You’ve got your product, your class, your course or your brand-new shiny freebie all ready and waiting to be sold. Exciting! And now you’re wondering whether a landing page or a website is the best way to sell it.
It’s a great question but actually, the question you should be asking is: “What is the best way for me to get this thing online, looking great, converting a bazillion people and getting sold?”
Answer: There isn’t a best, only a best for you right now!
In this blog, I’ll take you through exactly what you should consider with both of these tools to get the quickest, most effective results for your business.
What’s my preference?
If you don’t know, I’m a bit of a rebel. When people tell me to do something, I’ll probably want to do the exact opposite.
That can be a bit of a nightmare when choosing between those sensible mummy jeans and the swishy full-length – had to be imported in – dress.
When it comes to negotiating my way around the many ‘should do’s’ and ‘have to haves’ in business, my natural tendency to do my own thing comes into its own. I’m not going to tell you that you should use a website for your landing pages. Or that you should invest in the newest, whizzy landing pages platform for best results. That’s because these things are never one size fits all! Which one you choose to use is entirely down to the following:
- You!
- Your tech abilities
- Your design abilities
- How much you like or hate stats
- Where you are in your website journey
- Your website strategy
- Your particular business.
Now, as a website strategist/guru master head cheese, I favour building landing pages on a website. That’s because I design websites that are built as a marketing tool that brings in customers and converts them to sales. Landing pages are an integral part of that but this isn’t right for everybody.
Landing Page vs Website: Quiz Time!
To help you decide which one you should choose, I’m going to do a little quiz. Do play along in the comments!
*such fun*
Question one: Do you already have a website?
‘No, I just want to get selling!”. If you have a product course or freebie just waiting there and ready to go, don’t hold yourself back by trying to create an entire website to serve it. Just get it out there. Using a landing page builder like, Leadpages, Unbounce, HubSpot or even the signup form that comes with Mailchimp is fine. They are designed to help you sell your thing and they aren’t a sloppy second that you have to use because you haven’t yet invested in getting yourself a website. You don’t have to have an expensive website to start selling at all.
I know, I’m a website strategist!
If this is you – congratulations you’ve chosen! Now go sell it.
Question two: How good are you at the tech and design side of things?
Be honest with yourself here! Does the idea of creating a landing page on your own website fill you with fear? Does it take you forever to work out how to edit the pages you’ve already got? Or does your website limit the design of your pages because of the template or theme you’ve already got on there?
If any of these is yes, then you need to also choose the landing page software option. That’s until you have an easy to edit, easy to update landing page template on your website. Or a VA who’ll do it all for you! There is nothing worse than struggling with tech you hate or trying to get something to look good on screen when it’s just not your zone of genius. So make these things easy for yourself.
Question three: Can you create a great landing page on your website?
If you have a website and you’re fine learning how to build a fantastic landing page. Or have some kick-ass landing page templates to choose from – I’d go with that! Then you don’t need to spend more money on a landing page specific platform. Go with what you’ve got and you don’t need to make it more complicated than that.
Question four: Will this landing page improve your website?
Will it be better for you and your audience? A great website should be created to support and grow your business. Your website should be set up to attract new audiences through SEO. To boost your brand presence and take visitors on a journey. Building those relationships with them and then converting them to sales.
Moving your landing page off-site could mean that you’re losing some of that lovely SEO juice that will boost your website’s authority and get you ranked higher in Google search.
So, if you want this landing page (that you’re thinking of for this specific thing you’re selling or opting into) to support your website in doing that job, then you need to create your landing page on site. If that landing page/sales page/freebie sign up page is the pinnacle of your sales journey on your website – it makes perfect sense to keep it all on there.
Question five: Do you LOVE numbers?
One of the best features of landing page software, like Leadpages, is the in-built conversion stats and A/B testing features. But will you use them? If you are more likely to stick a pencil in your eye than fiddle around testing out different headlines to raise your conversion rates by x per cent, then forking out the extra for this sort of platform just isn’t essential. You can still do this on your website using Google analytics and some themes, plugins or extensions let you A/B test too.
But if you can’t wait to get your hands on all those lovely stats then using a landing page platform could be the best option for you. I’m not going to argue with you!
And now… the BIG MISTAKE business owners make when choosing between a landing page or website.
They think they have to buy a BIG EXPENSIVE WEBSITE to sell their thing. Whether it’s a small thing or a big thing (and before they’ve even tested the market to see if anybody will buy their thing anyway!)
If this is you and you are thinking that you need a website to sell, or you need a website to show you are serious in your business, then I’m here to tell you: You don’t need one. Not now, not yet.
You can build a successful landing page for very little. That landing page can be your conversion page after you’ve gathered your audience together on social media, in your groups or from your podcast. Get selling!
Get your business off the ground and test out those waters before you consider investing in website marketing. That way, when it comes to creating the perfect website to grow your business further, you will know exactly who you are talking to, who will buy from you and how you can attract and convert more of those lovely customers into your crazy little world.
Convinced that you’re ready to take that next step in growing your business through your website and making landing pages a solid part of your online ecosystem? Then I’ve put together a free workbook for you to get started on your wonderful website strategy.
Click the link and download your freebie!
Or, you can get in touch with me directly by clicking right here and we can start the conversation about how I can help you get the right website for your business.
Kat x
