As a business owner, you’ve likely created your fair share of sales pages, but whether they’ve produced the results you were hoping for is another story. Having a sales page that doesn’t turn into conversions is not only disheartening, but also a waste of time and money for your business
We’ll walk you through how to create a high-converting sales page that will reduce the frustration and help make your next launch a success. That way, you can stop stressing about the numbers and start dedicating more energy to serving your clients.
Back to the Basics: What is a Sales Page?
First things first: What is a sales page and how does it differ from a landing page or home page? While this question may seem trivial, understanding what purpose a sales page serves and how it’s different from the other pages you create can help you see what changes to make to design a high-converting sales page.
A sales page is a type of landing page whose purpose is to persuade a prospective client to make a purchase. The type of audience that ends up on a sales page is usually already pretty warm. In many cases, they know your brand and are actively looking for a solution to their problem, but just might need an extra push to decide to take action.
This is different from other kinds of landing pages, like ones that serve as a lead generator. Their job is to help you collect information—like names or email addresses—that you can use to stay in contact, build relationships, and eventually offer your services as a solution to the struggles they’re experiencing.
A sales page is also distinct from your home page, which is less narrow in scope. While a home page can drive conversions, it also serves as a place where people can learn more about your business and the services you offer, making it more educational in nature.
Purpose of a Sales Page
The purpose of a sales page is to persuade prospects into making a purchase and becoming clients or customers. To do this well, it has to do a few different jobs:
Acknowledge concerns or aspirations.
You can’t convince someone they’re in need of your services if you don’t validate their struggles in the first place. Therefore, your sales page needs to acknowledge their specific concerns so they feel seen and heard, which is important in building trust.
Paint a picture of what the future could look like.
Your sales page should show the person what could change if their concerns were addressed. If they see what’s possible, they become even more interested in resolving the problem.
Present a solution to their concern.
Here’s where you come in! Once you’ve opened up their mind to a set of exciting possibilities, your sales page needs to present a solution—your solution—that’s specific and directly responds to their frustrations.
Demonstrate your expertise and ability to help.
The person is much more likely to buy from you if they feel you’re someone they can trust. Therefore, your sales page should demonstrate that you know what you’re talking about through social proof, testimonials, information about your background/certifications, etc.
Direct your audience clearly to their next step.
Assuming you’ve been successful thus far, the final step is to convert! To do this, your sales page should clearly call out the action they should take—whether that’s to purchase a product, enroll in a course, or join a membership.
These components are essential and will serve as the foundation for creating a high-converting sales page.
Anatomy of a Sales Page
To ensure these tasks are carried out effectively, your sales page should follow a strategic structure that guides your audience from taking an interest to taking action. Although each sales page will look different depending on the specific audience and offer, they generally follow this format:
- Header: Names the offer
- Subheader: Summarizes the offer and its benefits
- Call-to-action (CTA): Offers an initial opportunity to take action
- Frustration: Calls out the audience’s struggles
- Future: Paints a picture of what the future could look like
- Fix: Introduces your offer as a solution
- Benefits: Outlines the benefits of the offer
- Features/Inclusions: Outlines the features/inclusions of the offer
- Investment + CTA: Introduces the price point and provides another chance to take action
- About: Introduces you and your brand as the trusted expert
- Who It’s For/Not For: Shows your audience they’re in the right place
- Objections/ FAQs: Addresses audience’s hesitations
- Reiterate Future: Drives home the biggest benefit
- CTA: Provides a final opportunity to take action
Following this structure helps you tell a story, taking your audience on a journey from problem to solution, with you as their guide. But if you want to learn how to create a high-converting sales page, you’re going to need to dive deeper than the basics.
3 Keys to Designing Sales Pages That Convert
To create a high-converting sales page that gets you closer to your goals, you should focus your attention on three major areas.
1. Get Clear on the Big Picture
Before you even start drafting your sales page, there are a couple of big-picture questions that deserve your careful consideration: Who is your audience and what do you have to offer them? Developing clear answers to these questions will help you guide them to take action.
Define your unique value proposition.
Knowing exactly what you have to offer is essential to persuading your audience to buy. You should have a clear idea of not only the value your offer brings, but also how it’s unique from other brands. That way, you can show your audience why they should buy from you rather than someone else.
Understand your audience.
When you understand your audience’s frustrations, values, beliefs, and motivations, you’re better able to acknowledge how they feel and offer a solution that truly addresses their concerns. Plus, if they sense your genuine desire to help, they’ll be more likely to want to buy from you! (Not sure if you truly understand your audience or not? Give this podcast episode a listen.)
