It’s not so complicated: The anatomy of SaaS demo landing pages

Sidharth: Hey, everyone, this is Sidharth, I am mentor at GrowthMentor. And primarily I’m a B2B, SaaS, SEO consultant. I work with high growth startups and organizations in the tech space who are wanting to drive demand through organic channels. And happy to be here with Spyros today and discussing about demo landing pages.

Spyros Tsoukalas: Welcome. Here said, I’m glad we are sharing that discussion. So today we will be discussing about demo landing pages a topic that’s not so complicated, as many people might think. So would you like to share with us what’s different between normal landing pages and demo landing pages?

Sidharth: Yeah, sure. And, honestly, there’s primarily just the intent behind the demo landing page. So what we are primarily trying to capture with the demo form, per se, is intent, which is more closer to bottom of funnel, so who are probably sales ready, or at least in the kind of discovery phase of maybe comparing solution which is similar to yours, and probably figuring out if it’s a good kind of product fit. And the reason why demo landing pages are important for organizations is primarily because it allows the prospect to be more confident about giving that information and being kind of ready for that sales call. And also, like knowing about the fact that okay, this is what I will end up probably getting on the call. So and the other landing pages that we can talk about is basically your content, download landing pages, or it could be a contact information landing page, or it could be a pricing page. So quite a few landing pages out there to discuss but yeah, today, our focus topic is demo.

Spyros Tsoukalas: So since you are active in the relevant market, what problems or difficulties did you observe when startups get to deal with this kind of landing page like them once? Like what goes wrong?

Sidharth: Yeah, um, honestly, I think it’s more to do with like losing little focus in terms of when they are building out the landing page. So they kind of treat it as just another kind of what do you say content asset on the website, where you have the ability of capturing lead data, and then kind of working them either through nurture or through a sales outreach. But what I say is an opportunity missed is sometimes when you leave a lot of options for the user to leave the landing page as well. So you will see that most companies might make the mistake of probably adding a lot of internal links towards the product pages thinking that, okay, it’s going to add value, they might be like out links towards the customer stories of case studies. And this is not a great practice, primarily, because what you want is when a user comes to your demo landing page, the end result should be that they are leaving their contact information so that they are kind of being reached out by sales. And of course, if they are not ready, then they will any which was not convert. But by giving them avenues to leave the demo landing page, you are actually like leaving money on the table in a way. And that’s where I see a lot of kind of, what do you say, a little mistakes that organizations make the secondly, what they also miss out is the opportunity to actually show the value of the product. So what I would say the best way to approach it is actually just have your value props, very clearly outlined there. What is the user going to be getting, and also adding like, third party validation. So it could be in the form of testimonials, it could be in the form of your ratings across like platforms, like G to software advise quite a few other kind of listing platforms out there. And then also having like a video explainer about the platform itself, and what is it that the user gets? And ideally, the other thing that you should also focus on is what sort of information are you collecting in your form fields, because you don’t want to make it too complex? And probably it’s better to kind of enrich the data through like, Data Intelligence tools, like ZoomInfo, or Sixth Sense or Bambora. Stuff like this. So yeah, I mean, those those are some of the best practices that you can follow in terms of creating the perfect demo landing page.

Spyros Tsoukalas: Yes, so if you could summarize like, let’s say we have a young startup like a very early stage and if you could summarize the a few steps so that they should be taken care of what in like these demo landing pages, what would you least like if we could if we could make a list? So what would you include?

Sidharth: For sure. So, ideally start off with, of course, the big picture in terms of what is the solution statement that you’re trying to kind of get the user to understand better in terms of what they gain, it could be in terms of better efficiency, it could be cost savings, it could be in terms of getting more robust kind of data, through the platform, stuff like this. So that becomes like your main selling point on top. And then you begin with kind of addressing their specific persona. So it could be that you are selling to either the it vertical, the HR, vertical finance, vertical retail, so you kind of focus on that specific use case, in terms of how does your solution kind of help them in any which way possible, and then you go into like actually adding a video. So that that kind of and the video should not be more than 60 seconds, like it should be a quick explainer, in terms of this is how your platform kind of comes in integrates with existing systems, figures out what needs to be done, or what needs to be achieved. And then you have the end result. So that’s a sort of very quick value prop, as well as kind of showing the robustness of the platform. And then you go into like three primary value props. And I always recommend like go with checkboxes, because it kind of always gives the user the kind of positive sentiment that okay, like, this is what I’m getting. So that sort of checkbox approach always works. And finally, you kind of end off with third party validation. So it will be in the form of your big picture customer manuals, and then support that with your ratings across the platforms that we spoke about Jeetu Kaptara, all of these places. And of course, the form fill will be right next to the video on top. And then eventually you also have a call to action. But that call to action should actually take you or take the user back to the form rather than like jumping out of the page. So the that kind of create the perfect anatomy of a demo landing page, wherein you are not leaving a lot of options for the user to think about, okay, what next, it’s only the end goal is to fill out the form and get the demo. And at the same point in time, you have a much better conversion rate as well, rather than like focusing on internal links or focusing on what other places that you can try the user towards.

Spyros Tsoukalas: Thank you. That was very clear. So in our data before getting on the record, like we were discussing about how you can optimize per industry or per job function, would you share your thoughts around this topic?

Sidharth: Yeah, so I mean, honestly, it’s leveraging some bit of the intelligence tools that we spoke about. So if you are doing like a very targeted campaign approach, with like leveraging ABM, so ABM being Account Based Marketing, wherein you are very well aware of what company you’re going after, as well. And specifically, then you are aware of what industry verticals, the plane, and also what is the job title that you’re going after. So that way you can like by using tokens, and of course, platforms, like let’s say, Demandbase, Hushly, even 6sense, Bambora, all of these kinds of tools that you can integrate within your system. You can create a very personalized user, or somebody who’s coming to the demo landing page, wherein they are seeing, like, Okay, this is a solution for this specific use case for my organization. And this is what I will be able to achieve if I integrate this into my enterprise systems.

Spyros Tsoukalas: Makes total sense. If you work with such a level of targeting the landing pages should be adapted like to the details that your campaigns include. So before we finish this episode, what tools do you use? Or do you recommend when dealing with landing pages?

Sidharth: Yeah, great question. So in terms of the tools, so of course, the basic tool being WordPress, so most of the landing pages are built on WordPress, but then there’s also the option of using Unbounce. So I love to use Unbounce when I need to kind of get quick landing pages built out. And apart from just building out landing pages. There’s also the kind of integrations with all the other tools that I mentioned which is Demandbase, 6sense, Hushly, any of these which can be used for Account Based Marketing. And apart from that, also like your forms will probably be coming from, or kind of marketing automation tools like HubSpot, or Peridot or probably even Marketo. So, those sorts of integrations and kind of play that happens between the platforms is, of course, essential because that’s how you can create a lot more better experiences for the users. And eventually also using some sort of understanding of also how the user interacts with the landing pages. So I love to use Hotjar. What’s the scroll depth? What’s the click through and where are bouncing off of and stuff like this. So it’s great to kind of have these tools at your disposal so that you are able to get as much user intent and user Intel as possible to better kind of optimize your campaigns.

Spyros Tsoukalas: Thanks for taking the time to sell and share all your insights with us today, and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.