Email Marketing Basics: How Many Landing Pages Should I Have?
A dedicated landing page is an essential part of any digital marketing toolbox. It’s the entryway for your sales funnel and a potential perennial lead generation booster. It can convert visitors, improve customer relationships, and keep your brand on top of the search engine results.
I’ve already covered the basics of landing pages. I’ve discussed how the best landing pages are made and how they boost your target audience engagement.
Now, I want to look at some technical details.
Thanks to the multitudinous types of landing pages, it’s easy (and correct) to say you’ll need more than one. But is there such a thing as too many landing pages? And how many landing pages does your brand need? Is there a drawback to having multiple landing pages?
I’ll answer these questions (and more), so keep scrolling!
How Do Landing Pages Work?
Now, before you start creating your own landing page, take a moment to consider its functionality.
A dedicated landing page is a purpose-built web page with a specific end goal. It’s a gateway to other web pages through which a business can do one of many things, including:
- Boosting inbound marketing performance from search engines
- Building email lists and generating leads
- Delivering information about or confirming user interactions (e.g., purchases, shipments, or unsubscribes)
- Determining and assigning segments to users
- Directing traffic to specific web pages (e.g., a blog post, purchase page, or social media platforms)
- Increasing conversions and boosting revenue
Notably, that list is incomplete. There are many more uses for landing pages, and I don’t have time to address the individual specifics. Nonetheless, I must emphasize the sheer multitude of possibilities. Landing pages serve countless functions; business websites must account for those goals. Moreover, a landing page is not the same as a home page.
Landing Pages Streamline the Sales Funnel
First, you must understand that landing pages are built to achieve one goal. They’re like butter or oil in a hot pan. Without them, things will stick and congeal. (In this case, what “sticks” is your customers!) However, even a teaspoon smooths out the process.
Of course, you’re not scrambling eggs; you’re greasing your sales funnel.
So, with that in mind, there’s only one logical conclusion: The number of landing pages should equal your business goals.
If you’re hoping to increase conversions, bolster engagement, and direct traffic to social media sites, you’ll need three landing pages. If you then need to support your online advertising with some lead generation, you must add a fourth landing page. Add a fifth if you need to improve organic traffic and SEO.
One Landing Page Per Business Goal
A landing page’s greatest asset is its singular focus.
A cluttered home page won’t catch as many leads as a streamlined squeeze page. Similarly, you’ll get more from your PPC ads by linking them to dedicated sales pages. Those specific landing pages leave consumers only one route. Visitors arrive with pre-ordained interest and are led, uninhibited, to the end goal.
The best and most high-converting landing pages take advantage of that singularity, forcing visitors further down the marketing funnel.
Goal-Oriented Call-to-Action Links
By extension, that means your unique landing pages should have purpose-driven call-to-action links. Every CTA should be a step closer to converting visitors. Most landing pages have fewer than a dozen CTAs and may repeat target destinations.
Again, it’s all about that funnel.
You want that paid traffic converted to paying customers. Once a visitor lands, you must act.
In that sense, a landing page is like a queue at an amusement park. You’re drawn in by the signs and sounds — in this analogy, the advertising campaign — and immediately funneled onto a one-track path.
Now, let me take the comparison a step further. In digital marketing, your call-to-action links are the décor and music scattered throughout the park. At this stage, our target audience is already “inside the park” and interested in your paid advertising. You don’t need to gather more visitors (unless it’s an SEO marketing campaign); you must make the message match the action.
How Many Landing Pages Do Business Websites Need?
So, putting that information together, you should arrive at some compelling conclusions, namely that:
- Effective paid ads lead to equally effective landing pages.
- Every landing page is a chance to drive traffic to your site.
- Landing pages are remarkable ways to generate leads
- More landing pages mean more traffic.
All these conclusions are correct.
However, the answer to the question posed by this blog post is less concrete. Ideally, websites should have at least one landing page, likely a genericized lead capture form or conversion booster. At the same time, there’s no technical reason to limit your landing pages. Some large-scale businesses have dozens of landing pages, each devoted to a singular active online marketing campaign. At the same time, some small businesses have succeeded with a mere handful of landing pages.
Ideally, you should have one landing page for each goal, but that doesn’t necessarily mean one per marketing campaign.
