Brand Personality - Voice and Tone

Brand Personality -  Voice & Tone

A brand's voice and tone are integral components of the brand personality. When applied consistently well, the brand voice is highy recognizable like a friend whose voice you recognize, even before you can see him or her. In other words, if your content appeared alone, ie without a logo or other cues, and if among that of competitors, your customers should be able to recognize your brand (ie strong brand awareness). As with any other aspect of brand strategy, brand voice design starts with considering the type of communication with which the target customer will  resonate. From that basis, the brand creates its voice accordingly. To be clear, voice includes any type of content; from social media content management, webpages to video, email autosignatures, product pages, the responses that your sales representative gives, the images in an advertisement and so on.

Brand style guidelines include communication instructions for your brand's content creators. Since the brand's voice must be consistent, instructions commonly have precise specifications with 1) goal regarding the desired emotional customer reaction 2) brand voice keywords, 3) tone instructions, 4) style tips and 5) any other noteworthy points.

1) Goals may be written as mini mission statements for the voice. Here are some examples. 

Mailchimp talks of "writing empowering content" which in short is essentially a mission 'to write empowering content'. 

Atlassian (that provides networking software to virtual team members) gives software creators 5 mission statements to "inform to build trust", "empower to inspire action", "encourage people along the path", "motivate by showing possibilities", "satisfy by meeting expectations" and "delight with unexpectedly pleasing experiences".

Extended goal / mission statements also sound much like a movie director's instructions to an actor on how to play a specific role. For instance, brands specify whether creators' content should sound like a trustworthy friend that makes customers feel secure (the 'innocent'), a wise teacher (the 'sage'), pampered (the 'lover') and so on. 

Mailchimp goes on to explain this mission in greater detail. Notice how they even name the role content players must act with the words "like experienced and compassionate business partner". I am unsure whether they provide content creators with details on how, to use their words, Mailchimp walked in their customers' shoes and know marketing technology is a minefield of confusing terminology. However by having shown their ability to relate, they provide a backstory to help creators to essentially pretend in their minds to be Mailchimp insiders who had those experiences and developed empathetic feelings for newcomers and, in turn, to recognize the need to "educate without patronizing or confusing" customers on behalf of Mailchimp.

we’ve walked in our customers' shoes, and we know marketing technology is a minefield of confusing terminology. That’s why we speak like the experienced and compassionate business partner we wish we’d had way back when.

We treat every hopeful brand seriously. We want to educate people without patronizing or confusing them.

Using offbeat humor and a conversational voice, we play with language to bring joy to their work. We prefer the subtle over the noisy, the wry over the farcical. We don't take ourselves too seriously.

Whether people know what they need from us or don’t know the first thing about marketing, every word we say informs and encourages. We impart our expertise with clarity, empathy, and wit.

Atlassian tells their creators to "write as if you are a wizened member of the team." Then they go on to explain that looks like. "Show up at the right time and be open, humble, and warm - offer direction for the most appropriate next steps and get out of the way." 

2) Brand voice keywords are adjectives like 'plainspoken', 'bold', 'optimistic' and so on (as pictured in bold print immediately below). Even though these keywords are usually commonly known vocabulary, brands define each word further to avoid variant interpretations. Notice how this often involves lots of other adjectives. They take no chances of ambiguity. For instance, like keyword #1 below, brands also establish boundaries that are 'do nots'. They often do this by highlighting how different their voice should be to a potential misinterpretation. For instance, after they describe how "the world' often speaks with "hypobolic language, upsells and over-promises", Mailchimp then stresses that "we strip all that away and value clarity above all".

Atlassian has 3 voice keywords 'bold', 'optimistic' and 'practical with a wink' (which they discussed in the 'personality' section of the introductory part of the document but go into even further detail in the 'Voice' section). They explain that creators should "inform by being open and clear on what people are experiencing in our products. It's about telling them what they need to know at that moment and nothing more." 

