February 2024

If you’re currently in a romantic relationship, Valentine’s Day is hopelessly devoted to you! 

 

For those of you who aren’t, fear not, Valentine’s Day is your holiday too! 

 

We all know this holiday is heavily commercialized, marketed as the designated time to profess your love for that special someone. Hell, no sooner are the Christmas decorations down at the mall then up come the hearts and flowers. And yes, if you’re in a romantic relationship, it’s practically expected that you indulge in Valentine celebrations. Whether through handwritten notes, flowers, chocolates or a quiet dinner at a swanky restaurant, professing your love monetarily on this day is something you ignore at your own peril. 

 

However, it can also be done simply, a day devoted to love, but we think your brand can and should take a deeper look at how you can bring Valentine’s Day to all people. 

 

Something else we, as a strategic branding and marketing company, dare not ignore is the ability to get in on the Valentine’s Day festivities and step up our love celebration game. 

 

Now, if you’re a candy or flower shop, promoting Valentine’s Day is as easy as unlocking your doors in the morning. Those of us not in romance-adjacent industries will have a slightly trickier road ahead. So how do we profess our love of love through marketing and branding? Let’s explore how you can present this holiday of love to all people….

 

It’s important to note that not every generation feels the same love for Valentine’s Day that others do. Let’s first note the fact that the holiday can be varied and inclusive, and not limited to couples in the throes of the honeymoon phase. Don’t forget about Galentine’s Day and the platonic affection it elicits. It can be a day for people who love their pets like family. School age children exchange gifts with friends and classmates. Celebrating self love helps single people through what can be a trying time for them as well. What we’re saying is that expanding your radius will capture the hearts of those who weren’t planning on celebrating the holiday traditionally. 

 

Opening up this inclusive celebration is also good for business!

 

Here are some fun ways to promote Valentine’s Day (and yourself) to your clients (attached and otherwise)…

• Create a social media contest.

Ask your customers to share their love stories, and offer incentives to the best (or funniest) ones. Make sure to emphasize your affection for the varieties of love that exist in the world. Keep it light and fun!

• Create some Valentine-themed content

There’s no better way to embrace the day than by, well, embracing it! Write a Valentine’s Day-themed blog, create social media posts, or send out love themed emails. Get yourself involved with love, is what we’re saying! People enjoy seeing a brand engaged in relatable, human emotions, and this sort of action can inspire affection from your customers. 

• Host a virtual Valentine mixer

It’s 2024! Get virtual! Host an event (maybe with wine and cheese) that encourages employees and/or customers to drop by and take part. Valentine’s Day can and should be for everyone. The more the merrier! 

• Sweet deals for sweethearts

Offer deals and gifts catered to the holiday, but don’t necessarily feel compelled to take yourself, or it, too seriously. Expressing love for someone doesn’t have to feel forced or walled-in by romance. Put a new spin on an old tradition with promotions that emphasize positivity above all else. 

• Valentine redesign

As always, adding a little holiday-themed love to your logo, splash page, or Facebook page will let people know you’re getting in on the festivities. A brief logo dress-up makes your brand stand out and enhances the human element of your organization.

 

Finally, why not use this time, in your own way, to remind people that we’re all pretty much the same. We, by and large, desire the same security, comfort and love. While we’re not all on the same path, our goals don’t really differ all that much. So, why not give Valentine’s Day the positive energy it deserves and remind people of the power they possess for change and unity under the banner of humanity as a whole? 

 

Cynics will say, “Oh, it’s just a holiday created by Hallmark”, and they’re not totally wrong. However, just like every other heavily marketed holiday, Valentine’s Day is what you make of it, and millions of people can make a whole lot of good out of it. 

 

To that we say: let’s brand the LOVE! 

 

If your website is your storefront, then the landing page is your warm greeting, cash register, and clipboard newsletter signup form. 

 

Your landing page serves one supreme purpose: turning browsers into buyers. 

