Personal injury claims can result in a payment of tens of thousands of pounds and so fees of several thousand pounds can be earned by the lawyer who gets the business. That’s why companies are prepared to bid an average of £75 per click in AdWords for the keyword phrase “personal injury claims”. This means that pay-per-click (PPC) advertising is very expensive and high converting personal injury landing pages are essential to generate quality leads.
In this post I will show you how to create a high performing personal injury landing page. This includes examples of the good, the bad and the downright ugly personal injury landing pages. There are some established best practices for designing landing pages which you may find useful, but here I will concentrate on the specific needs of the personal injury market. This will ensure you get a high conversion rate.
As increasingly browsing is becoming mobile only I am focusing on the mobile user experience as this is also the most challenging to optimise. A mobile first strategy ensures users on a small screen are not overwhelmed by content designed for a desktop experience.
Begin with your audience:
Before designing any landing page it’s essential to think about whom you are targeting and what their main decision style is likely to be. There are thousands of personal injury lawyers competing for business. It’s difficult for customers to tell one company from another. This means that people searching for a personal injury lawyer don’t have the time or ability to compare lots of different suppliers.
As a result decision making in this kind of market can often be a matter of guesswork for consumers. This is why strategies relating to brand salience can help here as most prospects won’t have made a personal injury claim before. Due to the nature of the service, trust is also important. Cognitive biases, such as loss aversion and authority are also drivers of decisions in this kind of market as people look for short-cuts to making a considered choice.
For example, loss aversion means people are often attracted to the concept of no win, no fee. This is because it eliminates the risk of large legal fees that the customers is unable to pay if they lose their case.
Establish Trust and Credibility:
As the vast majority of prospects won’t have previously used a personal injury claims lawyer they are unlikely to have much, if any, awareness of individual firms. This means the landing page must quickly establish trust and credibility as otherwise visitors will go elsewhere.
First impressions count and so it is important that your landing page looks professionally designed and is clutter free to minimise cognitive load. This means having a clear information hierarchy and display prominent risk reducers (e.g. No Win No Fee and free phone) to reduce user anxiety. However, the asterisk (*) at the end of the “Call us Free” may undermine the impact of the message as it raises anxiety about it not always being the case.
Use third party validation (e.g. regulatory logos, partner logos or reviews) to transfer some of the goodwill from other organisations or people to your brand. Customer reviews or endorsements from experts can provide a powerful short-cut to considered decision making as they help establish trust in the brand.
Image Source: Seriousinjurylaw.co.uk
Have a clear call-to-action:
Your primary call-to-action (CTA) should be clearly visible and describe what happens next. It also sets expectations for the next page that the user lands on. The CTA label should complete the sentence “I want to ….” and so don’t use generic copy such as “Submit” or “send”. These three landing pages all have prominent CTAs that use language that clearly communicates what happens next.
Avoid giving too much choice:
The more choices you offer users the longer it is likely to take them to decide which to select (see Hick’s Law). When offering multiple CTAs it is important to give clear guidance on which is best for them.
Some sites, such as Accidentcliamsadvice.org, display both free phone numbers and 0333 numbers. This can create unnecessary confusion for users as 0800 numbers are now free for both landline and mobile users. 0300 number are not related to a specific geographic location and are not generally free to call. By suggesting mobile users call the 0333 number the company could actually create mistrust about their motives.
Image Source: Accidentclaimsadvice.org.uk
Keep It Simple:
Designers and web masters often like to follow the latest trends in web design to make their sites look current and stylish (e.g. over-sized hero images or auto-sliders). Avoid these fads and create landing pages that have a clear visual separation between content and the page shell (page title, navigation and background).
Don’t break basic web conventions such as not placing your navigation either at the top or bottom of the screen. This is where users expect to see your navigation and so it creates issues if it’s not located in the normal position. Avoid complex background designs as this is distracting and can make it difficult to read copy.
Allow Users To Scan Content:
Research has shown that most users scan web screens and only read the content that they are most interested in. This means avoiding large blocks of text and allow users to scan content by:
- Having prominent titles and subtitles.
- Using bullet points rather than sentences.
- Keep content to an absolute minimum to avoid information overload.
