Are you promoting a lead magnet or special offer on your WordPress site? Then you’ll likely need a landing page.
Landing pages are stand-alone pages designed with the sole purpose of capturing leads and sales. Visitors usually “land” on them after clicking an online ad, social post, or email link. You can use landing pages to collect email addresses, promote webinars, schedule a consultation, sell your products, and more.
Sounds great, but how do you go about creating a WordPress landing page? Luckily, there are two simple methods you can use to build the perfect page for your next promotion.
We’ll walk you through both methods, plus give you a few tips to ensure your landing page delivers as many conversions as possible.
But first, you’re probably wondering why you need to go through the trouble of creating a special landing page. Can’t you just direct visitors to your home page or another page on your website?
Sure, you can do this, but you probably won’t achieve the kinds of results you’re looking for.
Regular pages (especially homepages) contain a lot of distractions. There are menus, links to other pages, and plenty of unrelated content. Most importantly, these pages aren’t always related to your ad or link.
For example, let’s say you’re running a 30% off promotion. Someone clicks the link and lands on your homepage, where there’s no mention of the offer they were promised. They might take the time to find what they’re looking for, but more often than not they’ll simply click away.
Dedicated landing pages offer a number of advantages:
There are no menus, links, or other distractions.
They only discuss the offer or promotion the visitor is interested in to minimize confusion.
They’re optimized for conversions.
So, now that you know how important landing pages are, let’s go over how to build one.
Method 1: Create a 1-page WordPress site
One way to create a WordPress landing page is to simply create a brand new one-page website. If you’ve already created a WordPress site then you know how to do this. The process will be pretty much the same as your other websites.
Step 1: Hosting, domain, and set-up
If you’re building a brand new website you’ll need somewhere to host it and you’ll have to give it a domain. Most hosting plans allow you to have multiple sites under one plan, so it’s quite likely you’ll be able to just add your new site to your current plan. If that’s the case the only thing you’ll need to purchase is a new domain, or set up a sub-domain on your existing website.
Finally, you’ll have to install WordPress on your site. A lot of hosting providers make this easy and there will probably be an option for this in your control panel.
Most WordPress themes are designed for blogs, businesses, and other larger sites. Do a Google search and see if you can find any themes that are meant to be landing pages. This means they were designed for this particular purpose, which will make a big difference.
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Step 3: Remove unnecessary pages and content
Pretty much any theme you choose will come with different pages, sections, and menus. You’ll want to remove all of these to limit the number of distractions for your visitors.
You don’t want someone to click through to your landing page only to get sidetracked by clicking on your latest blog or your About page. That isn’t to say this content isn’t useful, but in this case you want to keep them focused on the offer you’re promoting.
Here’s what you’ll want to remove from your one-page site:
Any additional pages. The only page your site should have is the homepage.
Menus. WordPress themes usually have menus in both the header and footer. Make sure at least the header menus are deleted.
Sidebars. Sidebars contain too many distractions (additional content, links to other pages, etc.). Delete them so visitors stay focused on your pitch.
Links. Remove any links you find. You don’t want visitors to click over to another page before they have a chance to perform your desired action. The exception can be links in your footer to your website homepage and a privacy policy.
The goal here is to delete anything that could potentially divert readers and draw them away from the landing page.
Step 4: Customize your page
Once all the unnecessary content is gone, it’s time to start building your page. This is where you add text, photos, CTA buttons, and everything else you need to convert visitors into leads and sales.
Here are some of the elements you’ll want to add to your page:
An attention-grabbing headline.
High-quality photos of your product, or of people using your product/service, or both.
A list of the benefits provided by the product or service you’re offering.
A strong call to action. End by summarizing your pitch and then tell them what you want them to do (sign up, buy now, etc.).
Step 5: Publish
Once your content is in place, you’re ready to publish. Be sure to monitor the results of your page to ensure it’s converting how you’d expect it to. If it isn’t, try changing your headlines, images, and other elements until you find the winning combination. You'll want to use a third-party tracking tool such as Google Analytics to measure your results.
Pros and cons
If you already know how to build a site with WordPress then this method is pretty simple. It’s also very affordable, as you’ll likely only have to pay for the domain. However, there are some drawbacks.
First, you can’t use your current domain for your landing page. Depending on what you’re using the page for, you might want to create a new domain anyways. But in most cases, you’d probably rather just use your current domain.
Second, most WordPress themes aren’t designed for conversions. This means you’ll end up adapting another type of theme to suit your needs which could impact your conversion rate.
And finally, you’ll need to find and install the right plugins if you want to include features like contact forms and exit-intent pop-ups. This can be a time-consuming process. Another WordPress installation also means more monitoring of security issues, theme versions, and plugin updates.
So, while this method works it’s not always the best choice if you want to maximize your leads and sales.
Method 2: Create a WordPress landing page using the Leadpages Plugin
If you’re looking for an easy way to create a great WordPress landing page, you’re in luck. The Leadpages WordPress plugin lets you create high-converting pages using our popular Drag & Drop Builder and publish them to WordPress in four clicks.
