In this blog, we’ll cover off 5 common mistakes (if you’re interested in more 5 common mistakes series, click here) that small businesses make when they build landing pages.

Firstly, what is a landing page? A landing page is a page on your website specifically designed to NOT attract organic traffic and deliver a really targeted message to a specific form of advertising you’ve been performing. The most common uses are when using PPC advertising from Search Engines or Social Media platforms but a landing page can (and SHOULD) be used in absolutely any form of advertising where you’re targeting a specific group of potential buyers with specific problems so that you can talk directly to their problems and convert that traffic to a lead or a sale at a much higher rate.

Without further ado, let’s look at 5 common mistakes we see when working with customers on their landing page optimisation.

First Mistake: Not making sure the page displays properly across browsers and devices.

I can’t believe that in 2023 we’re still writing blog posts and discussing mobile responsiveness with business owners, (especially those with marketing budgets!) but here we are. Mobile traffic makes up more than 50% of internet traffic. Sending ad traffic to an unresponsive page means you’re practically ignoring half of the people on there which has a knock on effects such as:

• It increases your cost per action on the page by whatever % of that traffic is mobile.
• It will put customers off of using your brand in the future.

If you had a bricks and mortar store or showroom, this is akin to turning away 50% of the customers who are trying to get in your store. Madness.

Second Mistake: Including their navbar and footer.

When a customer visits your landing page, we should be pushing them to complete one singular goal. That could be to fill out an appointment request, complete a survey, purchase a specific product but it should always be a singular goal. Don’t distract the customer by giving them the opportunity to navigate away from that goal, distraction is the enemy of a landing page and any exit opportunity should be minimised as much as possible.

Basically, if you want your customer to do X. Don’t give them any option but to perform X on the landing page.

Third Mistake: Having too many goals throughout the page.

Data from CXL shows that adding more than one conversion goal significantly impacts how your pages convert, based on the assumption that asking your visitors to make too many decisions on the spot makes them end up making less decisions because they feel pressured. Adding a second conversion goal to a landing page in an e-commerce business showed a 266% drop in conversion, which obviously carries a huge impact.

In the world of landing page conversion goals, follow the KISS method. Keep it simple, stupid.

Fourth Mistake: Not including thank-you or next steps page.

Please keep in mind that while getting a customer to convert by buying a product, filling out a form or booking a meeting is the main goal for that traffic source, your job never actually stops at that point. Your job actually really starts at that point. If they’ve bought a product, they need to create an account and be remarketed to to avoid expensive advertising in the future. If they’ve booked a meeting you need to get them to attend that meeting and progress from there.

Always include a thank you page that makes the next step even easier and natural for them to follow. As an example, if they’ve booked a meeting add a thank you page that points them to more relevant information* about what to expect, what to prepare and so on. Make it easy for the buyer!!

*you should also be using this to track your conversions, but that’s for another post!

Fifth Mistake: Not displaying social proof on the page.

Forgetting social proof is extremely common on landing pages and for the life of me I can never figure out why. When I speak to small business owners I find that they constantly tell me word-of-mouth is their highest converting marketing channel (albeit they struggle to monitor and track it). Word of mouth is so successful because it’s baked in social proof, someone who is from a trustworthy position to your customer has recommended you. Don’t stop that being the case on your landing pages, including reliable, verifiable reviews and case studies about your business is extremely important when it comes to landing page efficiency and optimisation.

If you’ve not got a base of reviews, speak to your last three customers and get them to spend 2 minutes writing a review. Bobs your uncle, you’ve got yourself a review base.