I often analyze low performing Google Ads campaigns and quickly learn the culprit is the website. All too often companies hire an agency to manage the PPC with little to no thought of where the traffic will land.
They just land traffic on the homepage or an existing service page and hope that campaigns produce results.
Avoid this mistake, and strongly consider landing pages for paid traffic!
Many business owners have no idea the Google Ads auction places high importance on the expected click-through rate of an ad, ad relevance, ad formats as well as the landing page experience.
In fact, there is a score in Google Ads for Landing Page Experience and Landing Page Experience History.
In order for a Landing Page to convert page visitors into clients, it must be relevant to the search query, include original content, be easy to navigate and considered to be transparent.
Today we’ll look at how you can optimize your landing pages for Google Ads and generate more conversions.
Are you ready to get started?
Let’s begin!
Key Elements of a Highly Converting Landing Page
An effective landing page has six key elements. Let’s look at each of these elements in detail.
Killer headline
A landing page with a captivating headline makes all the difference in increasing the conversion rates for business growth. The headline you put should be able to capture your reader’s interest, attention, and understanding.
To compel a visitor to keep reading, make the headline short and tell the reader in a few words what your service is all about. Never make your headline more than 20 words.
If you offer a variety of services, name a high-level goal to spark your visitor’s interest. A declarative statement that emphasizes the importance of your services is a great way to do this.
Layout
The layout of the landing page should be simple and easy to navigate. Reduce overcrowding in the images by choosing a simple image that has clear text for easy understanding.
To increase your conversion rates, limit the number of images, copy, and links that appear on a landing page and organize your content in a proper structure. You may have heard that you must always put the most important information above the fold. Even though it’s a good place to start, it’s not always effective.
Make your landing page pleasing to the eye by removing sidebars and any other extraneous content. This helps you focus your layout on the conversion you want them to make.
Persuasive subheadings
The subheadings are supposed to persuade your reader to stay longer on the website. Give the reader more details about your services to be able to connect with you more successfully.
Landing pages have an average conversion rate of 5-15% yet they are often overshadowed by homepages.
Copy
An explanation about what services you offer is crucial for the landing page. The copy should be clear and straight to the point. It should all be geared to helping your potential clients understand your services better.
Strive to make your copy benefit-oriented. You need to show how your service meets an emotional need beyond being functional. As humans, we’re wired to avoid pain so tell your page visitors how your services will help them avoid frustration and solve the problem they are facing.
What goal do you want that page to accomplish? Use this to provide clarity to page visitors. Your copy can be fun and unique.
Images
Visual content creates an impact on a reader even before they read the copy. The pictures that you put on the landing page should be of high quality and be relevant to your service.
After all, the images are the first thing your page visitor processes. They’ll shape their impression even before they start reading your copy.
Let the image grab attention and demonstrate relevance to the visitor. The images are meant to give the readers a visual understanding of the services you offer and what they stand to gain.
Call to action
The call to action (CTA) is the most important element in a landing page as it converts visitors into customers. Make your CTA visible by using a button to show the visitors what action to take next.
To get people to click, increase the contrast between the CTA button color and the background color. According to research, red stands out on most web pages. This is because it invokes urgency, excitement, and passion.
Green is also calming and is associated with the “Go” traffic signal. It can be used to motivate clients because it’s mentally easier to pick this color.
How to Optimize Your Landing Pages for Google Ads
Below are the most effective ways you can optimize your landing pages for your Google Ads campaign.
Analyze your intent and user intent
User intent helps you identify with the mindset of the user while searching the keywords in Google Ads. This will help you determine what the user is thinking when typing a keyword phrase.
Connect your intent with the user’s intent by looking at which keyword is searched for a lot and come up with a landing page message that resonates with the user. Also, avoid using more than 10 keywords in one Ad Group as it makes it hard for one to connect to your landing page with keywords.
Match your landing page to your Google Ads campaign objective
Match the objective of the Google Ads Campaign and the content of the landing page to your prospective customer’s conversion path. Let the visitor feel a seamless transition from the Google Ads to the landing page. Sell the same information throughout the platform as it creates a sense of guarantee and connection with the users.
Think of your Google Ads text ad copy as a promise you make and the landing page is the delivery of your promise. Map out every step to conversion in order to fix potential interruptions that hinder you from fulfilling this promise. This could be having the same keyword or phrase that drove the original search. The smallest disconnect between your Google Ad Campaign and the landing page can disrupt the entire process.
Define your unique selling point
The unique selling point (USP) will define for the customers why you are the best choice in the market. Always define your selling point with a short description and tell the customer why they should turn to you for their specific problem
For instance, if the Google Ad addresses a “pain point,” let your page visitors know why your services is the best option. A strong USP will define what you’re offering as the best solution for visitors to your landing pages.
Explore different layout options
Layouts are designed to smoothen the user’s path. Have the web designer create for you different layouts of a landing page to choose from.
Have a guideline of items that you want to appear on the landing page such as:
- The headline
- The contact address of the company
- Copy
- Your phone number
- Your email address
Use your competitor’s landing pages to see what works for them. This will help you narrow down the types of layouts you should be working with on your brand.
Incorporate testimonials and customer badges as social proof
Social proof from third parties can act as a way to build visitors’ trust and confidence on your site. Incorporate testimonials and display a list of your satisfied clients. This way, the visitors will click the call to action button with confidence that the site is genuine which will boost your conversion rates.
Hubspot shows that customers are likely to seek service if it is recommended online. Therefore, display all the tweets, likes, subscribers and shares to convert the visitors to actual clients.
SEO Considerations
You will need to decide whether or not the landing page will also be used for SEO. In most cases, you will already have a page on the site accessible from menu navigation and optimized for SEO. Which means, in most cases, your landing page will be used exclusively for paid traffic.
It’s difficult to create a landing page that will be used for Paid Traffic and SEO since pages optimized for SEO typically have more text. And landing pages for paid traffic typically used bullet-point style copy, shorter paragraphs and rely on video and nice images.
Make your landing pages mobile-friendly
Always communicate with the designer of the site to make necessary changes that are in the interest of the user. Pay close attention to the details for example if the text is legible, if the navigation through the site is easy and if the site loads fast.
Research dictates that 53% of the users abandon the site if it doesn’t load in 3 seconds. Make the landing pages mobile-friendly so that more users can navigate and complete forms easily through their mobile phones.
For an increase in conversion rates, consider using amp versions in landing pages as they are designed to load almost instantly.
Analyze engagement using heat maps and recordings
Heat maps are a great way to analyze by use of graphical representation. Through the use of data from Google Analytics, one can analyze the behavior of customers or website users. Also compare competing for landing pages to constantly improve and make changes to create a better one for your customers.
Constant experimenting and analysis of the data help you to improve on the weak areas which in the long term will lead to business growth.
A/B test multiple versions of your landing pages
Regularly test the design and content of the landing pages to acquire a higher return on Google Ads spend. Integrate the use of the Google optimizer tool in Google Ads to test the landing pages at no extra cost. This will act as a tool for analyzing and tracking the costs of advertising and the number of sales conversion made from every Google Ad campaign.
Perform A/B tests for the unique selling point, call to action button and images. Test the different landing page versions against each other to see which one performs better.
Ready to Get Started?
When you optimize your Google Ads landing pages, you get more ROI from your ad spend and boost your conversion rates. Taking the above steps and combining them with consistent experimentation as well as testing of landing page versions will help you come up with better results.
The best part is you don’t have to do it alone. If you need professional help setting up a landing page for your Google Ads campaigns, contact us directly today for a consultation.
