Improving Your Sales Page, The More You Know

Before we talk about improving your sales page let’s talk about the difference between home pages, landing pages, and sales pages. Each has a function and a purpose which are different in small ways.

Your homepage has a primary object to inspire visitors to get to know and trust you by inspiring you to go to another page to find out more. It is the hub to funnel your visitors through your site to satisfy their informational needs and provide solutions to their problems.

A landing page is a little different because it is where we land when the visitor clicks a link or follows an action on your site, in your marketing materials, or in business promotions. It can be any page but is generally used to capture a lead or start a nurture sequence.

Your sales page is designed to sell something and is designed to have only one call to action. And that action is to get your visitor to buy and for you to make a sale. It’s the place you give the details of solving the problem, what they will get, and build trust. So let’s talk about how to make the most of this page.

How to Optimize Your Sales Page

Linking your solutions with the visitor’s problems and needs is the primary reason that you need a sales page, and without some type of action, you’ve found your number one problem.

To remedy this, you need to:

1. Understand the needs of your visitor. This is fundamental and needs to be the foundation of your landing page. You can’t sell them something they don’t need or want.
2. Understand the language to describe the problem. You need to be on the same page with your potential buyer or client and can do this by listening to the words they use to describe their needs.
3. Highlight the benefits and solutions. Now that you’re speaking their language, it’s time to tell them what they will get by working with you or acting on their offer.
4. Give them a clear call to action. What do you want them to do? It is as simple as that, and you need to make that action obvious and easy to find. Start with a button that uses action words like Buy Now or Book Your Session.
5. Give them one call to action, Confusion causes a lack of action, and each sales page should address the action of only one product or service.

What To Add To The Sales Page

Sometimes less is more, and you need to know the habits of your perfect client. Are they short on attention span, or do they need to be convinced? Do they overthink everything they see and read? If so, they might need a little more convincing that you are the real deal.

1. Cut your copy. Do you need all those words, and more importantly, are they only filling up the page? Knowing your customer will determine how much copy is the right amount, especially if they are going to read it.
2. Remove distractions to narrow the focus. Your images and media need to enhance the message and not distract from it. For example, if you’re adding a video, be sure that it does not have other recommended videos when it ends.
3. Search engine optimized copy. A good rule of thumb is one page, one focus keyword, and the same goes for your sales page. Use keywords that are relevant to that focus word and your visitor. Be sure it’s added to your title, headline, body, images, and link text.
4. A simple action to convert. Please keep it simple, Sally, because I don’t want to overthink what to do next. If you are selling from a cart, Buy Now will work fine, and if you’re scheduling an appointment, Book Now works. Use action phrases to entice them to take action and leave the clever play on words at home.
5. The proof is in the pudding. Anyone can be anything on the interwebs, so you need to reinforce that your solution works. Your testimonials should enhance the message with concrete results like “She saw things I completely missed” or “After using this solution, my sales increased by 25%”.

Enhancements To Your Sales Page

But you can’t stop at words, and images plopped on a page and wait for the sales to happen. You need to make sure they are right for the conversion. Sometimes it is making tweaks to a page, and other times it has several options. Here are some extra tips.

1. A/B testing. You need to know what works in the conversion process and what does not. Testing and watching your numbers is the best way to enhance any page. Start small by changing the headline or color of the buy button. Making small targeted changes will help you tweak and find what works.
2. Use more than one if necessary. Don’t do the one-size-fits-most method; if your solutions work for two different types of customers, use two different pages. The beauty of WordPress is you can create many pages with ease. Promoting the service or product can lead different audiences to pages that will speak to them directly.
3. Use psychology to drive action. Some use scarcity (the last spot open), and others use reciprocity (you give to get bonus items), but you need to know what will work for your audience.
4. Add social sharing buttons. Your customers should find your page valuable; some will want to share the love with others. Make it easy for them to increase your exposure by adding social sharing buttons to ALL of the popular social channels, not only the ones you use.

Sales pages are not one-and-done pieces of content. They need to be massaged and given attention every once in a while to make sure they are still working for you. What small change can you make to see different results on your sales pages?