When you’re crafting words for your landing page, you’re not just writing. You’re copywriting—writing for conversions. Every character could make or break your landing page.
After analyzing the most influential elements for conversion in 40,000 landing pages, Unbounce found that copy (28%) influenced conversion more than two times as much as design (13%) did.
Long story short, you can’t rely on flashy visuals alone to convert. You gotta sell with your copy, too.
No pressure, right?
The best practices for your landing page’s copy will depend on your audience and industry, but there are a couple of techniques you can follow to make any landing page shine brighter.
This blog post will cover four methods for better landing page copywriting and five examples to spark your inspiration. You’ll be converting more visitors in no time.
Four Rules for Better Landing Page Copy (With Examples)
These four techniques will help you craft landing page copy that converts:
1. Get rid of jargon
Jargon—terms that only make sense within an industry—doesn’t always sound clear to visitors. This language automatically excludes customers who aren’t in on industry terms. Avoid using jargon when you can.
In most industries, simple language wins more conversion than complicated terms do. The Conversion Benchmark Report found that in software as a service (SaaS) and law—two technical industries—lower word counts and lower Flesch Reading Ease Scores (FRES) resulted in more conversions. Content with a low FRES has fewer words per sentence and syllables per word, leaving less room for long-winded jargon.
You don’t have to get rid of all of the industry terms on your landing page, but you do need to know what your audience understands.
For example, you can get away with more jargon on business-to-business (B2B) landing pages, but you should be careful with business-to-consumer (B2C) pages. Keep your projection bias in mind and write your copy in a way your audience will understand.
The home-loan process involves lots of terms that’ll go over your head if you don’t work in finance. A home-loan management service, ooba, cuts down on their landing page’s jargon by focusing on the results for the customer.
The page mentions a few terms like “price ceiling” and “credit profile” that start to cross the jargon line, but it always follows up with simple explanations.
Editor’s tip: Having trouble writing copy that speaks to your visitors? Thanks to Snazzy AI, Unbounce will have AI-powered copywriting features in the future. Plug in some details about your audience and let technology do the rest.
2. Back your writing with numbers
Numbers are convincing, so they make more convincing copy. For example, 8 out of 10 people will read your headline, but only two will read the headline and the rest of your copy. That stat helps you understand the importance of headlines, right? (Given the emphasis on the headlines, would this be more effective if reworded? For example: “Only 2 out of 10 people will read the headline and the copy, but virtually everyone will read the headlines.”)
One of the top examples of B2B landing pages from Shopify emphasizes the fact that the platform has more than a million users.
This number works as social proof to build your trust in Shopify. If 1,000,000 other businesses are using Shopify, why shouldn’t you?
As an employee engagement software, Peakon has users who want to improve business results wherever they can. Therefore, Peakon’s trial signup landing page uses statistics to make compelling points to its number-focused visitors.
The “Increase revenue” and “Increase productivity” sections provide concrete numbers detailing how much Peakon increases revenue, productivity, and customer satisfaction.
In the “Increase revenue” section, you’ll learn that revenue can increase by up to 0.6% for every 1% increase in engagement and Peakon increases engagement by up to 10% in 3 months.
The “Increase productivity” section delivers a statistical triple threat. It explains how employees at highly engaged companies have 37% fewer sick days, 30% higher productivity, and as much as 2.5 times higher customer satisfaction rates. And you’re to assume that you’ll get a similar engagement from Peakon.
3. Tell a compelling story
Every landing page tells a story. The difference between a boring landing page story and one that gets results lies in its framework.
By following the right structure, you can present a gripping story that also markets your product.
One popular storytelling framework across subjects is ABT (And, But, Therefore). It includes a setup (and), problem (but), and solution (therefore). This formula builds tension, then resolves it.
You can apply the ABT framework to marketing through the PAS (Problem Agitate Solve) framework. It begins with an issue (problem), elaborates on that issue (agitate), and presents your solution (solve).
Check out how this Twitter landing page from IronCore Labs uses the PAS framework.
It starts with a problem (“How to Make End-to-end Encryption Work for Groups”), then agitates it (“A Lot of DIY End-to-end Encryption Solutions Are a Headache”). After setting up that issue, it offers its eGuide as a solution.
4. Energize your readers with actionable words and phrases
The point of a landing page is to encourage action—a conversion. Your copy should help you reach that goal by urging your visitors to do something. Actionable words and phrases explain what your product enables the visitor to do and directs them to conversion.
Let’s see how Snapchat uses actionable language on its Snap Kit landing page.
The landing page starts off with an actionable headline: “Grow your app with Snapchat’s best features.” This title does triple duty by summarizing what Snap Kit does, framing that summary as a benefit, and offering a soft CTA to start using its features.
Throughout the landing page, each headline is an action—share, unlock, make. These actions demonstrate how Snap Kit empowers customers to enhance their Snapchat experience.
Go Above and Beyond With Your Copy
As you write your landing page copy, ask yourself, “Would I be interested in reading this as someone outside of my company?” You have to look for ways to infuse your words with value to keep your visitors’ attention. You might be interested in your content because you work with it, but you’ll need that extra something-something for people new to the subject to stay on the page.
For more copywriting advice, check out the Unbounce Guide to Landing Page Copywriting. It’ll walk you through the steps to writing copy that converts.
