Landing page design: how to turn ad clicks into customers

The marketing manager spends DKK 15,000 a month on Google Ads. The ad promises “Fixed price on your bathroom within 48 hours”. The click lands on the homepage, where a carousel rotates five messages, the menu has 14 items and the word “bathroom” first appears three screens down. Most visitors leave within seconds. The ad usually works fine. The trouble starts after the click, and that is exactly what a landing page is built to solve.

A landing page is a page with one purpose. It receives traffic from one campaign, repeats the ad’s promise in its headline and guides the visitor to one action. Everything that does not help with that action is removed, including most of the menu. It sounds simple, and it is. The craft lies in choosing what goes in and in what order.

What is a landing page and how does it differ from a homepage?

Both types matter, and they use many of the same building blocks. The difference is focus. To learn more about how a homepage should be put together, read our guide to homepage design.

What should a good landing page include?

The vast majority of landing pages that work follow the same basic structure. It mirrors the questions a visitor asks in sequence: Am I in the right place? What do I get? Can I trust them? What’s the catch? What do I do now?

How do you write copy for a landing page?

The formula we use most often has four parts: outcome, for whom, without which downside, and next step. The headline covers the first two, the subheading the third and the button the fourth. That gives copy like “A new bathroom at a fixed price. No surprises on the bill. Get a quote within 48 hours.” It is plain, and it answers exactly what the visitor came for.

Headline formulas that work

• Outcome + time: “Your new website ready in six weeks.”
• Outcome + without the downside: “Book online without picking up the phone.”
• For whom + outcome: “Bookkeeping for tradespeople who would rather be on site.”
• A question that hits the problem: “Still spending Fridays sending invoices?”
• Number + promise: “A fixed price within 24 hours.”

Write about the outcome. “Integrated with e-conomic” is a feature. “The invoice is in your accounts the moment the job is done” is the outcome. Find more formulas and a structure for each page type in our guide to website copywriting.

How do you match the landing page to the ad?

The single most important factor on a paid landing page is the connection to the ad, often called message match. If someone searches for “electrician for EV charger” and clicks an ad about chargers, they should land on a page where the charger is in the headline and the image. A general page about electrical work feels like a wrong click, even if it mentions chargers further down.

• Use the same words in the ad and the headline, especially the keyword.
• Keep the offer identical: if the ad promises a free site visit, the button must say so.
• Build one page per ad group or audience when the messages differ.
• Match the image to the audience: a business customer and a private customer should each see themselves.
• Add UTM parameters to every link so you can see which ad generates leads.

We also help with the campaigns themselves under advertising, so the ad and the page are made by the same team and speak the same language.

How many fields should a landing page form have?

As few as possible, but enough to follow up. Name, email or phone and one qualifying question is often plenty for a first enquiry. Each extra field costs some completions but yields better leads. If sales get too many weak enquiries, an extra question about budget or timeline can actually be an improvement. Phrase the button as an action, make error messages clear, and show a thank-you page that says what happens next and when.

How do you A/B test a landing page?

An A/B test shows two versions of a page to each half of the traffic and measures which converts better. It sounds simple, but many tests are called too early on too little data. A common rule of thumb is to wait until each variant has around 100 conversions, and always run tests for whole weeks, so weekdays and weekends count equally. If you have less traffic, test big differences that produce clear results.

What affects a landing page’s conversion rate?

Beyond the message, three technical factors often make the difference. Speed: paid traffic usually comes from mobile, and a page slow to show its headline loses people before they have read anything. Mobile: the form must be completable with a thumb, and the button visible without zooming. Trust: HTTPS, real contact details and a cookie banner that does not cover half the screen. Read more in website speed and in our guide to conversion rate optimisation.

What does a landing page cost and when does it pay off?

A single landing page made by a freelancer typically costs from a few thousand kroner upwards, while an agency that also handles copy, design and tracking setup usually charges more. The cheapest option in the long run is often to have a landing page template built into your website, so marketing can create new pages with existing blocks. In our web packages, such a template can be one of the features. See pricing.

Worked example: what a better page does to cost per lead

Imagine an ad budget of DKK 15,000 a month and an average cost per click of DKK 25. That gives 600 clicks. If the page converts 2 % of visitors, you get 12 enquiries at DKK 1,250 each. If a new landing page lifts conversion to 4 %, you get 24 enquiries at DKK 625 each for exactly the same ad spend. The numbers are illustrative, yet the arithmetic shows why improving the page often pays better than raising the budget.

Which landing page mistakes should you avoid?

• Sending ad traffic to the homepage. Build a page for the campaign.
• Several messages and several buttons with different goals.
• A headline that is clever but does not say what the offer is.
• A carousel at the top. The first slide gets seen, the rest rarely.
• A form that asks for everything at once.
• No thank-you page, so tracking is imprecise and the visitor is left wondering.
• Testing for three days and declaring a winner.

A landing page is also a good tool for testing demand before you build something bigger. We cover that in our guide to validating an app idea. If you need landing pages or a template you can use yourselves, you can get a fixed price within 24 hours.