The right landing page is a beautiful thing.
It leads your prospects on a journey from the discovery stage right through to the moment they click "Sign me up."
The problem with most SaaS landing pages is they often don't convert well.
In fact, a recent study by Unbounce found that SaaS landing pages convert 10.46% lower than other industries.
That is pretty terrible when you consider that SaaS companies ought to have a better grip on digital things, including digital marketing.
In this post, we’re looking at how to construct a winning landing page from scratch.
We’ll showcase landing page examples from a variety of SaaS companies, including Market Muse, Intercom, MOZ, and several others.
Note: Want to create a highly successful landing page that converts? Sign up and try Leadfeeder free for 14 days and turn leads into customers.
But first, you need to understand your audience
Before you dive into creating your landing page, it is time to think long and hard about your audience. Ask these questions:
Who is your audience?
What is the problem or need your tool addresses?
How is your value proposition unique vs. the competition?
What part of the product or service are you going to visually communicate? If it’s a SaaS app or a tool, what’s the most important part of the product to showcase?
What are the key frictions that usually exist for the average visitor? Think about all of the reasons that a user might not convert
The better you understand what your audience needs and wants, the more effective you'll be at convincing them to actually take the desired action, whether that's buying now, scheduling a demo, or handing over their precious contact info for a custom quote.
Ready to build a landing page that converts?
Questions are the key to your landing page layout
For your SaaS landing page to successfully become a persuasion page, you’ll need to break it down into specific sections that focus on reducing ‘friction’ to convert.
When it comes to B2B SaaS, these friction points might include:
Am I in the right place? Is this website relevant to my problem?
How does this company compare against similar options?
What are other people saying about this product or service?
Is the company trustworthy?
Does the value offered outweigh the cost of the product?
Do I know enough about the product to take action?
Your next step is to address each of these friction points in each section of your landing page.
SaaS landing page sections
You won’t necessarily need all of these sections, but I've found that this structure works well for SaaS clients who operate within particularly competitive industries, such as market insights and CRMs.
Let’s breakdown the section and highlight some of the best SaaS landing page examples of B2B companies. We’ll also go into specifics around features to test, as this will be crucial to improving your landing page performance over time.
Landing page hero section
Ever heard of the three-second rule? If you can’t effectively communicate why you are relevant in three seconds or less, your visitor is going to bounce.
That is why the hero section is crucial. It needs to snag their attention right off the bat so you can convince them to stay.
That’s what the Hero section is all about: this is where you communicate your value proposition (i.e. how your solution solves a given problem) in three seconds or less.
Within this section, there are several common elements, including:
The image or background
The headline
The CTA (Call to Action)
The Hero section: image or background
There’s no hard and fast rule to say that you absolutely need a hero shot (sometimes a color background works just as well), but if you do decide to go down this road, there are a few things to consider.
Firstly, the hero image should give your audience an immediate idea of what your value proposition is. A good hero image clearly communicates both your brand personality and reflects your Value Proposition.
One common trend that we’ve seen lately is to showcase customers within the hero image, rather than boring stock photos.
Wave Accounting does this by embracing their real-world clients right their hero image:
Using people in your Hero images is a long-held best practice, but as with anything, be sure to A/B test to find what works best for you.
Also, have the person facing your CTA, so to direct the user’s attention to the most important part of the page.
Using people is a solid option, but sometimes a plain color background is more effective at reducing ‘noise’. This can be especially true in B2B, where people-focused stock images are overused.
For Intercom, a neutral background color helps keep the message front and center:
Test to see what works for you. Here a few A/B tests for this part of your landing page:
People shots vs. color backgrounds
People shots: men vs. women, old vs. young, etc.
People shots: real people vs. illustrations
Color backgrounds: light colors vs bold colors
Color backgrounds vs. abstract backgrounds
The hero section: headline
The purpose of the headline is simple: to draw attention to the problem that your product solves.
You need to describe why you’re the best option to solve a specific pain point.
The best way of achieving this is to make a crystal clear, highly-compelling promise to your visitors.
It’s not about creating a mystery or curiosity around your product at this stage. Your prospects are busy and don’t have time for guessing games: be painstakingly clear about what you bring to the table.
Moz, for example, focuses on solving a specific need relating to SEO professionals:
As with your Hero shot, you should continuously test your headline and sub-headline. Here are a few tests to consider running:
A sense of urgency or scarcity of supply.
A given benefit within a specific time frame vs. no explicit time frame.
Play on benefits vs. fear.
Subheadings vs. no subheadings.
Focus on a single main benefit vs. focusing on multiple benefits.
Short vs long length headlines.
Headlines that utilize social proof vs. headlines that don’t.
The Hero section: the form/CTA
When it comes to your form (or whatever your primary CTA is), I’m a firm believer that this needs to be in the hero section.
Don't bury this below the fold.
But keep in mind that this won't be the only CTA. People at different stages of the user journey won’t necessarily respond the same way to your call-to-action.
Some folks might be scared off by giving away their contact details right away. Instead, sprinkle a few CTAs throughout the landing page, and consider using 'ice-breaker questions' that don't dive for their contact details right away.
Asking qualifying questions (i.e. company size, industry), before finally getting down to business can improve conversions, as fewer questions are less intimidating to users, but also ensures you get more qualified leads.
Here is the form for MarketMuse, an AI-based writing tool. Their target audience is companies, so they ask for business information to help qualify leads.
What should you test when it comes to your forms?
