The fourth article in our Email Messaging Best Practices series
The days when it was enough for a lead generation email to simply refer prospects to your homepage are long gone. Today’s recipients expect to be led to specific website content, clarifying and elaborating on the email content which enticed them to click through. This connection also needs to become obvious to recipients very quickly to keep them engaged.
Here are a few best practices to help you develop landing pages for your email campaigns — to drive recipients to explore specific sections of your website in depth — and spark them to begin a dialogue with your company.
Make landing pages scannable and telegraphic
Think of your landing page as a portal with several entry points to elicit deeper engagement. The idea is to make the verbiage provocative and intriguing enough for prospects to want to know more, and to self-select areas they want to explore. It’s also best for the layout to have an open look that is easy to scan and digest and mobile friendly — enabling time-pressed prospects to quickly pinpoint areas most relevant to them.Keep intro verbiage succinct and above the fold
Website pages on the secondary and tertiary levels are often heavier on information, for the benefit of visitors looking to do a deeper dive on certain topics. By contrast, the landing page for an email leadgen effort should quickly speak to the overarching benefit that has been introduced in the outreach email itself. Try to keep this verbiage to a thematic headline/subhead and one or two short paragraphs at most. The idea is to keep this key messaging “above the fold” where the reader doesn’t have to scroll to see it.Use strategically placed CTAs to elicit response
Having a strong call-to-action (CTA) is the name of the game today in digital marketing. A valuable place for this is just below the intro messaging block section described above, keeping the CTA above the fold as well. It’s best to offer CTAs for any corollary subsections as well, along with an on-page signup form. Many recipients today simply won’t get to the bottom of your landing page. Give them ample opportunity to click through, engage further and/or initiate contact throughout the page.Employ A/B testing for design, messaging and CTAs
As with any email leadgen campaign, the practice of A/B testing can produce valuable insights that boost open rates, clickthrough rates and further engagement. Try varying the elements of your landing page, including design/imagery, headlines and subheads, details in the body messaging and verbiage/placement of CTAs.Include an offer to warrant diving in further
Consider if there’s something of value you can offer to landing page visitors as further enticement to engage? The possibilities are many. A limited time discount or free add-on with a purchase. A downloadable whitepaper. A link to a webinar, informational podcast or instructional video. A free app that relates to your area or service or expertise.By delving into the best practices outlined above, you can greatly increase the effectiveness and engagement factors across your email leadgen campaigns. A valuable step to generating more leads, responses and conversions — which in turn can increase sales and ROI.
More in our Email Messaging Best Practices series
- Writing Email Subject Lines to Pique Genuine Interest
- Using A/B Testing to Boost Email Campaign Results
- Sequencing Emails for Engagement and Retention
- Varying Email and Landing Page Content to Sustain Engagement