The ultimate guide to landing pages
How do I send traffic to a landing page?
Chapter 12
Need web traffic without all the expense? Learn proven tactics to take your landing page from published to popular to profitable on the web.
After you’ve published a page, it’s time to promote it and get it into the hands of your target audience. But where do your visitors come from before they ‘land’ on your landing page and how can you drive more traffic to your most important pages?
The most common landing page traffic sources (or digital marketing channels) include pay-per-click (PPC) ads, organic search, social media, and email marketing. Some traffic sources require that you spend some of your marketing budget, while others are free if you’re willing to put in the time and effort.
In any case, your goal, as a marketer, is to meaningfully engage with visitors on a third-party channel (such as a social media site) and direct that traffic to your dedicated landing page where visitors can learn more, buy now, and convert. How you use landing pages in your marketing depends on what you’re offering, to whom, and where your audience is coming from.
Most of the time, that’s done with a few simple strategies for driving traffic. Let’s look at how to promote your landing page by attracting and engaging the right visitors from the source.
Start at the (traffic) source
Even if you have the best landing page builder and your landing page is converting 80% of the traffic you send it, it could still be unsuccessful. Why? Unless that traffic represents your target audience, your landing page is winning a battle but losing the war.
It doesn’t matter how much money you spend (or don’t spend) on digital advertising, all web traffic is not created equal. It comes down to a strong focus on what criteria you’re using to target people, where they’re coming from, and whether your landing page delivers on its initial promise.
Put simply, if you’re targeting the wrong people it won’t matter how good your landing page is, because they’re not the type of people that will eventually become paying customers.
Your traffic sources are the foundation of your marketing funnel and will ultimately determine both the quality and quantity of your inbound leads (and customers).
How web traffic works within your marketing funnel
Wondering how much traffic you need or how many leads you should generate each month? Your landing page traffic acts as your denominator and determines how many people will ultimately trickle through the rest of your sales and marketing funnel.
For example, let’s say your Facebook ad reaches 100,000 unique users, and 1% of those users click through to see your landing page. That means that 10,000 people reach your page, and if your landing page has a conversion rate of 50% that leaves you with 1,000 new leads.
By considering how many leads you convert into paying customers and working your way back up the funnel, you can ultimately calculate how much web traffic you need to drive to your landing page every month in order to reach your goals.
However—getting to those goals require you to get into the granular detail of how and whom you’re targeting. This all comes back to the initial traffic source. Where and how you find traffic will determine how you promote your landing page and the quality of the leads you’re attracting.
For example, let’s say that you sell coaching services for retirees. Your target audience is between the ages of 50 and 70. You decide to run an Instagram paid advertisement. Although 5% of Instagram users are over age 55, the majority are between ages 18 and 35.
This means you’re not only wasting your money targeting your ads at the wrong people but also anyone who clicks through is not likely to become a customer. You’d likely do better with a Facebook or Google paid ad.
You want your traffic source to attract the right kind of traffic, so you’re more likely to engage and convert those visitors into leads.
Where can I find traffic?
Alright, let’s find great landing page traffic with the right sources!
1. Pay-Per-Click (PPC) Ads
Pay-per-click ads come in all kinds of shapes and sizes: from paid ads on social media platforms to display ads and search engine marketing (SEM).
Depending on the platform you use—whether it’s Google Ads or Meta ads or a third party—you have a limited ability to (1) capture people’s attention (2) deliver a message and (3) compel people to click to the next step.
That’s where landing pages enable you to own your post-click experience and deliver content that’s tailor-made for that unique audience and traffic source. Unlike a standard webpage, Leadpages landing page software affords you the flexibility and agility you need to integrate with your paid advertisements and make a high return on ad spend.
Pro Tip: Consistently run A/B and split tests on your PPC landing pages to scientifically squeeze the most value out of every dollar you spend on digital advertising.
2. Social Media
There are nearly 4.89 billion social media users worldwide, and an estimated 90% of the U.S. population has at least one social media profile. Therefore, social networking sites are one of the most powerful ways to spread your message to a large, captive audience.
Social media works well because you can use attractive visuals and enhanced copy to create a community of followers that will naturally engage with and advocate on behalf of your brand. It’s also a great way to pique visitors’ interest and encourage them to click through to your landing page to learn more or complete a purchase.
Pro Tip: Don’t just think about how to promote your landing page on Facebook because you hear other businesses doing it. Rather than chasing the next top-trending platform, focus on the social media sites where you have the largest and most engaged following.
3. Content Marketing
Content marketing involves strategically delivering content throughout your customer journey in order to convert traffic to leads, leads to customers, and customers to raving fans. The most successful content marketing involves a multi or omnichannel approach and remains highly targeted toward a narrowly defined audience.
Depending on your audience’s needs at various stages, you might educate, entertain, or inspire through your content with the understanding that if people find value in your content, they’re more likely to consider your brand when they’re ready to make a purchase.
Here are some traffic-driving content marketing tactics to consider for your business:
- Embed content upgrades (lead magnets) in your blog posts
- Guest blog for third-party websites and include a link to your primary landing page.
- Publish press releases online and with local news organizations and include a link to your landing pages (if permitted).
- Appear as a guest on a podcast and direct people to your landing page on-air and in the show notes.
- Submit inquiries to HARO (Help A Reporter Out). Usually, you will provide a short interview answer and a backlink to your site or landing page that comes from a reputable source.
Pro Tip: Wherever and whenever you publish, always ask if you can include a link. The more links to your landing page, the more likely you’ll attract a click.
4. Email Marketing
Your email list is one of the business’s biggest assets, but only if you’re constantly nurturing those leads and providing them with new opportunities to convert.
That requires that you produce content and engagement opportunities for your existing leads and customers as well as prospective audiences.
These warmer, more engaged audiences are more likely to be ready to make a purchase (or higher-ticket purchase) if only you’d provide an opportunity. Use your landing pages to invite these individuals to join a webinar, make a purchase, or take advantage of a promotion.
Pro tip: Email marketing is the best traffic source for a sales page since you are pulling on pre-qualified leads to make the sale.
Bottom line: Where and how you get your landing page traffic is critical to the success of your marketing funnel. Focus on traffic sources that provide a high volume of visitors that are relevant to your lead magnet and business.
