I hear two schools of thought about landing pages these days. The ad-word segment of folks seem to be saying that there should be no links on your landing pages but rather a form where users can submit their information to add them to your lead pool. From what I’ve seen, these pages contain limited information, mostly articulating features of the product or company, and are not focused on creating value for users – only collecting lead information to validate the ad-word buy, and add to the ‘lead list’.
I wonder what the effectiveness of those sorts of landing pages are. I wouldn’t be inclined to complete the form just from coming in from Google, for example, and providing my information to a company based on whatever information they have placed on their landing page. Would you? Does anyone have metrics to share on the effectiveness of this approach?
The other school of thought on landing pages comes from lead nurturing. I’m definitely in that school. I want to provide thought leadership and ideas that help potential customers understand the value that we bring to the table or that solves some pain for them. I want to let them know they’ve got a resource in what my company provides, and not that I’m just trying to sell them something. As someone coming from an ad-word click, of course I want them to opt in to my lead nurturing system, but at their choice, not be forced in.
As someone who shops for solutions online, I appreciate research that helps me understand my problem domain and its solutions. I’m interested in landing pages that have valuable information and links to further information. If and when I am ready for a conversation with that company, only then will I complete a form and request they contact me. And that doesn’t mean I’m ready to purchase, but it does mean that I’m ready to get contacted, and perhaps included on some emails until I choose to opt-out.
There’s a caveat in here: my perspective is for B2B organizations. An effective lead nurturing strategy requires content. It takes content strategy that has your company build a capacity beyond promoting its products, to one of using domain intelligence to create value for the customer (thought leadership) – and that is not necessarily what Marketing folks are used to creating.
I don’t think a landing page is the most effective way to register and track leads. In the B2B world, the preferred method of communication is through email. Email campaigns are a much less intrusive and helpful way to reach my target audience’s minds with useful information. Search Engine Optimization, through natural or purchased search terms helps people find me. Through the value they receive at my site – based on the content available and how relevant they find it, will determine whether I ever find out ‘who’ they are. The job of the content at my site and my landing pages is to earn my place in their consideration.
When I send emails out, I want software that allows me to track all responses to that campaign, not just opens and click-throughs. I want to track everything they do on my site once they click-through – even beyond the landing page! As a marketer, I want to know what content is most visited at my website once a user clicks-through an email – what else do they look at? I want to track it on an individual lead level, and aggregate the information for trending – so I can continuously improve how I communicate with the users coming to the site and showing interest in my products.
The school of thought that focuses on the landing page as a registration portal has too much of their attention on the “lead” part of “lead nurturing” to the detriment of serving potential customers. Technology should help us reach our audiences, not put barriers in the way. If the value is there, the leads will opt in when they are ready. And that is a much more valuable lead.