Designing a brand voice: voice keywords

A common practice is to establish roughly 3 voice keywords for content creators to apply to their brand voice. Consequently, these 3 words are pivotal elements of brand style guidelines.

Brand managers along with key content creators and communicators create and periodically finetune these keywords with a brand voice chart like the one immediately below (with examples that may correspond with the 'innocent' personality trait).

 

Voice characteristic	Description	Do	Don't
Authentic	We provide you with everything you will possibly need to do task X; tools and information.	-communicate directly and honestly (ie to be plain-spoken). - own up up to and address mistakes.	- overpromise - use jargon - push inappropriate products - distract with entertainment and hype
Emotionally intelligent	We want to understand and meet your needs directly.	- listen closely - observe - adapt to your needs	- make hasty assumptions - keep talking without checking on your emotional state.
Passionate (Brand evangelical)	We incorporate the brand's core values in our personal lives.	- use power words in describing the benefits of [the X cause re core values] - share our personal stories and those of others like you.	- do not use the passive tense. - use clichés or lukewarm language.

 

A brand voice chart is a live document that should be created and updated with input from others that include content creators and sales staff. Most importantly, check that content creators understand the raison d'etre and how to apply the keywords. This involves integrating the voice keywords into all aspects of human resources; from as early as: listing the (soft) skills you must look for during the recruitment and selection process; including this information in the onboarding process of new employees and content creators; or  testing and retesting their value and currency with internal and external persons related with the brand. 

Testing and retesting usually involves convening at intervals with key content creators and communicators for their feedback on what worked, what did not and ideal content.

These voice keywords are usually found and discussed in the brand personality part (of the 'Introductory') and or brand voice part (of the 'Contents' section) within the 'Brand style guidelines' document. 

3) Tone. If the brand voice is the spoken manifestation of the fixed brand personality, then tone is transient, like a mood! 

Difference between the brand voice and tone. 

As suggested above, the brand voice focuses on maintaining the emotional relationship with customers. All brands share the challenge of encouraging customers to trust the brand. However, some industries lend to certain emotional connections more than others. For instance, health care aims to encourage customers to feel cared for, financial services encourage customers to feel they can trust a brand, snacks encourage customers to feel that the latter can have fun with the brand. Brand style guidelines therefore respond directly to triggering these emotional states. The brand voice is fixed. Its goal is always to achieve a predetermined emotional state in the target customer.

While related, the tone of voice is adaptable. It is like the emotionally intelligent aspect of the voice that recognizes subtle differences among target customers and then adjusts how to still achieve the fixed goal of the voice.

For instance, if your brand sells financial investment services and aims to engender trust. While the voice will involve sharing basic product information, the tone recognizes that the nervous old lady who has no knowledge of financial risk management fits the 'amiable' buyer personality type and must be coddled. She is never going to catch on to hefty finance concepts and your fancy graphs. Focusing on those things will quickly lose any potential for gaining her trust. However, she wants to know that the client representative is someone with whom she has rapport, someone who understands her financial circumstances and take care of her. Conversely, a client who is a trader with an advanced degree in Finance fits the  'assertive' buyer personality type needs you to TONE DOWN your coddling but TONE UP your show of expertise in order to win over his trust. He would question your smarts if you tried to coddle him. However, you will win him over with demonstrably deep knowledge in Finance and can talk with him on his level, with the hard facts and figures to support everything you say.

The key however, is that, at the end of the day, both types of customer reach a high level of trust in your brand. All brands discuss emotional intelligence with creators.

In their 'Tone' section, Mailchimp tells creators to "consider the reader's state of mind [...] Once you have an idea of their emotional state, you can adjust your tone accodingly."

As pictured immediately below, when discussing tone, Atlassian diagramatically explains when creators should tone up or down some aspect of the voice. Here they expressly say to tone down 'boldness' when the person is apprehensive, confused, etc and give specific scenarios when this is likely to happen like when the person is new. They also specify places where this can happen like "error messages". Having clearly already done requisite data mining, they have prepared all of these instructions regarding toning up and or down voice elements within the context of each of the 5 goals in turn.

