Engage and Convert: Creating Effective Video Landing Pages

A video landing page is more than a landing page with a video; it's a web page designed to use a video as the main sales tool to engage visitors. Landing pages prioritize the use of video content to communicate offerings and drive conversions.

In general, there are three types of video landing pages:

1. Background video landing page: Uses a background video that auto-plays when a visitor lands on the site.
2. Hero video landing page: Replace the hero visual element with a video to sit at the front and center of the page to grab the visitor's attention.
3. Supporting video landing page: Uses video to supplement the rest of the landing page, which may rely primarily on copy and static imagery to encourage conversions.

While every video landing page is different, they typically consist of the following elements:

A video

The video is the main content on the video landing page. It can be hosted on any platform, including YouTube or the website itself. The content of the video will vary depending on the landing page's objective.

Supportive copy

While the video should be compelling enough to convince website visitors to take action, your video landing page should also consist of copy. Unfortunately, not everyone who lands on your landing page wants to watch a video. They might be in public or at work and don't want their sound on. In these cases, it helps to have supportive copy encouraging them to act.

CTA

Every video landing page needs a call to action to tell visitors what they should do next. Your CTA will vary depending on the objective of the campaign. For instance, if you want them to purchase a product, your CTA might be "buy now." Meanwhile, if you want them to download an e-guide, you might use "download."

Design

A landing page should have a simple, minimalist design that reflects your brand identity. The design should focus on the video rather than any other element on the page. This will help to avoid clutter that can distract visitors from viewing the video and understanding your offering.

How video landing pages differ from a traditional landing page

Traditional and video landing pages serve the same purpose: to make visitors want to take action. The main difference between a video and a traditional landing page is the type of content used.

Traditional landing pages don't use videos; instead, they use static images and copy to encourage visitors to take action.

On the other hand, video landing pages use different video formats to create compelling stories that capture visitors' attention. With these landing pages, video is the main design and content element because it's used to convey your message.

In general, videos capture attention much easier than static images, which is why video-sharing platforms are so popular. They use sounds, visuals, and motion to make visitors want to keep their eyes on the page rather than bounce.

On the other hand, a traditional landing page relies on copywriting in the form of compelling headlines to capture the visitors' attention. Unfortunately, sometimes even the best copywriting in the world can't stand up to an engaging video.

A video landing page is also much more interactive and immersive than a traditional landing page, which can improve the user experience. With these pages, visitors can watch and listen to content rather than read it, making it easier to digest.

Before searching through your video files to find the best one for your landing page, you should invest some time into planning your campaign. Always define the specific goals for the landing page.

Is it designed to sell when used with a PPC campaign, or will it be an organic landing page on your site with an offer that promotes lead generation?

After defining your objectives, you can align the video content with the overall marketing objectives. You should plan a storyboard to ensure the video covers all the necessary information in a way that's easy to understand.

Then, you can determine key performance indicators (KPIs) to measure the success of your video and the landing page itself.

Optimize your video content

Depending on the types of video content you have available, you may create a new video for a particular offer. In any case, you must optimize your video content by ensuring it aligns with the goals of your campaign.

Choose the right video format and length

Landing page videos should never be too long. Instead, it's usually best to keep it short and sweet to share your offer, educate the visitor, and tell them what to do next.

Choosing the right video format is crucial because it can add loading speeds. In most cases, you'll embed your video to your page, so the larger and longer it is, the longer it will take to load.

Create engaging and relevant video content

You should have basic video editing skills to edit your video for a landing page based on its objectives. You can use several types of videos; what you choose will depend on the ultimate purpose of the landing page. Your options include;

• Explainers: Explainer videos are designed to educate and explain a concept or product.
• Promos: Promotional videos are designed to be paired with promotional offers.
• Demos: If your landing page aims to help users understand how to use your product, a demo video can help you demonstrate value.
• Testimonials: Testimonial videos are engaging social proof that can help you convince prospects to take action.

Of course, background videos are another option, which can add movement and animation to an otherwise static landing page. These videos don't typically add to the value of the landing page but can make it slightly more engaging.

Another option is background videos. More a format than a type, a landing page video background is more about adding movement or animation to a landing page than conveying information. They typically do not include sound.

Prioritize video metadata

Video metadata helps search engines find, crawl, and index your content online. When you prioritize video metadata, your video may appear in video SERPs for your target keyword, helping both your page rank in SERPs while increasing the video's visibility online.

Designing an effective video landing page requires careful consideration of both visual and functional elements.

Choosing an appropriate page layout, prominently featuring the video, and focusing on user experience can help your video landing page perform better. Use these tips to increase your video landing page conversions:

Choosing an appropriate landing page layout

If you've used a video landing page before, it helps to create video landing page templates to measure their effectiveness and determine whether they perform well.

When you create a video landing page, what's most important is choosing a layout that features the video rather than using it to support the existing copy.

The most common video landing page templates replace the hero image with a hero video above the fold. However, it's not the only option you have available to you. Another option is to place the video below the fold and encourage visitors to scroll.

Placing the video prominently on the page

You should consider the video's purpose. If your video landing page is designed with the video in the hero section, the video is the most important aspect since it'll be shown above the fold and becomes the first thing visitors see.

However, if you're using video as supportive content, you can place it below the fold. For instance, if you're using an explainer video, you can place it in the middle of the page. Meanwhile, if you're using a testimonial video, you might place it at the bottom of the page.

Since a background landing page video doesn't necessarily serve the same purpose as these other types of video landing pages and only aims to improve the aesthetics of the page, there's no reason to make it more prominent than it needs to be.

Using compelling visuals and graphics to enhance engagement

Your video landing page should include other elements in addition to the video. You should use compelling graphics and visuals to enhance engagement.

Remember, not everyone is going to want to watch a video when they land on the page. Instead, they might prefer to read copy or look at static infographics to understand the purpose of the landing page and what they're expected to do.

Optimizing page load speed for a better user experience

Regardless of whether you use a hero landing page video or a video halfway down the page, you should always optimize the page speed for a better user experience. If your video landing page design elements take too long to load, you'll likely have a high bounce rate.

Video marketing can enhance your campaigns, but only if the content loads properly on the page. If your video is too large, it will take the entire landing page and various elements at different rates to load, leading to a frustrating user experience.

Implement SEO best practices

An organic video landing page designed to rank in search engines should always use SEO best practices to ensure the landing page and video can be found online.

Unfortunately, search engines like Google can't watch videos yet, but the metadata you provide can tell them more about the content of the video to help them rank.

Video SEO components to be aware of include:

• Captions and transcriptions: Any time you use a video landing page, it helps to add captions to the video if there's sound or dialogue since search engines can read captions and transcripts to help them understand the context of the video.
• Metadata: Meta tags help search engines crawl information about the video to make it more visible online.
• Sitemaps: Sitemaps can help search engines find and index video content on your website.

Track and analyze performance

After pushing your video landing page live, you should track the metrics you defined earlier. While we've provided you with some best practices for designing a video landing page, you know your business and its target audience best.

Split testing and measuring the performance of your campaigns and landing pages can help you make better data-driven decisions to improve the various elements involved and increase conversions. You can test everything from video length to supporting copy and CTAs.

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