Here are two landing pages which use different approaches to displaying content. Accidentclaimsadvice.org.uk on the left doesn’t follow best practice and so there is screen after screen of block copy. This site requires more than twice the amount of scrolling compared to National-accident-helpline and the content is much more difficult to digest because there is so much of it.
Keep Your Promises:
Ensure continuity and consistency with the upstream experience. Many personal injury landing pages perform poorly because they don’t send visitors to a dedicated landing page which displays the relevant keywords and limited content to avoid distractions. Instead they are sent to the homepage instead.
Similarly, if you mention ‘No win no fee’ in your PPC or organic search entry make sure this is present on your landing page. Otherwise this can cause anxiety and confusion as visitors may not be sure that is what they are signing up for.
Image Source: Injurylawyers4u.co.uk
Only Ask For Information That Is Required:
With the implementation of European GDPR legislation it is even more important than ever to only request information we need to complete a desired action. Social norms also require us to respect a user’s privacy and any organisation that oversteps the mark is likely to suffer from poor conversion rates.
So, given that most personal injury sites want to arrange a call-back, why do so many sites, such as the ones shown below, also request the user’s email address? This is unnecessary and could make users anxious about how their data is likely to be used.
Make sure your landing page clearly indicates why you are collecting information and how it will be used. Only ask for information that is definitely required for the first step in the customer acquisition process. Don’t include optional fields on your form and avoid repeated data entry by transferring data from your forms to your CRM system.
Short Form vs Long Form:
There are a number of pros and cons of both short form and long form landing pages. Short form pages are generally more focused and have fewer distractions. However, long form designs are generally better at catering for users at different stages of the decision making process. You are much less restricted by the content you can display and so they are more flexible in delivering different content.
Image SourceL Injurylawyer4u.co.uk and National-accident-helpline.co.ukLike most things implementation is crucial and experimentation is the best way of finding out what works for you. Use A/B tests to identify how short form and long form designs influence user behaviour and conversion rates. Such tests will provide evidence for your decisions rather than relying on subjective opinions that are often wrong. See this post on how to choose A/B testing software that suits your needs.
The good, the bad and the ugly!
The Good:
The national-accident-helpline.co.uk site follows many of the best practices outlined above. It has clear CTAs, customer ratings and reviews to establish trust and uses bullet points and links to minimise the length of copy.
Image Source: National-Accident-Helpline.co.uk
The site also uses headings and sub-headings to help users scan the content and the sticky navigation ensures a CTA is permanently visible on the screen. Social media links could be removed from the home page as personal injury claims are not generally a social behaviour.
Image Source: National-Accident-Helpline.co.uk
The Bad:
The accidentcliamsadvice.org.uk page is nicely set out and has lots of information, but there is just far too much of it. It’s equivalent to 20 screens to scroll on an iPhone 6 and is likely to put off many users as it’s difficult to scan. There is some great content here, but it’s not accessible enough for many users.
Image Source: Accidentcliamsadvice.org.uk
The Ugly:
Ugly can often beat the stylish but it’s important to not overload users with choices. These two landing pages for solicitors lack a clear CTA and offer too many options at the beginning of the user journey. They appear to be designed around how the lawyers categorize claims rather than the nature of the client’s injury. A landing page should be about the user and not about your internal processes and procedures.
Image Source: Irwinmithchell.com and Claims500.co.uk
Test, test and test:
The above advice in this post is based upon personal experience and evidence from many A/B tests and research that I have undertaken. But that doesn’t mean what has previously worked in a different context will work for your personal injury landing page. Optimisation is about testing and learning from what doesn’t work as much as what does work.
So use my suggestions here to inform your decision making. Don’t forget to test and measure the impact on your conversion rate. Also be careful not to use vanity metrics such as clicks on a call-to-action as these are meaningless unless they also lead to an improvement in key success metrics (e.g. leads or revenues).
Conclusion:
A high performing personal injury landing page will focus on user needs and how they make their decisions. Always begin with the customer and look to establish trust and credibility as soon as possible. People scan web content and so follow these simple rules:
- Make your CTAs prominent and clear.
- Don’t offer too many choices.
- Keep you design simple and avoid complex backgrounds or other distractions.