Here is another example.

4) Style tips 

Style tips covers many areas that might also appear in other sections of a brand's content style guidelines. They always discuss level of formality. Other very common points relate to level of humor. See examples below for other types of tips.  

Mailchimp content style guidelines provide style tips in the following way.

Style tips

Here are a few key elements of writing Mailchimp’s voice. For more, see the Grammar and mechanics section.

• Active voice Use active voice. Avoid passive voice.
• Avoid slang and jargon Write in plain English.
• Write positively Use positive language rather than negative language.

5) Other noteworthy points. 

Brand voice, tone & style in action

When discussing brand mascots (another powerful manifestation of the personality), I mentioned the snack brand Cheetos' Chester Cheetah's Twitter account. (The brand has since changed their brand voice. However, their old brand voice is a noteworthy case study). Pay special attention to that earlier content, language and even punctuation. The language was very informal. Consistent with his character and tagline 'dangerously cheesey', Chester sounded like a teenager. He broke punctuation rules, used slang, emoticons and spoke of misadventure while attempting to get the snack. 

 

Clearly, brand style guidelines were created because the brand's voice, tone and style were consistent across media. See video compilation of Chester Cheetah commercials.

Based only on the video and social media posts, I gather that this brand's guidelines likely suggest the following.

Goal(s) & role:

• Goal: 
• To make adolescent peers to think the brand (and their mascot Chester) are 'cool' and funny. (video content)
• To encourage adolescents to obey the call to action "get your own!" (written content)
• Role: to speak as if he is an American adolescent who conspires with peers in mischief.

Voice keyword(s):

• cheesy (obviously joking, slapstick and over the top, a pun for the cheese flavor of the snack)

Tone:

Style(s):

• Extremely casual speech. Regarding written social media content; anything goes! Rules regarding punctuation and spelling should be broken. Use many icons and emoticons that are over the top in nature (like bang and stars around the head). However, content should remain child-safe. For instance, it should exclude malicious forms of violence, aggressiveness and indecent language.
• Smooth and sly acting.

Cultural sensitivity

Brands sometimes attempt to capitalize on popular catch phrases that originate as part of the signature voice of minority groups. The sting that such groups feel is intensified when this cultural exploitation occurs amidst ongoing discrimination against such groups, especially by the cultural appropriating brand. For instance, after a black rapper called Meghan the Stallion coined the term 'hot girl Summer' in 2019, it became popular, motivating millions of social media users to join her 'hot girl Summer movement'. in July of that same year when a customer of the fast food chain, Wendy's commented on liking one of their drinks, Wendy's tweeted that that drink was the 'official drink of hot girl Summer'. However, the black community had experienced incidents of racial intimidation by that brand's representatives within recent history. One such incident includes when some Wendy's employees slipped a racist note (with the word 'niggar') into a black 7-year old's kid's meal package and then initially put the mother out of the restaurant when she complained to management.

Brands should encourage creators to research words, sayings, movements and concepts thoroughly before applying them to branding material. 

CONTENT RELATED TO BRAND PERSONALITY - VOICE & TONE

Branding

Brand style guidelines 101

Communication style guidelines - Mailchimp

Communication style analysis - Coca Cola

Social media 101

Brand voice - taglines

Brand personality

Brand positioning, strategy

Brand awareness strategy

Social media content management: Content planning involves first understanding your target customer. This includes preferences regarding how you sell to him or her (aka the 'buying personality' type). In turn, this should inform your brand and tone.

Automated MailChimp Email Campaigns aka Workflows

An automated MailChimp email campaign delivers emails to 'audience' lists or a part of a list based on triggers and timelines. It is different to a 'regular campaign' because an automated campaign is triggered by a qualification event and can be sent out repeatedly once members of the audience list qualifies (ie versus a one-off message that 'Mary gave birth to a baby boy this morning' which is spent and can not be triggered after being sent the first time). This post illustrates how to create an automated MailChimp email campaign that involves a trigger. 

