

THE PROBLEM: YOUR BUSINESS ISN’T GROWING AS FAST AS IT SHOULD!

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