- Use bullet points and headings to enable scanning.
- Ensure you keep your promises.
- Ask for the absolute minimum amount of information.
Finally, don’t assume that you know what will work. It’s always a good idea to test because we are all prone to confirmation bias and other cognitive biases that encourage us to believe we know more than we do. Establish a culture of experimentation to find out what actually works for your organisation.
The real estate and buy-to-let sector is highly competitive and derives most of its traffic from paid search advertising (i.e PPC and display advertising). For this reason it is especially important to optimise real estate landing page design when traffic is so expensive. I’ve already written about how to create a high performing landing page, but I’ve not previously examined investment property landing page design.
However, when I recently did some work for a property company in London, I was surprised how poorly optimised many real estate landing pages are in the UK. I noticed basic faults, such as not following standard web conventions , a lack of tag lines to reinforce the unique value proposition and poorly worded call-to-action copy. Furthermore, mobile landing pages were either broken or lacked device related functionality.
What Defines a high converting real estate landing page?
What does the evidence tell us about property landing pages? Unbounce, the landing page specialists, have taken data from their Conversion Benchmark Report and the analysis of their top ten highest converting real-estate landing pages. Using this analysis Unbounce identified the following characteristics of a high performing real-estate landing page:
- Short pages convert better: By measuring the word count on the page they found that a 33% lower conversion rate for longer landing pages.
- Reading ease: Landing pages that used 6th grade level language had nearly double the conversion rate of those written at university level English.
- Call-to-action button: All high converting real-estate landing pages included a detailed description of the offer and the vast majority had a “request a call back” or “call us” option. The best designs also included button copy that reinforced what visitors would receive by completing the form.
- Imagery: The designers also noticed the use imagery with beautiful hero shots of interior and exterior of properties. Full-width photography backgrounds, maps and floor plans were also prominent in the best designs.
How do UK Buy-to-Let Landing Pages Perform?
So taking this data and my own expertise in improving landing page conversion by over 30% I evaluated five of the top PPC buy-to-Let landing pages in the UK. The landing pages were selected according to their position in a Google search for “buy-to-let property”. I have no links to any of the sites evaluated.
1. The Axium:
This site reminded me of my days in online gaming as the site is dark and menacing. The contrast is poor and some of the font sizes are far too small for anyone with less than perfect sight. Analysis of low contrast sites by psychologist Adam Alter found that such designs disrupts information processing and makes people more judgemental and critical.
Image Source: The-axium.com
The other points I noticed on the page are:
- No telephone number/contact details.
- Having navigation can be a distraction and is worth testing removing.
- The call-to-action “Apartment Types Here” is somewhat lost as it doesn’t stand out on the page and it’s not clear it is clickable.
- It’s not clear which is the primary call-to-action
- “Submit” to what? The copy on the CTA should complete the sentence “I want to ….”
On the plus side the landing page is short and there are easy to find contact details below the fold. The mobile landing page also renders well and supports mobile functionality (e.g. tap to call or to email).
2. Urbane Brix:
This a long form landing page and yet there is very little content above the fold. The page lacks contact details, a tag line and a call-to-action above the fold. Prospects would have to scroll at least once to find contact details and the contact form is two scrolls down the page.
Image Source: Urbanebrix.com
I’ve previously covered 62 web form design best practices to optimise conversions and this form breaks a number of those recommendations. The form lacks impact when users discover it and the main issues I have with it are summarised as:
- There is no headline to communicate why prospects should complete the form.
- Single column forms generally convert better
- Placeholder text causes usability issues.
- Remove non-mandatory fields to minimise the length of forms
- “Submit” to what? Should reinforce what prospects will get by completing form.
The mobile landing page did not facilitate smartphone functionality (e.g. tap to call or to email). The phone number displayed was not responsive and so users have no other option than to complete the form. This can be a frustrating experience for prospects who want to talk to someone immediately.
3. SevenCapital:
This is a long form page but it would be less of an issue if all the key elements of the proposition were located above the fold.
Image Source: Sevencapital.com
- Displaying your phone number in the top left-hand corner breaks a strong web convention that your logo should be located here. The contrast is poor and the font size is also too small. Locate your telephone number on the top right-hand side of the page and make it prominent.
