A video landing page is a web page/site that is designed exclusively for the purpose of driving traffic to a call to action. It is an essential "best practice" strategy for videos that are designed to generate sales or invite action.
A landing page can be a page within your own website with a simple, distinctive URL. Or, it can be a free-standing microsite (mini website). We often find the latter to be ideal for companies with large corporate websites, which don't have the same design and functional capabilities as a microsite—or would take too long to change. We’ve built landing pages in a matter of days, allowing our clients to quickly erect a digital destination for their video content or ad campaign.
Not familiar with a landing page? Here's an example of a landing page designed to help promote a video production.
WHAT A LANDING PAGE CAN DO FOR YOUR VIDEO
Landing pages are a powerful tool for collecting data and bringing SEO value—especially if you host on Vimeo and miss out on some of the perks of YouTube.
THE ADVANTAGES OF USING A LANDING PAGE OVER SENDING CUSTOMERS TO A NON-OPTIMIZED PAGE ARE MANY:
- It controls the viewer experience and draws them strategically, through intentional design, through the points that lead to sales—removing all distractions and obstacles for the viewer. In other words, it moves them through the sales process more effectively.
- It places your video in the context of easy-to-navigate information and context that inspires a desired action.
- It boosts conversion (viewers to leads).
- It lowers abandonment rates (people who come to your page and leave because it's too hard to find what they're looking for). This is a common occurrence that is often unmeasured but results in lost revenue for a business.
- It makes the expected action so unmistakably obvious that the viewer can expend minimal energy to decide on next steps. Viewer fatigue is an issue all communicators must face, and landing pages are an excellent remedy. Examples of actions include subscribing to a newsletter, downloading content, purchasing a product, or talking with a sales person.
Good landing pages are benefit-oriented, simple, easy to navigate, and mobile-friendly. They focus on the essentials. Everything that doesn't help drive the viewer to the desired action is cleared away, making it easy for the viewer to respond to the call to action. They act as a perfect way to both display your video and market your product/service.
Since CMBell's website and Vimeo channel are so closely paired, using a landing page works well for many of our in-house project needs. The landing page helps us make up for some of the SEO positives that YouTube brings which can be lost when hosting on Vimeo. We also use Vimeo Pro to add a link to each of our embedded videos, helping us steer traffic toward the web pages we want visitors to see.
COMPARE DATA FROM YOUR LANDING PAGE WITH OTHER DATA TO GET A FULLER PICTURE
By looking at analytics from multiple vantage points, you'll be better able to draw conclusions about the impact of your project. Here are just a few ideas you can use:
- Compare the data from the embed platform (e.g., Vimeo stats) with page and engagement metrics on a website.
- Compare unique visitors to a web page with overall plays on a collection platform.
- Compare overall website traffic with the number of video plays a video receives, to correlate a growth increase.
- Compare demographic reports of the upload platform and landing page.
- A/B test thumbnails with Google Optimize prior to launch when deciding which thumbnail will capture the higher click-through rate.
Ensuring that each location links back to a page meant for your viewers can be of great value. With full control over the aesthetic and linking of the page, you are more likely to steer visitors toward the desired goal of the campaign and to convert visitors into leads.