WHAT IS A WEBSITE

A website is a series of webpages bound together by a common domain name and displayed on web servers. Essentially, a website is a home for all the information you want to put out on the web. The information on your site is typically made up of a combination of text, images, videos and icons that come together to tell a unified story.

All of this content is added to a site using HTML, which is a markup language that web servers can read and use to display the relevant information. Nowadays, many websites can be created with website builders like Wix that enable anyone to build a site. This doesn’t eliminate HTML, rather just means that it will be created for you by a tool.

A brief history of websites

After the conceptualization of the internet and a series of technological advancements paved the way, the first website, as we know it today, launched in 1991. Tim Berners-Lee, a computer scientist, is responsible for creating the world wide web and for facilitating the communication of HTML documents with web servers. This enabled content to be displayed on the internet in the way we have become accustomed to.

Since then, websites have developed quite a bit. Various different systems for the building, design and presentation of sites have come and gone. Perhaps most notably, the continued development of HTML and CSS has led to a revolution in how DYNAMIC WEBSITES can be. Websites now feature advanced design elements as well as responsive features to adapt to the ever changing manner in which people browse the web.

 

WHAT IS A WEBSITE  LANDING PAGE

What is a landing page?

The basic definition of a landing page is a dedicated page on a website that you land on directly from an external source such as a paid ad or email.

The landing page is the digital version of the direct marketing letter, highly targeted and focused on one specific outcome. The aim of the landing page is to stimulate a predetermined action using targeted copy to connect with a user and persuade them to act.

Landing pages can be constructed for SEO purposes to capture organic search traffic. They can also be used with paid advertising through search engines or social media.

The two channels of discovery to a landing page are:

Organic search: When a user finds the page from an organic SERP listing. Aside from delivering on the promise and intent of the query, the organic landing page must also make their brand and their offer clear.

Marketing campaign: These landing pages are usually accessed by a link from a paid ad or email. Traffic from paid ads has high commercial intent and is usually ready to complete an action. The page must be ready to fulfill that need and designed to funnel the user with all other options stripped away.

What is the difference between a landing page and a home page?

A home page is like the entrance to an airport. There are many check-in desks in the terminal building that are points of entry to channel you to the different gates and destinations.

Home pages are the portal to a destination.

Landing pages are the destination and all about conversion.

Can a home page be a landing page? Usually, no. There are always exceptions, such as a one-page website created specifically as a squeeze page to capture email or gain sign-ups. For a website that is more than four or five pages, the home page usually exists as the portal to enable a user to navigate to other pages.

The home page has too many functions to be focused on one landing page conversion.

Landing page examples

The main two types of landing pages are:

• Lead generation landing page
• Clickthrough landing page

Below we have two email marketing companies and two types of landing pages. Campaign Monitor goes for the lead generation landing page and Mailchimp is a clickthrough.

The Lead generation page has a form on the page with the aim to capture an email address. This page can sit at the top (TOFU), middle (MOFU) or bottom of the funnel (BOFU) depending on where in the sales funnel your lead generation belongs.

TOFU Lead generation pages are used with free downloads and giveaways such as ebooks, whitepapers, access to webinars, or a free ‘teaser’ piece of content that has value. Ecommerce companies use discounts and special offers as an incentive for email capture.

The email capture is followed up with a series of email communications to establish a direct relationship and nurture the lead over time.

BOFU lead generation pages simply capture Sales Qualified Leads (SQL) for the sales team to close. These can also be used with access to webinars and content downloads, and for free service trials from SaaS companies.

Below is a TOFU landing page for ebook download. The page leans towards a classic style of design, but it does tick the box of having the sign-up form above the fold and includes social proof testimonials further down the page.

How to create a landing page

As highlighted at the start of this article, failing to deliver on the promise from ad to page is a waste of your budget and the user’s time.

A landing page should be approached as a standalone page rather than another page on your website. Ideally, you will have reduced navigation and reduced options to take your attention away from the desired action.

Before you start to create a landing page, consider your end goals for the page.

7 BEST LANDING PAGE BUILDERS IN 2022

1.Kickofflabs – Best For Promotional Pushes

Kickofflabs is excellent for promotional efforts on landing pages.

You can dramatically increase your conversion rate by promoting contests on landing pages.

Contest CTAs have a 3.73% higher conversion rate when compared to other CTAs.

In addition, Kicklabs can set up viral giveaways, sweepstakes, and product launches with little to no effort.

Kickofflabs gives you the options of controlling the following:

• Pre-launch waitlist.
• Bonus entry sweepstakes.
• Leaderboard giveaways.

And much more.

The landing page builder is intuitive and requires little to no learning curve to set up promotions.

Kickoff labs also offer an SMS option to extend your reach offline for giveaways.

Pros:

• SMS integration option.
• Multiple contest options.
• Pre-launch waitlist.

Cons:

• Pricing is costly for higher trafficked websites.
• Limited template options

2.Instapage – Best For Agencies

Instapage is similar to Unbounce, offering highly customizable features for landing page creation.

In addition, it offers 80 high-quality templates.