- Social media icons only create potential exit points and no one is going to share a page before they have purchased anything. Get rid of them!
- Avoid using the same colour for different call-to-actions as it takes attention away from your primary CTA.
- Always place labels outside of the input field and avoid placeholder text as this can cause usability issues.
- “Send” fails to reinforce what prospects will receive by completing the form.
When we looked at the site on a popular iOS mobile device we see a rectangle at the bottom of the screen with no label. When I clicked on it I was taken to the contact form. This creates a poor impression of the site because no one has checked the site on popular browsers and devices. It is easy to automate this process by using a cross-browser and device testing service.
Image Source: Sevencapital.com
4. Aspen Woolf:
This is another long form landing page. The main issues I have with this page is that it is too busy and lacks a clear information hierarchy. Hick’s Law tells us that the more choices people are offered the more time it takes them to make a decision. So to avoid choice overload be careful not to present too many different options.
Image Source: Aspenwoolf.co.uk
- Don’t place your telephone number where users expect the logo to be.
- Your logo should be in the top left-hand side of the page.
- Navigation can be a distraction on landing pages and test removing to see if it helps.
- Too many competing call-to-actions above the fold can kill conversions.
- The sticky bottom bar can be a distraction and hides some content.
The amount of content on the AspenWoolf page suggests this is not a high converting page. Unfortunately the contact form creates more friction with users and is unlikely to encourage prospects to complete the form.
Image Source: Aspenwoolf.co.uk
- It lacks a compelling reason to complete the form.
- There is far too much dense copy on the left of the page. People don’t read they scan and so copy should be in short paragraphs or preferably bullet points.
- Why ask country if you don’t need it?
- Best remove non-mandatory fields to minimise form length.
- “Find out more” may not be appropriate if the company automatically calls prospects.
On a smartphone users are unable to click on the phone number displayed at the top of the page. Most users will expect to use device related functionality such as being able to tap phone numbers on a mobile device. You can check to see what users are tapping on by integrating a user experience tool. Some, like Hotjar, are free if your site receives less than 2,000 visits a day.
5. Emerging Property:
This is also a long form landing page. Although the form is not wholly located above the fold, enough is clearly visible to encourage prospects to scroll slightly down the page to complete it. The main challenges users have with the page are:
Image Source: Emergingproperty.co.uk
- There is no tagline to reinforce the unique value proposition.
- No telephone number or contact details visible above the fold.
- The headline lacks context and so has limited meaning until the user digests more of the page content.
- No labels outside of the form fields.
- Poor CTA label copy as doesn’t confirm what the prospect will receive by completing the form.
On a popular iOS mobile device the page does not render correctly. The heading on the hero image is not readable because it overlaps with the white background. This is why it’s important to use a cross-browser and device checking service to audit your customer experience.
Image Source: Emergingproperty.co.uk
Conclusion:
Landing page optimisation is particularly important when the vast majority of your traffic is derived from paid advertising (e.g. pay-per-click or display advertising). If you don’t have the internal expertise you should consider bringing in a conversion rate optimisation consultant to advise you. They can conduct an heuristic evaluation of your website and app to identify where you can make improvements. They can also transfer skills to your organisation to allow you to take control of the optimisation process.
If you have sufficient traffic you could also begin A/B testing your landing pages to identify what works and what doesn’t work. Don’t just copy your competitors as they may not know what they are doing any more than you do. Don’t forget to also check your user experience on a regular basis using cross-browser and device testing tools. Broken or poorly rendering sites can destroy your credibility with prospects online and kill your conversion rate. Use web analytics to monitor your conversion rate so that you can quickly identify when there may be a problem.
Are you struggling with a conversion rate of less than 6% with your landing page design? Are over 30% of your visitors bouncing and are your engagement metrics poor? Well, if that is the case there is a strong likelihood that your page is suffering from one or more of the 8 deadly sins of landing page design.
A landing page of course is any page where a visitor first lands on a site and so for many visitors this is the homepage. Landing pages can have a massive impact on your conversion rate because they are near the beginning of the funnel. If you want to make an impact on your conversion rate it is better to start here than almost anywhere else because you will have the largest number of visitors to influence.