Scenario for onboarding new customers or onboarding new employees 
This example will be for the latter (ie onboarding new employees). After reviewing the 'Data' department qualification job interview (via live chat such as Tawk.to), you wish to begin onboarding the candidate. Before running the campaign, you have already collected her email address (in the pre-chat form). You use this email address to create her MailChimp account. Additionally, to trigger the auto response email campaign aka 'workflow' in MailChimp, within her account, you will append a tag '2a data - pending' (an internally designed code to tell you that this person will go into the Data department and must be served the campaign that aligns with the talent pipeline stage numbered 2a). In the 1st email, you congratulate the qualified candidate for being selected and invite her to update her profile by clicking the link to the update profile webpage. If she clicks on the link, she will set off another trigger, specifically a post-email action that removes the 'pending' tag from her account. Additionally, by clicking the link to complete her profile, her account will automatically receive the 'Data' department tag (to show that she is now a member of that segment). Her having clicked the link to complete the profile also triggers an email that will be sent within an hour to inform her of the next step (orientation), reminding her that it is contingent upon her completing the profile.

Step 0 - Preparatory Steps (Create a list)

• See steps to create a MailChimp list. NB once you have attached a list to the workflow, you can not change it.
• Create a signup form
• Get the link to the signup form

Step 1 - Create the campaign tag(s) and attach them to relevant contacts

Let's say you will attach a tag with the suffix 'PENDING' for a campaign example 'Talent pipeline Stage 2 for DATA' for onboarding personnel. When the want that tag to be automatically removed when the campaign has been sent, do the following.

a - Create the tag

• Lists
• Select the list (example athletes)
• Manage contacts. A dropdown menu should appear
• Tags
• Create tag. I like descriptive names like 'X Pipeline Stage 2a - DATA - PENDING' 
  
• Create
• Repeat the steps above for the tag which will be automatically appended to contacts after the campaign. Example 'DATA'.

b - Attach the tag to relevant contacts

• Lists
• Select the list (example 'athletes')
• Check the box in the left column next to the relevant contact(s). The heading should change to reveal new options, among which include 'add or remove tags'
• Select 'add or remove tags'
• click once on the tag(s) to be added and twice on any to be removed. 
  
• Verify that the tag(s) have been attached successfully. Do this by looking at the 'tags' column for the contact(s). If the tag(s) were attached, they will appear in this 'tags' column.

Step 2. Create the campaign

• Campaigns
• Email
• Automated
• Subscriber Activity
• Welcome new subscribers
• Onboarding series (as pictured immediately below)

• Name the campaign, preferably something descriptive, like 'Workflow trigger: 2a Data segment pending tag - Profile request'
• Select a list, etc
• Click 'Begin'
• From this point forward, it will be a matter of completing a checklist that appears within the Campaign creation interface. Each email is preceded by a trigger. You have the option to add another email, which will automatically add a new preceding trigger field. 
• Select the trigger
• Click 'Edit' next to the default 'Trigger' setting. 
  
• Change trigger (in the Edit trigger' section)
• Select 'List Manager'
• Select 'Added Trigger'
• Select the time frame, whether immediate or delayed and, in the 'settings' field, the tag that will be the trigger, in this example the tag with the 'Pending' suffix.
  
• Edit the email details. Consider descriptive names like 'Email 1 of 2 in Pipeline Stage 2 workflow - Profile request - trig: DATA pending tag'
• NB. Since your recipient already has a MailChimp account, do NOT send her a link to the new profile setup form. Rather, send the update profile form with the use of the *|UPDATE_PROFILE|* merge tag. You can add this merge tag as you would any other hyperlink. 
• In the Content section of the Campaign Builder, click Edit Design. 
• On the Design step, click the text content block you want to edit. 
• Type the text you want to link, like 'Update Profile', into the editing pane.
• Highlight the text, and click the Link icon in the toolbar. 
• Type or paste *|UPDATE_PROFILE|* into the Web Address (URL) field, and click Insert. 
• Click Save & Close.