A Few Examples of Landing Page Use
The idea is better explained through examples.
The Four-Part Landing Page Setup
So, imagine you must meet four goals by the end of the current quarter. Your business must gain more leads, improve organic traffic, increase conversions, and increase social media interest. Moreover, you already have two ongoing PPC ads running on your best-seller.
Logically, you’ll need at least four landing pages to achieve your goals:
- Click-through landing pages can focus on the best-sellers and conversions. Consider segmenting your audience and delivering unique content to existing customers. Alternatively, you can use the same landing page for everyone. Drive traffic by linking these to your existing paid ads.
- An informative sales page can boost search engine optimization and garner more leads. Fill it with plenty of details and zero in on those crucial pain points. You can also add customer testimonials to deliver valuable social proof.
- Use an interactive onboarding page to direct interested parties to your social media profiles. An SEO-optimized landing page might rely on keyword research, while a paid traffic push relies on appealing value propositions. You may use a SERP checker to analyze the keywords, see how they rank the best with the given keyword, and examine the search value of the keywords.
- Lead generation landing pages can gather and sort new prospective customers. These optimized landing pages will be packed with exclusive offers and deals, all but guaranteeing more leads. You may need multiple pages to handle different audiences depending on your business needs.
The Three-Part Sales Pitch
That’s simple enough, but what if you have a linear goal?
Imagine you’re trying to achieve three sequential goals. You want users to visit your website homepage, subscribe to your newsletter, and purchase your new product — in that order. So, knowing the facts, you’ll need three landing pages. (You could suffice with two, but you’ll get more traffic with three.)
Your plan of attack will look something like this:
- An optimized general information page will generate leads from search engines. You’ll want this landing page to be packed with high-quality images of your product, and don’t forget to work on the SEO. This page will appear in search results, functioning a bit like this blog post. (In fact, many of my blog additions double as inbound marketing posts!)
- You’ll need some lead capture pages, too. These will have a contact form or sign-up option. You can make do with a single sign-up page, but you can also make a new landing page for SMS marketing campaigns or direct mailers.
- Finally, top the journey off with a gorgeous sales page. If you have multiple products, you’ll want separate landing pages for each. The separation may seem superfluous, but it guarantees each will be a high-converting landing page. Consider adding some SEO to this page; it’ll help it show up in search results.
Can You Have Too Many Landing Pages?
So, is there a point of diminishing returns? Do conversion rates drop after a certain number of landing pages?
Technically, no. You can’t really have “too many landing pages,” although you can certainly have too few. When I said everyone needs “at least one landing page,” I wasn’t kidding. That’s the bare minimum. However, there’s no firm maximum. Every landing page gives your conversion rates a boost, and creating separate landing pages for different needs only improves your odds.
Nonetheless, there is one huge caveat, and it applies to all your marketing campaigns.
Quality Over Quantity
A handful of fully polished landing pages is worth five dozen haphazard ones.
If your existing samples are low-quality, there’s no need to make more landing pages. Instead, focus on polishing your existing stock. Then, expand from there.
You want to create landing pages that match the tone of your marketing campaigns. Your content should resonate with your target audience, and your call-to-action should be irresistible. Remember: This is more than a basic Facebook page. You’re creating the opening to your sales funnel. Whenever you create a landing page, you’re designing a first impression.
Put your best foot forward. Take the time to master every landing page.
Perfect Your Landing Pages With Professional Help
Now, here’s the real kicker: The perfect landing page could take months to develop, and forget about making multiple landing pages at crunch time. Every landing page must be unique, especially if it’s destine for search engine indexing. However, at this point, you’ve probably spent more time and money on R&D than you’ll earn back with even the best conversion rates.
So, how do you increase conversions without going broke?
You turn to The Email Marketers.
I founded my brand to give every business a chance to succeed. I’ve hand-picked my team of specialists to ensure your conversion rates shine. Everyone at The Email Marketers has the experience and insights to supercharge your email marketing, and we’ll handle however many landing pages you throw at us.
Don’t believe me?
Schedule a free strategy session to learn more about The Email Marketers’ skills. I’ll show you how we’ve improved countless brands’ email marketing campaigns. I’ll also deliver a personalized plan to help your brand succeed.
So, take the plunge! See how a team of on-demand professionals can turn that bland call-to-action link into a perennial source of income.