Here’s how it works:
Step 1: Sign up for a Leadpages free trial
If you haven’t done so already, register for an account. You can try Leadpages free for 14 days, giving you plenty of time to test all the tools and features without any risk.
Finding the perfect template for your campaign is easy. Leadpages templates are sorted into a number of categories, including discount, webinar, free resource, event, sales, and more. You can also choose to sort them by historical conversion rate to find the ones that generate the most leads for existing customers.
Step 3: Build your landing page
After you choose a template you’re ready to start building your page. Use the Drag & Drop Builder to edit text and images, add and remove sections, and refine the design of your page.
As you create your landing page, the Leadmeter will analyze your page and offer tips to better optimize your page for conversions. This makes it easy to create a high-converting page, even if you’ve never built one before.
You can also take advantage of Leadpages’ conversion tools. Add pop-up opt-in forms, exit-intent pop-ups, CTA buttons, online payments, and everything else you need to improve your conversion rate.
Step 4: Publish your page to WordPress
Once you’re happy with your landing page it’s time to publish it. You can do this in the Drag & Drop Builder by clicking the “Publish” button in the top right corner. After your page has been published, open your publishing options and select “WordPress” to download the plugin.
Open the plugin in WordPress and log in using your Leadpages credentials. From there, select the landing page you created in Leadpages and publish it on your WordPress website. You'll be able to publish your landing page as a standard landing page, your new website homepage, a "welcome gate" for first-time visitors, or a 404 error page.
After these few simple steps, you’ll have a highly-optimized landing page that’s perfect for lead magnets, PPC campaigns, events, and more.
Pros and cons
This method will cost you a little bit more than creating a one-page WordPress site. But if you want a page that’s completely optimized for conversions, easy to update, and includes built-in conversion tracking, Leadpages is probably your best option. Even more so if you plan to run multiple campaigns with multiple landing pages.
The professionally designed templates, along with real-time tips from the Leadmeter, make building a high-converting page super simple. And there’s no need to purchase new domains and build new websites. You can add as many landing pages to your WordPress site as you want, all under one domain.
Plus, Leadpages pop-ups, forms, checkouts, and other conversion tools mean you don’t have to go looking for plugins to get the functionality you need.
In the end, the extra conversions you’re sure to generate will more than make up for the added cost.
Landing page tips and tricks
Whatever method you choose to create your WordPress landing page, there are a few things you can do to improve your results. Here are our top tips for building high-converting landing pages.
Define your unique selling proposition
Your unique selling proposition (USP) is the one thing that sets you apart from all your competitors. Take the time to establish your USP, then work it into your landing page. You’ll especially want to incorporate this into your headline, as it’s your primary benefit.
Establish the problem and then present the solution
As you’re building your landing page, put yourself in your customers' shoes. What problems are they currently facing? Write them all down and identify the ones that are most important. Then show how your product or service solves these problems for the customer.
Use the right imagery
Purchase high-quality images from Shutterstock right from your Leadpages account.
Photos have just as big of an impact on conversion as copy does, so make sure to choose the right ones. Here are some suggestions:
Choose photos with smiling faces.
Avoid cheesy stock photos.
If you’re selling a product, zoom in as much as possible and show it from multiple angles.
Show someone using your product, as this makes it easier for potential customers to imagine themselves using it.
Focus on benefits, not features
Don’t just list off a bunch of features that are included in your offer. Show the reader how each of those items will benefit them.
For example, here’s a feature:
Sign up for my course today and I’ll send you a free landing page checklist.
And here’s a benefit:
Sign up for my course today and I’ll send you ten tips that will help you increase your landing page conversions by as much as 20%.
See the difference? The first example tells you what you’re getting, but the second example tells you why you want it.
Include testimonials
Positive reviews from former and current customers are one of the best ways to help prospects overcome their objections and take the plunge. Some people just need a little reassurance from their peers that they’re about to make a smart decision, so include some testimonials to help them out.
Chances are, your first landing page design won’t be 100% optimized. That’s why it’s a good idea to perform an A/B test. This is where you build two variations of your landing page to determine which one performs best. For example, you can create two different headlines to see if one leads to more conversions than the other.
Leadpages Pro accounts include our A/B testing tool. This allows you to create two (or more) versions of your page and send half your traffic to one and half your traffic to the other. After the test is done you can review the results and choose the variation that converted better.
Start building WordPress landing pages today!
A strong landing page is critical to running a successful campaign. Whether you’re collecting leads or making sales, the quality of your landing page will dictate whether you reach your goals or fall short. So, follow the tips and advice in this guide to ensure your page converts the way you want it to.
Thinking about using the Leadpages plugin to create your WordPress landing page? Try Leadpages free for 14 days to see if it’s a good fit for your business. In addition to building landing pages, you can also use the plugin to add pop-ups and alert bars throughout your site to capture even more leads.
Try Leadpages free for 14 days
Easily create your website and landing pages with the only platform engineered by marketing nerds.