Step 3. Test the Campaign

Even if you send tests to list members, the experience is slightly different in some ways. For instance, test subjects will not be allowed to update profile preferences and their names will not appear where the merge tags exist for inserting names. 

• Campaigns
• Click 'Design Email' to see the email content. Either read your email(s) aloud or listen to it while an audio reader reads the content aloud. If necessary, make changes.  
• To send the test, click the arrow for the dropdown menu in the top level campaign. Then select 'send a test email'
  
• Open and review test emails not only on your desktop but also on a mobile device. This is extremely important given the fact that people open emails on their mobile devices at an ever growing rate. Ensure the experience is good. For instance, recipients should not need to scroll from left to right to read the content of the email. 

Step 4. Run the Campaign
If you already have details regarding your market's login times, schedule your campaign accordingly to enhance the open and response rates.

CONTENT RELATED TO AUTOMATED MAILCHIMP EMAIL CAMPAIGNS / WORKFLOWS

• MailChimp Lists
• Introduction to Drip Email Marketing Campaigns
• Plan content for a drip email marketing campaign / an autoresponder email campaign

MailChimp VS GetResponse: Your Business Type

MailChimp and GetResponse are both email marketing and automation platforms with attractive offers for many businesses. This post is a quick glance at which may be best for your business based only on your size, rate of growth in number of subscribers and even financial performance.

• GetResponse is likely to be a better choice for businesses that are larger, has a faster growth in the number of email subscribers and already generates a profit to pay when your business exceeds the limits of the free version.
• MailChimp is likely to be better for your business if it is smaller, has a slower rate of growth in the number of email subscribers and may be unable to justify the cost if your business exceeds the limits of the free version.

The two reasons for this choice are as follows.

1. The service is free until

• GetResponse: 1,000 subscribers
• MailChimp: 2,000 subscribers 

2. Lowest available monthly paid plan after the free version

• GetResponse: USD 15 monthly, ie after a limited trial period of 30 days
• MailChimp: USD 10 monthly, ie after exceeding the 500-subscriber limit within the free-forever free version below

CONTENT RELATED TO CHOOSING BETWEEN MAILCHIMP AND GETRESPONSE EMAIL MARKETING PLATFORMS

• MailChimp Basics - An Introduction

MailChimp Basics: Email Marketing Tool

MailChimp is an email service provider  ESP. It is a very useful marketing tool in light of the continued strategic value of email marketing. Since MailChimp offers many packages, including a free one, it is attractive to a wide range of businesses. This post serves as a quick overview of MailChimp for the complete beginner. 

Immediately below is an image of the MailChimp top menu functions. It is always best to start with 'lists'. However, below is a quick rundown of some MailChimp functions.

• Lists (ie mailing lists). Start by creating a list. A list is simply a collection of recipients to whom you may broadcast correspondence. Members of a list have the same data fields. For instance, a school may place teachers and students into 2 separate lists. After all, the 2 groups are likely to have different data fields. Students may have fields for student grades, form teacher and so on which are unsuitable for teachers. In this example, it would therefore be best to have 2 separate lists for each group. However, you may create a segment within a list like 'final year students', 'junior year students' and so on. 
• Create lists. In addition to the segments options (mentioned below), you may also create segments within lists by creating and adding 'tags' to the relevant contact. Another alternative involves creating filters based on field values. 
• Add subscribers through manual entry or automatic entry (from other email collection apps)
• Integration with email collection apps (like Welcome Screen)
• Create segments. 
• Create signup forms (embedded, pop-ups and so on). You can create multiple types of form for a single mailing list. 