If you want to build a landing page from scratch or edit one of the eighty templates, the drag-and-drop landing page builder offers powerful features which include:

• A form builder.
• Customizable widgets.
• Integration options.

Instapage also includes a handy feature called Instablocks.

Instablocks enables you to create reusable landing page assets that you can import into any of your previous landing pages.

Agencies that need to create multiple landing pages for clients will find the Instablocks feature will help free-up bandwidth.

In addition, heat maps and A/B testing help improve conversion rate optimization.

Pros:

• Reusable pages.
• Built-in heatmaps.
• A/B testing.

Cons:

• Visitor limitations.
• Reporting is limited.

3.Divi – Best For WordPress

Divi is a WordPress theme, so building a landing page on-site is simple. The Divi page builder was built by Elegant Themes.

Divi offers an extensive library of high-quality templates, powerful content editing tools, a plugin, and a split-testing optimization tool called Divi Leads.

Creating landing pages is critical, but iterative testing will increase your odds of success.

For example, a recent test conducted by Groove increased conversions on a landing page by 100%.

By using Divi Leads, you can create and test with little to no effort.

Pros:

• High-quality templates.
• Flexible pricing options.
• A/B split testing capabilities.

Cons:

• Divi has a learning curve due to all the features offered.
• Limited support.

4.Convert Kit – Best For Driving Email Signups

Convert Kit offers robust email journeys, but its landing page builder is also world-class.

Getting started is also free.

Templates are highly customizable and visually stunning.

Furthermore, Convertkit offers thousands of images from a partnership with Unsplash.

The main selling point of Convertkit is the seamless automation integration with third-party tools.

In addition, segmentation tagging can build systems to personalize messages to increase your conversion rate.

Pros:

• Free to get started.
• Thousands of images to use free of charge.
• Several integration options.

Cons:

• A/B testing is limited.
• The analytics can be more in-depth.

5.Wix – Best For Beginners

Wix has millions of users worldwide for a reason.

The Wix platform is easy to start building great-looking websites and landing pages.

In addition, Wix has the lowest learning curve on the list due to its highly intuitive drag and drop user interface.

The best part about using Wix is the free pricing making it the most viable option for users who want to get their feet wet.

Wix also integrates with over 50 payment solutions.

In addition, if you are focused on ecommerce, you can create ecommerce landing pages to promote exclusive deals and showcase new products.

Wix also offers heatmaps to help optimize the user experience to increase your conversion rate.

Pros:

• Free to get started.
• Several pre-built templates.
• Several integration options.

Cons:

• Limited control for more advanced options.
• Ads for the free option.
• Non-brandable domain name unless you upgrade.

6. Clickfunnels – Best For Driving Sales Leads

ClickFunnels focuses on the entire funnel experience through segmented landing page experiences.

Creating landing pages that focus on upselling, cross-selling, and down-selling is seamless with Clickfunnels.

The primary differentiation between ClickFunnels is the number of sales-focused features, pre-made landing page funnels, and training provided to marketers.

Russell Brunson, a highly seasoned direct response marketer, founded ClickFunnels. Russell created an easy-to-use, highly versatile landing page builder that can drive sales leads.

Some of the best features ClickFunnels offers:

• Membership Funnels.
• Webinar Funnels.
• Checkout funnels

And much more.

Pros:

• Explicitly designed for generating leads, nurturing leads, and closing leads.
• Several Pre-built funnel systems.
• Free and paid training events from top-tier marketers.

Cons:

• In comparison to competitors, it offers fewer customization options for landing pages.
• Building unlimited funnels will require a high monthly fee for most small businesses.

7.Unbounce – Best For CRO

Unbounce is in a league of its own for optimizing traffic.

Several features focus specifically on conversion rate optimization. Furthermore, over 100 and 25 pre-made responsive templates exist.

Setting up several landing page variants to gauge performance is effortless with Unbounce.

However, one of the most powerful features Unbounce offers is the AI-powered feature called Smart Traffic.

Smart Traffic applies dynamic visitor attributes to redirect traffic to the highest converting landing page variant.

The algorithm includes several attributes such as user location, device type, and demographics.

Unbounce also has opt-in email popups and sticky banners to incentivize users to submit an email that can connect to your email platform of choice.

In addition, if you are running paid traffic, you can use another helpful feature called dynamic text replacement.

Dynamic text replacementrotates the text on your landing pages to create a personalized user experience for user segments from paid media.

More than 15,000 companies use Unbounce.

Pros:

• Simple to use drag and drop functionality.
• Dynamic text replacement for SEM campaigns.
• 125+ templates powered by AI technology.

Cons:

• No option to add custom classes to CTA buttons.
• Only premium plans include redirects and integrations.
• Higher learning curve than other competitors.

Conclusion

Depending on what your primary focus may be for creating a landing page, the platform you choose will have differentiated functionality.

There is no right or wrong answer to which landing page builder you should use.

Each platform has strengths and weaknesses.

To weigh your options, consider your budget and business goals and which platform is the most closely aligned to your needs.

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