What is a high landing page conversion rate?
A benchmarking study by Unbounce of landing page conversion rates shows how conversion rates vary significantly according to the industry sector. But there are also huge differences within each sector when we break down landing page conversion rates into quartiles.
Real estate suffers with one of the lowest average landing page conversion rates (7.4%). Whilst catering and restaurants have the highest (18.2%). However, what is most shocking is the massive difference between the average and the median conversion rate for landing pages. The lowest median conversion rate is just 2.4% compared to the highest of 18.2%.
Think about that for a second. That’s a difference of over 7 times for the highest average converting landing page. That could be the difference between success and failure of a business. This study just confirms how important landing page design is. It can make such a huge difference to your conversion rate and your bottom line. So, what causes some landing page designs to perform so poorly?
The 8 deadly sins of landing page design:
Tim Ash, CEO of Sitetuners, outlines seven deadly sins of landing page design in his awesome book Landing Page Optimization. I couldn’t beat this superb list and so I’ve outlined below how each of these deadly sins can be resolved and added an eighth sin of my own.
1. Unclear call-to-actions!
Unclear or ambiguous calls-to-actions create confusion and frustration among users. It should be clear where to click with little need for any consideration. The aim of the page should be clear from a prominent headline at the top of the page. The CTA should be clearly visible in a well-defined block that is visually prominent. The remainder of the page should be plain and visually un-cluttered.
A clear CTA should describe what occurs next and what the user can expect when they arrive on the next page. The text on the CTA should complete the sentence “I want to..” and so you should avoid generic copy such as “Submit” or “Continue”. Never use a hyperlink for a primary CTA as links are less visible and users expect the main CTA to be a button.
2. Give visitors too much choice!
Hick’s Law indicates that the more choices you offer a user, the longer it will take them to come to a decision. This also means that your conversion rate is likely to decline as you increase the number of call-to-actions you display. The aim should be to assist customers in deciding what best meets their needs by directing visitors towards a relevant CTA or desired content.
To assist in this process ensure you avoid clutter on the page, keep detail to a minimum, group related choices into a smaller number of categories and use visual cues to minimise the need to read copy.
This homepage from Comms-Express lacks a clear CTA and offers visitors far too many choices. The page displays ads, social media icons, an auto-slider with a CTA and other conflicting CTAs which distract users. The star rating also partly obscures the primary navigation and the page lacks a clear structure. It is difficult to know where to look first on the page.
3. Visual distractions!
Keep your landing page simple and ensure there is a clear visual separation between page content and the page shell (header, navigation and background). Complex backgrounds, animation and auto-play videos automatically draw they eye and can annoy users at a crucial point in the user journey.
Maintain the user’s focus by directing them towards the “happy path” which takes the user to the preferred conversion action.
Other visual effects to avoid include;
- Dark and dramatic colour themes of black or saturated bright colours that create a dark and mysterious atmosphere with a limited appeal.
- Garish text which employs large fonts in high contrast colours and is emphasized by the use of edging effects. Like drop shadows and fades.
- Visual embellishments & flourishes such as containers using drop shadows and other design effects. Page sides that are filled with complex patterns or images distract from the main body of the page where the call-to-action is located. These type of elements break-up eye flow and distract users.
- Banner ads or elements that look like banners can take attention away from your conversion action. It gives the impression that you are more interested in advertising revenues than meeting customer needs.
- Entry pop-ups can be an unwelcome surprise. They can also prevent users from viewing the content that they are looking for.
In this A/B test on Cheeky Bingo a dedicated landing page with a very prominent primary “Join For Free” CTA massively outperformed the existing home page. The homepage had been the main landing page for most new visitors, but it suffered from multiple CTAs, distracting banners and general clutter.
The landing page recorded a 133 percent uplift in clicks on the primary CTA and this resulted in a 27 percent uplift in registrations and a 9 percent uplift in first time deposits.
4. Not keeping promises!
It is essential that the landing page design matches people’s expectations and intent in relation to what they have previously read about your proposition. For example if you mention an offer in your PPC ad or in your organic search entry it is important that it is clearly and consistently displayed on the landing page. Otherwise visitors may feel anxious, confused and frustrated.