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• Email campaigns. This involves one-off emails with content related to anything like a newsletter (to announce one-off tentpole promotions, DIY instructions for a product, case studies related to a particular product or segment, contest results announcement, early-bird coupon for an upcoming sale and so on). See more newsletter content ideas. Also see how using Twitter hashtags (#) can extend your reach beyond only those people whose email addresses you have.
  

  

  Basic MailChimp Email Campaign. In addition to sending the campaign right away, you may schedule the campaign, a feature that is great for tentpoling and other time-sensitive events.
• Automation email marketing. This is a more complex type of campaign. It involves a timed sequence of emails that may be triggered when the lead completes an action like submitting a form, abandoning a shopping cart and so on. 

Your ideal starting point is to create a mailing list. Let's say that you have created and entered into a list (named 'Veg Gardening List'), the image below displays the dashboard for that list.

Once you have a list, start with 'General forms' to create a new subscription signup form for the 'Veg Gardening List'. This option allows you to enter all of the possible fields for which you wish to collect information, even if some fields are initially hidden during the initial signup. NB Most lists ask for nothing more than the email address and, in some cases, the first name. Subscribers will be automatically prompted to complete the other fields. If you subsequently choose other options like 'embedded', 'popup', etc, they will still relate to the same 'veg gardening list' with the full list of fields that relate to the list with the default setting the same regarding which fields will appear and which hidden.  

When you click on 'General forms', the following 'create forms' will appear. Start with just the basic 'subscribe' form pictured below in the drop down menu  of what may seem an intimidating set of list options. However, in reality, all those many options appearing below 'subscribe' are actually part of an automatically generated sequence of emails. They enable the subscription process. You can actually ignore them since the default templates are acceptable in most cases. However, when you have extra time, click on each to customize the wording of each email and element of the sequence.
  

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RELATED CONTENT TO USING MAILCHIMP FOR EMAIL MARKETING

• How to Create a MailChimp Mailing List
• Before creating a MailChimp campaign, use this Autoresponder Email Sequence template to create a campaign plan
• See how to use Twitter hashtags to extend market reach beyond those interested people whose email addresses you have.
• MailChimp VS GetResponse. Which should you choose? Your business type may determine the answer.

Landing Page 101

A landing page is the first page that a lead sees after clicking through an off-site advertisement (like Instagram story, email campaign, free or paid Youtube video, Facebook, Google, search engine results page / SERP and so on. This post will guide you through the steps of planning an effective landing page.

This great landing page not only looks attractive but also has many key elements that include a list of product benefits (top left); a key benefit or unique value proposition next to the price, 'lifetime access', as if justifying it; urgency; high contrast in the urgency element as black on yellow stands out; contact form with clear call to action / CTA 'Go to Step 2' button; security badges; payment methods and live chat window (bottom right)

USES

Its goal is to focus the lead's attention on only one thing; a single call to action (CTA) as follows.

• CTA 1: 'lead generation' form, aka 'opt-in', 'squeeze page', 'splash page' or 'lead capture page' form, ie a contact form that converts visitors into leads by collecting contact information. This is best done when coupled with the promise of 'lead magnet', aka a 'bribe', ie a non-cash payment using something of perceived value like 
• a gift card
• a discount coupon
• a chance to win something of perceived value
• free consultation 

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• CTA 2: 'click throughs', ie a sequence of pages (and or emails) through which visitors move according to their individual stage in the sales funnel. The sequence often occurs through email autoresponders. Either way, each page or email in the sequence sells the idea of a value proposition and product. Each page's CTA is to either go to the next content page or more directly to a product page or shopping cart.

