“This page looks great. Why isn’t it converting?”

We’ve all asked questions like this before.

You spend hours on end designing, developing, and building a landing page that you’re proud of — but it won’t convert and you don’t know why. Unfortunately, there are many factors that could be silently killing your landing page conversions.

While a well-designed landing page helps with conversions, it isn’t the only factor that helps users convert.

No matter how many thousands or even millions of hits you get on your website, you need the proper conversation rate, development, and design practices in place — otherwise, you won’t convert.

Achieving a high conversion rate on your landing pages is crucial to bringing in business. When users get confused, don’t know where to look, or the page speed is too slow, they’ll bounce.

Why would anyone waste their time on a website they can’t figure out?

The average person now has a shorter attention span than a goldfish, so you don’t have very long to make a good first impression or to close someone.

The good news is, when you find the right partner to help you, most — if not all — of these conversion-killing mishaps can be fixed.

Let’s dive into the six major factors killing your conversion rate and how to avoid them.

Non-Responsive Design

In 2021, more than half of all internet shopping traffic comes from a mobile device.

If your landing page isn’t mobile-responsive, you’re already missing out on half of your potential sales. Is that something you can afford? Probably not.

So, what is “responsive” design, exactly?

Responsive landing page or web design is a flexible and fluid system that reacts to the user’s device. It dynamically changes the appearance of a website depending on the resolution and orientation of the user’s screen.

In other words, a responsive design means that a user will have the same experience and see the same elements, whether they’re browsing on a computer, tablet, or cell phone.

Your developer should be able to fix response issues but if you’re attempting to implement the fixes yourself, there are a few best practices to follow.

First, use a grid system for your design. A grid system will be the framework for the scalability of your website.

A grid system will provide your site with consistency across all screen resolutions. It will keep the proportion of your elements and spacing uniform by allowing them to adjust to a specific screen-width using percentages — this will ensure your landing page is responsive.

Every time you make a change or run a test on your website, make sure you’re doing the same on the mobile view so nothing falls through the cracks.

Having a consistent experience will result in an increase in lead generation, sales, and conversions. A lack of responsiveness is potentially costing you revenue.

Poor Copy Emphasis

Another conversion killer is a lack of emphasis on content. This includes the weight, styling, and positioning of your text.

Properly emphasizing the copy on your landing page can help grab attention and highlight key points you want users to notice and remember. However, if not implemented efficiently, it could be a killer.

Not everyone who visits your landing page will read all of your content word for word. This means that making your text scannable is extremely important. Plus, content that is easy to scan and read will help with your SEO.

You can accomplish this by emphasizing portions of the copy, providing the user with focus points. These points help break up monotonous text. Emphasizing key elements of text immediately attracts the user’s eye and also allows them to easily digest and retain the information presented.

Consider tactics like bolding your unique selling propositions (USPs), using a list format to illustrate pain points, increasing the text size of your offer, or moving your call to action (CTA) to the top of the page — just to name a few.

Not Enough Authenticity

Consumers are bombarded with offers on a daily basis. They have almost become immune to some marketing messaging because they see it so frequently. They are conditioned to clearly identify when someone’s trying to dupe them or sell them on a concept that’s too good to be true.

So, when they land on your page, make sure you’re 100% authentic. You need to earn their trust (and you need to earn it quickly because 55% of visitors spend fewer than 15 seconds on your website). Yes, you are marketing to them, and yes, you are trying to convert them. But if you come across as inauthentic, you’re going to lose that prospect.

Alright, so how do you go about earning the trust of a landing page visitor without sacrificing conversions?

Use tactics and elements that reinforce credibility and trustworthiness. For starters, the language you use will play a big role here. If your landing page is packed with fluff copy, it’ll feel like spam and you’ll be perceived as an online infomercial. Words like “revolutionary,” “exclusive,” “groundbreaking,” “advanced” … the list goes on and on.

Use language that is clean and conversational. Avoid industry jargon. Your copy should be customer-centric as well — use words like “you” and “your” to personalize and showcase value.

Testimonials are another great way to build trust. Almost nothing is more powerful than social proof. But they must be legit. Fake reviews will have the opposite effect.

Also, make sure all of your contact information is visible on the landing page. If you give the impression that you’re hiding from customer contact, it will raise questions about how legitimate you really are.

Load Time

Chances are (at least once), you have landed on a web page that loads its content at a snail’s pace. It’s painful. Let’s face it, technology has made us increasingly impatient — so much that 40% of people abandon a website that takes more than three seconds to load.

Do you know how fast your landing pages are loading? Given the above statistics, you should.

Remember, landing pages should be focused on the goal of converting your user by being as minimal as possible and eliminating all unnecessary bloat.

Too many plugins, improper code, and large, high-resolution images and videos are a few examples of bloat that could skyrocket your load times. Make sure your pages are optimized and lightweight.

Leverage free tools like Pingdom, GTmetrix, or Google’s Page Speed Insights to test the load times of your landing pages. Anytime you tweak or modify the page, it is a good idea to run another test.

Inconsistency

Does the ad a user clicks to get to your landing page make sense? Are the branding and the design the same?

Another reason your landing page is killing your conversions: your marketing efforts are not consistent.

If your ads show a modern, brightly colored ad, yet the landing page associated with it is dull and confusing, landing page visitors will feel duped. There is a high volume of spam online these days and if a user feels any sense of inauthenticity, they’ll bounce — literally.

Don’t try to be tricky with your ads or your landing page. Instead, be authentic and transparent.

Make sure there is consistency between the sponsored message and your landing page to increase your landing page conversion rate.

Aesthetically, both should use the same color palette and imagery. Your offer and supporting messaging should also be the same in both areas. The last thing you want to do is sensationalize an offer in your ad … only for readers to click through and realize it was clickbait.

Poor Usability

So, you want your landing page to convert? Make it as easy as possible to do so.

Solid user experiences are the foundation of conversions. The experience you build for your visitors needs to be streamlined and easy to use.

Eliminate all distractions. If you provide users with an opportunity to navigate away from your landing page, chances are, they will. Remember — humans have attention spans shorter than a goldfish; they’re easily distracted. Don’t make it hard for them to stay on task.

There are many website and landing page design best practices to follow to avoid killing your conversions.

Making users jump through hoops to get in contact with you or complete way too many fields on a submission form is confusing and hurts the user experience.

We’ve seen that having more than two or three calls to action (CTAs) on a page can be a conversion killer. Instead, define one goal for your landing page and position your content to drive people toward that goal.

Work With the Right Partner

Creating high-converting landing pages can be challenging even for established brands, but Uhuru is up to the challenge. Over the past 10 years, we have created hundreds of landing pages for clients that have exceeded expectations with real, data-driven results. If your landing pages aren’t converting the way you want them to, reach out to our team of experts and get your business back on track.