The goal gradient effect suggests that people are more motivated by how close they are to their goal rather than how much progress they have made so far. This means you should indicate how close visitors are to achieving their goal (e.g. sign up in less than 60 seconds) to boost their motivation.
5. Visitors don’t read, they scan web pages.
People scan websites and rapidly get lost if there is no clear visual hierarchy or organisational flow to guide them. It is difficult to scan large blocks of text and so dense SEO type copy can harm your landing page design and lead to a low conversion rate.
To assist visitors with scanning your page ensure your landing page design:
- Uses short bullet points rather than sentences.
- Has clear page headings and sub-headings.
- Uses the inverted pyramid style, with the most important copy first & last.
- Be ruthless with editing to keep content to a minimum.
- Place supporting text such as offer terms and conditions on a supporting page or information popovers.
The Spotify homepage below uses bullet points to clearly communicate the benefits of signing up to the music download service. It uses loss aversion to highlight the features customers lose if they don’t sign up for Premium. The design also explodes the myth that a landing page has to be short. For many users subscribing to the service is a major commitment. It is important to allow visitors to explore the nature of the free and subscription services. The design also ensures there is only a single prominent CTA on any individual screen to assist conversion.
This long-form page also sets expectations about Spotify’s free service. Users are less likely to be disappointed if they sign up for the limited free service. This encourages users to consider the benefits of the subscription service rather than getting users to automatically signing up for the free service.
6. Asking for too much information
Social norms apply just as much to online interactions as they do to offline conversations. It is important that we respect a user’s privacy. To benefit from reciprocity we offer as much as we can and ask for as little as possible in return.
When we do request information on a landing page ensure you follow these guidelines (also see post on form design best practice guidelines):
- Have a clear headline that explains the benefit to the user.
- Use concise descriptive labels and tool tips if necessary.
- Organise input fields into logical labelled subgroups.
- Only ask for information that is absolutely necessary to take the visitor to the next step of the user journey.
- Remove all optional fields and collect additional data later on in the process.
- Eliminate repeated data entry by automatically refreshing your CRM or personalisation engine with data from your forms.
When a visitor is on a mobile phone there is even greater pressure to keep information requests to a minimum. Here Skyscanner, the flight ticket comparison site, manages to keep all the input fields and the CTA visible on the screen without the user having to scroll.
Skyscanner runs thousands of A/B tests a year and so it is interesting how the page flow focuses on popular destinations immediately below the form (social influence). However, further down the page we see short paragraphs on the benefits of the service and evidence about its reputation. The landing page design combines a long-form design with effective use of white space and simple illustrations to avoid information overload.
7. Lack of trust and credibility:
For people to be comfortable with any transaction it is necessary for both parties to establish a level of trust that allows them to interact without the suspicion that the other’s actions are solely selfish or might be to the disadvantage of one party. We have to extend some trust to completely unknown people to enable small and large transactions to take place.
First impressions count as research indicates that visitors form an impression of a website within 50 milliseconds. This means that a landing page must look professionally designed and clearly communicate key messages to establish trust within a few seconds.
Follow these key rules for your landing page design:
- Be ruthless with clutter to keep content to a minimum in your landing page design.
- Have a clear organisational structure to your page to minimise cognitive load.
- Display risk reducers (e.g. free postage, easy or free returns and money back guarantee) to lower visitor anxiety.
- For visitors who may not have heard of your brand use third party validation (e.g. by displaying partner logos or reviews) as this transfers some of the goodwill from other people or organisations to yours.
- Third party validation communicates that knowledgeable experts or reviewers consider you have a quality product or service. It provides a short-cut to decision-making.
Themathsfactor.com landing page design uses a combination of a celebrity endorsement and strong customer testimonials to establish trust and credibility. The design also caters for visitors at different stages of the buying process by offering multiple CTA. However, it ensures the primary CTA – ‘Get started today’ is the most prominent.
8. Not understanding your markets decision style:
Before you begin thinking about constructing your landing page design it is important to consider the predominant choice style in your market. What is a decision style you say? Well, decision styles is about extensive analysis and research (Bentley, Earls & O’Brien – 2011) to understand the relationships, similarities and differences between different behavioural styles of decision making.