Form field length: Shorter forms vs. longer forms. Shorter forms tend to work better, but it depends on the industry and the qualification criteria.
Form field questions: Different types of ice-breaker questions. For example, do questions around ‘pain points’ work better than questions relating to objectives?
Form CTA buttons: Phrasing, color, size, etc. Does an orange button against a blue background outperform a dark blue one?
Landing page features section
After introducing the problem you can help to fix (in the Hero headline), it’s time to show exactly how your product fixes it.
In order to do that, you need to be crystal-clear on a) who is visiting your page, b) the problem or need that they have, and c) how your product helps to overcome it.
For Wave, their customers want to be able to use an online money platform to pay bills, send money, or even buy phone minutes in an easy to use platform.
Wave use icons, headlines, and text elements to communicate the broader features that help to overcome their customer's main problems:
Don't dive too deep — you want to keep this section nice and concise, so focus on features with clear benefits. You can use the FAQ or another page to get more specific.
When it comes to landing page optimization, look at A/B testing these features:
The use of images vs. iconography.
The use of numbers vs. textual statements.
The number of features — four versus six or eight, for example.
Headlines only vs. headlines and subheadings.
Landing page social proof section
Social proof is all about instilling trust in your product or service by sharing how other customers feel about your software. People are more likely to convert when they see that someone like them is vouching for the product or service.
Typically, this takes shape in the form of:
Review ratings
Customer testimonials
Influencer testimonials
Award wins
PR coverage
Case studies
Brand partnerships
Client lists
However, if you choose to demonstrate social proof, stick to a mostly visual format. For B2B SaaS companies, the most-of-used social proof signals are generally client lists, press coverage, and testimonials.
Client lists: Client lists communicate expertise and authority. However, they tend to be the weakest social proof signal, given that there is no implied endorsement from said client, other than just being your client. Usertesting.com features some strong customer brands in its client list.
Press coverage: Coverage in the press can provide validation that your product is the real deal. Naturally, the more well-known the publication, the more kudos it will lend. TopTal conveys this awesomely, with logos, quotes, and in some cases, video links to the actual report (in this case, interviews with the CEO):
Landing page testimonials: Testimonials come in many shapes and sizes, from simple quotes to full-blown video endorsements. Below, you can see a powerful example from Hootsuite, which lets users expand to learn more.
Overall, within the social proof section, there are lots of different aspects you can test, including:
Different forms of social proof - review ratings, PR coverage, case studies, etc.
Text testimonials vs. video testimonials.
Social proof positioning - above-the-fold vs. below-the-fold.
The ‘Why Us’ section
Your users' most pressing question is Why are you the best choice?
This is particularly true if you are using paid ads to drive traffic, which means they've seen several other options in the search results.
The key here is to focus on clarity. The more concise your message is, the easier it will be to persuade your visitors to convert.
InsightSquared takes its competitor on directly by leveraging ratings and reviews from third-party sites:
Comparison tables work great as a quick visual reference, or when comparing multiple companies side-by-side. But if you’re comparing against a single competitor, you’ll probably want to elaborate further on the core points of distinction.
You might want to look at testing a number of elements for this part of your page. For example:
Section layout: Text layout vs. comparison table
Image testing: product shots vs. person-focused images
Headlines: Single headline vs. headlines & sub-headers
The FAQ section
When it comes to elaborating on features and benefits outlined in previous sections, the FAQ plays an important role in solidifying understanding.
If your visitor makes it this far down on the page, their intent level is a bit higher than the average prospect. But they may have a few lingering questions.
A good FAQ section will focus on 6 to 8 questions designed to overcome any remaining friction to conversion.
Why only 6 to 8 questions?
In all likelihood, a large chunk of traffic comes from mobile, so overloading your mobile landing page with FAQ’s can actually work against you.
Good questions to ask (and answer) include:
Questions around supporting products or service features.
Questions about your on-boarding process.
Questions around how to claim promotions or trials that are tied to your landing page.
Questions around payment schedules and additional fees.
Consider using an accordion feature, so users can click to read the answers, rather than facing a huge wall of text.
Testing your FAQ section can make quite a difference to your conversion rates, as users who make it up to this point tend to be more engaged than the average user.
Potential testing opportunities include:
Q&A depth: long-form answers vs. short-form answers.
FAQ layout; standard vs. accordion vs. enhanced (with images).
Subheaders: no subheaders vs subheaders.
Summary
So there you have it, our deep-dive into creating a successful SaaS landing page. Hopefully, it provides some inspiration for your own landing pages.
Here are a few key points to keep in mind:
Before designing your landing page, focus on understanding your audience and their needs. This will help you craft a page that drives results.
Think of your landing page as a persuasion page. Use every section to remove friction throughout the decision-making journey.
Key components of the Hero section include image or background, headline, and form.
The features section highlights the core features of your product and highlights the value shared in the Hero section.
Social proof signals should be peppered throughout your landing page. The social proof section is a good place to anchor the bulk of these signals.
Testimonials should be used to hammer home the value of your product. More elaborate testimonials such as case studies and video testimonials can add an air of authenticity, and instill more trust than simple ‘quote’ testimonials.
The ‘Why us’ section is for comparison charts and highlighting your UVP. Be a bit more direct in your messaging to hammer home why your product is the ideal solution.
Choose six to eight concise FAQ’s, in order to help remove any lingering friction to conversion.
Above all, keep testing. Ongoing landing page optimization is key!
Note: Want to create a highly successful landing page that converts? Sign up and try Leadfeeder free for 14 days and turn leads into customers.
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