The Most Sinister Landing Page Design Mistakes You Might Be Making

Does your landing page see a significant amount of traffic but still doesn’t get enough conversions? This means people can find your page, but it isn’t convincing them to subscribe, make a purchase, or explore your site.

With over 1.7 billion other sites out there, all it takes is one click for customers to back out and try somewhere else.

Fortunately, there’s still hope for fixing your landing page. The best landing pages all share similar positive qualities, and they all avoid mistakes that push people away.

It’s vitally important to understand common design mistakes and find out if they apply to your site.

Value Your Landing Page

It’s important to remember that your landing page is a standalone page made for a single objective: driving conversions.

That’s why you need to optimize your landing page design, so it doesn’t end up asking for a lot of different things. Otherwise, your possible visitors will get overwhelmed and leave.

A small business without an endless supply of funds shouldn’t waste a single dollar on something that won’t work. Any dollar spent this way is a dollar you can’t use for growing your company. It’s important to remember that 80% of businesses fail in two years due to these unnecessary expenses.

If you don’t want to end up like these failed startups, you need to avoid certain pitfalls. Here are some of the most common landing page mistakes you should avoid at all costs.

Slow Page Speed

There are a lot of things that can go wrong with your landing page, like the wrong color scheme, or the lack of brand representation. However, for you to address these problems, your visitors should be able to see your landing page in the first place.

Having a slow page speed is one of the most common SEO mistakes that can ruin your rankings on Google. It also leaves a bad impression on your visitors, since almost 3 out of 4 people leave websites with landing pages that don’t load within 5 seconds. It’s even worse if you’re hosting an eCommerce website because you’ll lose 50% of your traffic when you have a three-second load time.

This is the main reason why a lot of big industry brands focus on reducing their landing page’s load time. It’s common for these websites to have less than a second of load time. It’s quite pressure-inducing, but you need to match that speed.

Too Many Distractions

Most people believe that users should have the ability to choose as freely as they can. That means you need to provide them with as many choices as possible. This doesn’t apply to landing pages however, especially when they’re used to fulfill a single specific objective.

Always remember that our society lives in an attention economy. That means most people’s ability to make decisions gets hindered by too many choices. Extra elements will diminish the importance of the necessary ones on your landing page.

Minimize the distractions, and your visitors will notice the important items first. That ensures that they’ll take the most desirable action on your landing page. 

No Unique Selling Proposition

When you remove the distraction, your potential customers should see the important sales point of your business. Put yourself in your visitors’ shoes and ask this question. Why would anyone buy this product or service?

With that in mind, you’ll communicate your value proposition in a clear, firm voice.

Depending on your landing page’s goal, you need to bring out what makes your business special. This is different from your Call-to-Action (CTA). Your value proposition is your business’s main selling point, while a CTA helps turn the interest from this proposition into a desirable action.

Copy that Doesn’t Match Your Offer

The content of your landing page should match with all the offers you’re giving. That means your value proposition and the body copy should match the ad copy. It’s especially important with the ads that lead people to your landing page.

Ads that aren’t consistent with the landing page content leave a bad impression on your potential clients. Relevancy and consistency help preserve your customers’ attention. If you manage to captivate them, it’s easier for them to perform your desired action.

Lots of Visual Mistakes

It’s an accepted fact that our society lives off visuals. That said, there are two big ways visuals can harm your conversion rates.

The first is with irrelevant images.

You need to put the right image up since it serves as your offer’s visual representation. It will demonstrate how your business works to your prospects. That way, they can picture themselves using it.

If you put up irrelevant images, it will confuse visitors, and can result in misunderstandings. Always make sure that you give them a clear idea of what they’ll get.

The next big mistake is having no image at all.

Having no image is as bad as having the wrong image on your landing page. Images help communicate your business’s value proposition. Make sure that your visuals stand out and lead prospects toward your goals.

Not Optimizing Your Landing Pages for Search

Your landing page should have optimized content for both humans and search engines. It’s especially important to optimize for Google since it controls about 92% of the global search engine market. Plus, you may not have the budget for PPC campaigns.