 

It’s a page that’s able to stand on its own as a representation of your business. And,  above all, it should be optimized for conversions. 

 

By “conversions” we’re referring to any activity that inspires visitors to become customers. You want to instill the desire in your potential clients to perform a specific action. From making purchases to signing up for features or promotions with their personal email, your landing page is there to create action. 

 

Your landing page creates an exchange of personal information. It’s all about communicating your most basic, action-oriented information and dropping a helluva CTA. Save your description of brand identity and business proposition for your home page. 

 

To that end, actually crafting the perfect landing page requires a delicate balance of design, functionality, and user psychology. 

 

With the supreme lack of patience exhibited by people online (god help you if your website takes more than 10 seconds to load), it’s absolutely imperative that your landing page gets a person’s attention and gains their trust before you’re done counting the fingers on your right hand.

 

Here are some things to keep in mind when designing your landing page.

 

Conversion Path

Your conversion path begins with the advertisement of a specific promotion or feature – something irresistible. Usually, this begins with a form to fill out on your landing page that promises more information about the promotion or feature. Once this is filled out, an email with the information your visitor was hoping to learn about can be sent. While that happens, your visitor can be redirected to a thank you page wherein you can express your gratitude and lead to the main body of your website. This all sounds relatively simple until you remember just how cautious people are about giving out their personal information. This leads directly into our next talking point…

 

Inspiring Trust

This can be done in a myriad of ways, and here are some good ones. 

• Give a little bit

If people are going to hand over personal information, they’re gonna want to know you are who you claim to be. A great way to do that is to actually give a small portion of the materials you’re offering to customers before they hit the paywall. Customers will see its value and be inspired to go further

• Just the facts

In the new age of information, detailing verifiable facts about your business is essential. Furthermore, these cold hard facts gain trust. It’s impossible to truly debate validated data (although many have tried.)

• Testimonials

There’s nothing more encouraging to potential customers than the rave reviews of others. So, if you’ve got people telling you just how amazing they think you are, why not ask them to do a quick writeup for use on your landing page?

 

Hooky Headline

Words have great power, and your landing page headline is the first thing people see, so you’re gonna want your writing to be about as impactful as copy can get. Make sure it’s innately relevant to the power of your product so that people aren’t tempted to click away. Your headline needs to relate to the user journey and contain active words that inspire action. Additionally, your headline should be written like a value proposition, emphasizing what potential customers can get out of your product or service that they simply couldn’t get anywhere else. 

 

Scannable Text

Internet users scan more than they read and process, so your landing page absolutely needs to relay its information in a way that communicates in a blink. This means keeping your header simple and your content organized in a visual hierarchy that attracts and leads the eye. Your headings and subheadings are where your most important information should be. To more easily attain this result, consider using the F Pattern, which is a site layout that follows the natural thought processes and eye movement of the reader. Your users naturally begin reading your heading, proceed down to the next row, and so forth.

What You Offer

Certainly your features are great and worth talking about but, more often than not, the benefits you offer are a much higher selling point. And, because the sole purpose of your landing page is conversions, it should prominently feature the benefits your brand offers. Focus on how customers benefit from your features and save the actual features copywriting for the interior of your site. 

 

A Killer CTA

Great Calls To Action should inspire people to dig deeper. Many businesses choose to offer something for free in exchange for personal information, such as samples or a trial. However you do it, your CTA needs to grab attention and inspire movement. Therefore it’s a good idea to have your CTA stress this with phrases like “try it for free” or “sign up” or “get started.”

 

Trial and Error

Continuous improvement is key. Implement A/B testing to experiment with different elements, from colors to layout, and analyze user behavior. This iterative process helps fine-tune your landing page for optimal performance.

 

Creating the perfect landing page is an ongoing journey that involves a deep understanding of your audience and a commitment to refining your approach. By focusing on these key factors you can elevate your landing page from a mere entry point to a conversion powerhouse. Keep experimenting, stay attuned to user feedback, and let your landing page evolve with the dynamic digital landscape.