2. Perfect Your Messaging
Your messaging is another area where small changes can make a big impact. Remember, when it comes to creating sales pages that convert, it’s not just what you say but how you say it that makes a difference. Here are several tips for ensuring your messaging is as effective as possible:
Leverage brand voice and the art of storytelling.
People are more likely to buy from someone they connect with. Let your unique voice shine and implement storytelling techniques to make your audience feel like they’re taking the advice of a trusted friend.
Be descriptive with your headings and subheadings.
When it comes to designing a high-converting sales page, be as descriptive as possible. Short, impactful headings can be effective in other contexts, but details are what will drive your audience to make a decision. This is especially true for skimmers, who may not read much beyond your headings and subheadings.
Get specific about the features.
By specific, we mean focusing on the highest-value features that have benefits that truly respond to the needs, concerns, and aspirations of your audience. In addition, just like your headings, aim to provide the nitty-gritty details of whatever features you include, and make sure to attach a benefit to each one!
Go beyond the benefits.
What truly persuades people to make a purchase is the promise of big-picture impact. Instead of simply naming surface-level benefits (like clearer skin from your new facial cleanser)—dig deeper to show your audience what they really stand to gain (like higher self-esteem).
Address every objection.
In addition to providing an FAQ section, aim to keep your audience’s objections in mind as you craft the rest of the sales page. For example, when naming your price point, point out that investing in your offer is no more expensive—but far more impactful—than the sum of their daily coffee runs.
Prove you can be trusted.
Research shows that 97% of consumers read customer reviews before making a purchase, which means testimonials are essential to a high-converting sales page. That said, gaining your audience’s trust is about more than social proof (ethos). You can also appeal to your audience’s emotional responses in your copy (pathos) or demonstrate your knowledge and expertise with statistics about your offer or brand (logos).
Use action-driving CTAs.
Not all CTAs are created equal. To persuade your audience to make a purchase, use strong command verbs and phrasing that both evokes enthusiasm and a sense of urgency. Think something like “Start living a healthier life today” or “Join now to unlock your potential.”
3. Optimize Your Design
Manipulating design elements is another way of increasing the conversion power of your sales page. In today’s digital world, people are relying increasingly more on visuals to provide them with information, meaning that the design choices you make can have an enormous impact on your audience and whether or not they choose to buy from you. Here are some elements to consider when trying to design a high-converting sales page:
Incorporate high-quality images and videos.
Today’s audiences respond best to content that includes images and videos. In fact, research shows that images produce 650% more engagement and people are 85% more likely to purchase a product after watching a video. You can take advantage of this competitive edge by incorporating images and videos into your sales page that are of high quality—after all, first impressions matter!
Remove possible distractions.
The goal of sales page is to persuade your audience to make a purchase, which means you should eliminate as many distractions as possible. This includes things like sidebars, footers, distracting fonts, and links that could take your audience away from the page.
Make the text easy to read.
These days, most of us have developed the habit of skimming for information, including your audience. Therefore, you should make your sales page as easy to read as you can by writing clear and descriptive headings, breaking up blocks of text, using bulleted lists, and bolding important information.
Use a dynamic layout.
Keep your audience engaged by using a dynamic layout. Rather than write a block of text on a plain background, break up the page with different colors and shapes that will maintain your audience’s interest.
Add urgency.
People are more likely to buy if they know it’s their best or only opportunity. Consider including a countdown to cart close that encourages your audience to make a decision—but only if it’s genuine. Creating fake limited-time promotions just to create urgency can destroy the trust built with your audience.
Implement an exit-intent popup.
Exit-intent popups are windows that appear when a person tries to leave your page, usually to encourage them to stay. Using this tool on your sales page can give you one last chance to remind your audience of what they stand to gain if they make a purchase.
Incorporate accessibility features.
If you’re making use of videos and photos, make sure they’re accessible to all of your visitors. Using ALT text on your images, enabling captions on your videos, and enrolling in tools like UserWay.org will go a long way towards making the experience of your sales page more accessible.
CREATE A HIGH-CONVERTING SALES PAGE THAT CHECKS ALL THE BOXES
Although we’ve walked you through how to create a high-converting sales page, there are a lot of components to keep track of that may leave you feeling overwhelmed.
To keep yourself organized and ensure you create a sales page that’s optimized for success, check out our Sales Page Template in the North Star Messaging + Strategy Template Shop.