The patterns in the data suggest that in many markets buyer behaviour is strongly influenced by what other people are doing or what we think they are doing. This is characterised by people following experts or trends (e.g. what’s most popular). At the other end of the spectrum there are occasions when we use a more considered rational style of decision making. These two different styles of decision making form the horizontal axis.
The horizontal axis reflects the number of similar options we have to choose from. At the top of the axis people are faced with relatively few similar options and so they can make a judgement call if they possess the knowledge to do so.
But at the other end of the spectrum people are faced with so many choices that it is practically impossible to identify an ideal product or service to meet their needs. Here people have to make an uninformed choice based on either guesswork or popularity (i.e. social proof).
How do you identify which quadrant your market falls into?
You need to study the characteristic of your sector. For instance, if your market follows the 80:20 rule (i.e. long-tail distribution), where a few large brands account for the lion’s share of the sales, this tends reflect strong social influence. When people are more rational and evaluate brands independently you would expect to see many more brands of a similar size.
Once you have identified the quadrant where your market is predominately positioned you can create strategies that are most likely to be effective with your audience.
North West:
If your customers are in the North-West quadrant you need to communicate about real or perceived superiority of your product or service. Dyson’s household appliances and Audi cars are examples of this strategy.
South West:
The South-West quadrant is more about making your product stand out from the crowd as there are so many similar competitors. This could for example involve using celebrity endorsements or loyalty schemes. Insurance and insurance comparison sites fit into this quadrant as most people don’t have the time or knowledge to understand the differences between the many different features and choices available.
Our choices in this quadrant are largely guesswork. As a result cognitive biases and short-cuts such as confirmation bias and loss aversion can be especially influential in these markets.
North East:
If your customers are mainly in the North-East quadrant then they tend to follow the advice of experts or authorities. Endorsements or awards from recognised professional users or bodies can therefore be powerful motivators for visitors as they establish your credibility.
In the 1990’s when IBM still made PCs there was a saying that nobody got fired for buying an IBM. This reflects the importance social influence as a risk reducer and the desire in business not to be seen to make a bad decision. For this reason some SaaS solutions such as A/B testing software fall into this quadrant.
South East:
Being situated in the South-Eastern quadrant is all about popularity and so social proof is king. Strategies here include being seen as the popular choice (e.g. show how many thousands or millions of customers you have), displaying lots of ‘Likes’ and shares or showing positive media mentions from a well-known publication or website. Popular music, fashion and the latest fads (e.g. fidget spinners) fall into this quadrant. Popularity is of course fickle and so these markets are characterised by extreme volatility.
Predominant style:
These quadrants are of course generalisations, and so you might find some of the strategies from other quadrants also work in your market. Indeed, sometimes your market could fall in-between two quadrants. However, the point of the decision style map is to get you to consider the main ways people make decisions and focus on developing marketing strategies that are relevant to the majority of customers.
Conclusion:
Landing page design is crucial to your conversion rate and so make sure you design them with care. Begin with identifying the predominant decision style in your market as this will help you develop appropriate marketing strategies for your proposition.
If you can, send your new visitors to a dedicated landing page that has been designed specifically with conversion in mind. This allows you to eliminate content that is solely for existing customers that is often not at all relevant to new prospects. It also enables you to keep navigation to a minimum and reduces your number of stakeholders to just those responsible for acquisition.
- Ensure you have a clear and compelling call-to-action that stands out from the page.
- Limit the number of choices you offer visitors to make choices simple.
- Keep visual distractions to a minimum by having a minimal visual aesthetic design
- Show how close visitors are to achieving their goal and ensure you match upstream expectations.
- Use bullet points and visual cues to make your page easy to scan.
- Keep requests for information to an absolute minimum and make sure visitors feel they are getting the better deal.
- Finally, ensure your design and content instantly establishes your credibility and professionalism.
If you follow these eight rules of landing page design you will improve engagement and conversion at a crucial step in the user journey. Most brands spend significant sums on driving visitors to their site and so it is crucial that your landing page is fit for purpose and maximises conversion rates.
