You’ve worked hard to create great ads on Instagram: choosing the format, choosing your images, writing a great caption and adding a compelling call to action. Now just sit back and let your customers do the rest, right?
Not really!
Getting that click is only half the battle. Whether they’re making a purchase, downloading your app, or subscribing to your newsletter, your visitor hasn’t accepted your offer yet.
Having a great Instagram landing page on the other side of this ad is key to converting clicks into conversions.
Your ad is the hook, and the landing page is the pitch. Do something Don Draper would be proud of: compelling, directlyand irresistible. Find the formula for a great Instagram landing page below.
8 essential elements of a high-converting Instagram landing page
1. Make it scannable
In this hyperactive digital age, our attention span is only eight seconds long. If you don’t convey your meaning quickly, you will lose your audience to the next one. Armie Hammer dancing boob.
To do this, you need to make the text on your landing page easy to review and understand. Don’t force your client to look for meaning – it should be clear and understandable.
Opt for short pieces of text or bullet points over long paragraphs. If you can use an infographic or statistics to convey a point more effectively, do it! Here are more tips for writing concise, persuasive text.
2. Stay focused
Your landing page is not just another version of your home page. It’s a signature dish, not a 250-piece Cheesecake Factory menu. You want it to do something really well, so keep an eye on it.
Everything on your landing page should lead the visitor to your call to action (CTA). At first glance, it should be easy to see what the purpose of the landing page is and what someone should do once they get there.
Make sure your CTA stands out and put some thought into creating it. Do not distract customers with other links or options that could distract them from the task at hand. Here’s how to write a great CTA.
This landing page from Squarespace is a prime example. The graphics make it visually appealing, but the text is clean and minimal, with a prominent CTA button. The client is clear about what the next step in their journey should be.
If you need or want to add more content such as testimonials or feature details to your landing page, keep the most important text above the fold.
Having some white space (or black space in this Squarespace example) looks good and diverts the customer’s eye. Using arrows, bullet points, or other visual cues can also help.
Are you asking your visitor to fill out a subscription form or share their contact information before downloading your ebook or app? Stick to the basics and avoid adding too many fields for a higher conversion rate. Visitors from Instagram will be on mobile devices, which is not ideal for filling out long forms.
3. Show social proof
There’s a reason to check Yelp before choosing a restaurant (or the analogue method: picking a place with lots of happy-looking eaters in it). Likewise, there’s a reason you don’t buy products with one-star ratings and bad reviews on Amazon. Social proof is important in decision making because generally speaking, if a lot of people like something, then it’s probably fine.
Social proof can take many forms:
- A glowing reference from an influencer
- Logos of companies using your service
- User ratings
- Number of users, downloads or subscribers
- And more!
When it comes to opinions, share authentic, private details from real people about why your product or service is special. This provides credibility and reassures potential customers of the value of your product. Here are some elements of effective references.
Remember: Since your landing page has limited space, choose the best examples that reinforce your offer.
4. Clarify value
Don’t get so caught up in convincing your audience what they should do that you forget about convincing them why they should do it. Communicate the value of your offer.
Often times, an Instagram ad only provides enough character to hint at the offer. On your landing page, you have the opportunity to detail it. Why should your customer act now? Why would they choose you over a competitor? What makes this opportunity special?
The descent of Tangerine Bank makes it easy to pinpoint value.
Give specific examples when explaining the value of your offer. Don’t say your product or service is “best” or “better than the competitor”. Vague and exaggerated expressions can be forgotten.
If you force customers to look for the details they want, you risk losing interest (remember: our attention span is short!). Instead, share concretely what sets you apart from your competitors.
5. Message matching is key
Message matching looks exactly like this: make sure your messages (in this case, your Instagram ad and your landing page) are perfectly aligned.
This sounds counterintuitive, but often clicking an ad takes you to a landing page on a completely different topic. Or the message is slightly different and contradicts the reason you clicked on the ad in the first place. “FREE ICE CREAM!” If you’ve ever seen a sign that says outside of an ice cream shop and then inside discovering that ice cream is free with just a $20 purchase, you’d be rightfully annoyed.
This kind of bait and switch is confusing and frustrating for customers. If you advertise a free app but take someone to a landing page about a paid version, that person won’t stay there.
It’s often a good idea to repeat the exact wording of your ad text on your landing page, as it proves the customer is in the right place.
HelloFresh, a meal planning service, does this well on their landing page. The Instagram ad promises a special offer of three free plates. This same offer is repeated at the top of the landing page, fulfilling this promise.
As in this example, message matching not only avoids confusion but also builds trust.
6. Create a seamless visual experience
Maybe you’ve heard that 60 percent of the top brands on Instagram use the same filter for every post. This is because visual consistency is important for your brand identity and creating a pleasant browsing experience.
The look and feel of your landing page should align with your Instagram ad and website. Use images and fonts similar to those in your ads. This kind of continuity increases the probability of purchase.
If you’ve ever been to a beautiful boutique with gruesome dressing rooms, you know how jarring this transition can impact your experience. Don’t let your landing page be your brand’s unpretentious dressing room!
Wealthsimple, an investment management service, seamlessly transitions to the landing page. Have you noticed how Instagram ads reflect colors, graphic shapes, and fonts?
7. Use different landing pages for different ads
Now that you know how important message matching and consistent images are to successful landing pages, you can understand why you should update your landing page for each ad.
That doesn’t mean you have to reinvent the wheel every time. You can update the text of the landing page to reflect the headline in your Instagram ad, or change the image to match the ad.
For example, Skillshare has created Instagram ads that showcase each of its different courses. An ad featuring logo designer Jessica Hische inviting customers to sign up for Skillshare leads to a landing page displaying Jessica’s course.
8. Healing experiment
Just as you should always test your Instagram ads, you should also test how different elements perform on your landing pages. A/B test two versions of a landing page with the same ad, or tweak your landing pages regularly and see which performs best.
Try different CTAs to see what converts more. Try adding different images or rearranging elements on your landing page. See which influencer testimonial had the biggest impact. Get creative – you might be surprised what works best!
As with other experiments, such tests will help you develop your strategy and get to know your customers. You will better understand who your audience is and what they are looking for from you.
Instagram landing page tools
Making a landing page is easier than you might think, thanks to companies that offer specialized tools to get the job done.
Unbounce offers everything you need to create and test landing pages to maximize conversions. With a wide variety of customizable templates, you can create a landing page that fits any campaign or promotion. One thing to note is the Layout Assistant feature, which makes it easy for an Instagram user browsing mobile to see what your landing page will look like.
Lander is another company that lets you design beautiful landing pages without the need for coding. More than 100 landing page templates can be customized to help you convert ad clicks into conversions. The landing pages you create are also easy to duplicate and edit, so you can fine-tune them to be compatible with different versions of your ads (as outlined in point 5).
Instapage claims it can increase your conversion rate from 3 percent (on average) to 22 percent. The secret sauce they use to optimize the post-click experience consists of a number of customizable options, including options to match messages based on user demographics and search keywords.
With these tools, you can start creating landing pages that turn ad clicks into tangible effects and take your Instagram strategy to the next level.
Save time managing your Instagram presence using Moyens I/O. From a single dashboard, you can schedule photos and post directly to Instagram, engage with viewers, measure performance, and run all your other social media profiles. Try it for free today.
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