Before you write your headlines and product descriptions, ensure that you do some serious keyword research. This will help in the organic growth of the landing page. Find the balance between the rate of searches and the number of companies competing with it.

No Social Proof

Another common mistake for businesses. Lack of social proof decreases your landing page’s effectiveness. If you’re endorsed by a lot of satisfied customers, you’ll have a stronger reputation. That means you’re trustworthy, making it easier for people to convert.

You need to get reviews from real customers, as well as celebrities and industry influencers. They need to use your products and services, while saying something good about them. Show their names and pictures once you get their permission.

If you can get a local celebrity, you’ll have a better level of social proof. Another good way to get a better reputation is to connect with industry professionals. You should learn how to add LinkedIn to your marketing strategies.

Poor Mobile Optimization

Google’s mobile searches exceeded its desktop counterpart almost five years ago. It’s a trend that won’t go away. That’s why it’s safe to assume that more than 50% of your landing page visitors use a mobile device. 

If you don’t optimize your landing page for mobile users, you’ll miss out on both money and reputation. Take note, mobile visitors have different intent and get distracted easily. That’s why you don’t need to put a lot of text, just make sure it’s clear and legible.

You Have Confusing Call-to-Actions

CTAs are your business’s lifeblood, since they prevent people from visiting your website without doing anything. It’s a common practice, but customers get turned off if you put more than one CTA on your landing page.

That’s why you need a single, yet effective, CTA to get people to convert. Find the perfect mix of content, colors, and urgency to get your visitors to act. Use action verbs and be concise.

Your Landing Page Asks for Too Much

When people get to your landing page, it’s important to keep your information gathering to a minimum. A common mistake is to ask for a lot of private details. If this happens, your potential customers will feel uncomfortable, and they may back out.

Even if you fix this problem, you need to make sure that your forms aren’t too complicated. For example, you don’t want to mix in great summer marketing ideas with a registration form.

Your customers will want to get your products as soon as they can without hassle. If you put one or two extra fields, it can decrease your landing page’s conversion rates.

A good alternative is to find the right balance between information gathering and customer convenience. As a general rule, you need to get their email address and name. You can also do some adjustments to make some fields auto-fillable on subsequent visits.

You Have Bad Typography

Typography helps present your brand’s story and make its details work for you. It helps in portraying your business’s atmosphere and tone.

It does a lot of things for you, that’s why you need to make it fit your company’s image.

Some landing pages are too plain and have scrawny typography. Aside from that, tiny images and the use of cheap stock photos won’t help in attracting new customers.

Don’t limit yourself with common fonts. Instead, find a legible font that suits your business goals.

Your Landing Page Relies on Videos Too Much

While 80% of traffic leads to videos, only a small percentage of people watch the ones on your landing page. Videos are great for driving conversions, but you need your text copy to make sense without it. If people don’t watch your videos, they need to have the means of understanding your landing page’s goals.

Relying on videos too much can make you lose a lot of potential consumers. It’s especially true for those that don’t have the internet capabilities to watch your landing page videos. If you want to get as many conversions as possible, don’t settle for a single type of media to help with your landing page.

You Lack Simplicity in the Conversion Process

It’s common for online businesses to have abandoned shopping carts, regardless of their size. It’s unavoidable for some people to back out due to a variety of reasons, but you might be contributing to this problem by making your conversion process long and complicated.

A good way to optimize your landing page for your sales process is to get rid of unnecessary steps. People always want things to be quick and easy. If you put more steps in this process, your customers will start liking you less.

Make it a point to consolidate as many processes as you can on the landing page. For example, you can allow your visitors to make accounts, fill out contact information, and sign up for newsletters within that page. It’s great since it helps in limiting the opportunities for people to drop out.

Take note, every new page you add to your website gives users more opportunities to leave without converting. Declutter and streamline your landing page. Put everything in the visitor’s reach without confusing them.

Improve Your Landing Page Design Today

There are a lot of ways for you to fix your landing page design. The mistakes mentioned above are just some of the things that you should avoid.

However, if you aren’t sure about what else to do, it’s time to call in some experts. There are a lot of agencies willing to fix your landing page. Make sure you do your research and reach out to the most reputable ones around.