DOs

• Prepare to get visitors to understand your message fully within 5 seconds or less
• Place the CTA above the fold (ie high on the page before visitors must scroll down)
• Use color contrasts. The CTA button should contrast with the background and other page elements. Colors on opposite sides of a color wheel stand out the most. See an effective example below with a yellow button and blue background. (The white text does not take away from those more prominent elements)
• Have only highly targeted content. Every element of content should be congruent with the message that motivated visitors to click through to the landing page. This is particularly true for click through pages. Use videos and images that reinforce the message, especially because they also speak to non-readers
• Deliver value. Your target market should perceive your offer as having value
• Clearly show visitors the value proposition.
• For lead generation, offers should be directly related to your main product to raise the chance that your leads can be converted
• Limit distractions from the CTA and offer. 
• Limit navigation away from the CTA

This is a lead generation landing page by the 'Welcome Screen' app. This kind of landing page is ideal from Youtube videos or other external links that provided some value on weight loss and restoring health. If value (perhaps in the form of a very informative how-to video) has already delivered some value, it is a 'reverse squeeze' / landing page because some part of the value has already been delivered. It covers an entire webpage. It therefore hides all of the website's usual navigation elements. However, it is interesting that it does not hide the Privy app (in the top right corner) or the Zopim Chat app (in the bottom right corner) that are also used on this Shopify store. This type of landing page is ideal for special promotions. It works in conjunction with otherwise competing apps that may be used for general newsletter signups.

• Limit exit points. This includes limiting the amount of navigation away from the page.
• Keep lead generation forms as short as possible
• The fewer fields you request, the better. Most marketers collect only the email address at first and then get remaining fields later. However, a second exception to this is the lead's 'first name'
• Avoid asking for address, telephone number (as these generally turn people off)
• Keep content short
• use bullet points to highlight each benefit
• material should be quick and easy to scan. For instance, short headings can have bold print with bullet point information
• Test different pages and elements
• Research suggests that basic 'Submit' or 'Contact Us' buttons are relatively ineffective options, especially as they attract spammers. Buttons that speak specifically about the offer are better like 'Sign up', 'download now', 'I want x now' and so on.
• Prepare an effective 'Thank you' page for after visitors complete the CTA
• Include social media icons
• Give leads something to do that moves them down the sales funnel
• Assure leads of their privacy. 
• Provide a link to your privacy policy. However, remember to keep visitors on the landing page. So set the link to open in a new window or better yet, to open as a popup window. To hopefully satisfy their concerns to the extent they will not engage the link at all, I set a tiny text window to appear when the mouse hovers close to or over the text of the link. The text says, 'We will not share your contact details without your consent.'
• Your details will not be shared with third parties
• Prompt leads to enter their MAIN email address to avoid missing time-sensitive information.

Whenever possible and without cluttering the page, remind potential leads to give you an email address that they use regularly. MailChimp allows you to have fewer content on the page. The help text appears only when the potential lead places the cursor inside the Email field. 

• Whenever suitable, include images of smiling people as they increase conversion significantly
• Prepare a confirmation page
• to instruct the lead to the next steps like 

• white listing your email address

• checking email for instructions on how to get the lead magnet 

• to create expectations like the frequency of promised content
• to invite friends, possibly for something in return

Landing Page Example: direct from Youtube video on Youtube. This is a classic landing page.

DON'Ts

• Avoid using the 'Home Page' as a landing page. Unless its message responds specifically to the goal of your marketing campaign (which is generally not the case), create a highly targeted landing page.

APPS TO CREATE A LANDING PAGE

• Apps that allow you to create landing pages. These include  

• MailChimp's 'general' signup form opens on a dedicated webpage, without navigation or other distractions. MailChimp has a free version for accounts with up to a certain number of mailing list subscribers (I believe 2,000). This option is quite attractive because adding new subscribers is full automated (unlike with some other options). Paste the automatically generated URL (as pictured immediately below) into HTML code. The resulting page will have a URL that incorporates your domain name in the earlier portion.

• Privvy 
• 'Welcome Screen'. It also has a free package

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RELATED CONTENT

• Finished the landing page? Engage your leads.
• Set up Instagram stories
• Set Up Email Marketing Autoresponses
• Motivate visitors to go to your landing page with a promotional video
• When you have completed your landing page, consider planning your sales pipelines.