Email marketing landing page tips: what to fix

The inbox sets the subscriber's expectations. They read the subject line, take in the offer in the first lines, and tap while the email is still in mind. If the link opens a general brand page, a different price or a slider of older products, they have to rebuild the offer from memory, and most will not bother. On a phone the problem doubles. Some mail apps open links in their own built-in browser, and a tall header pushes the offer below the first screen. The owner who wrote the email already knows the offer, so the mismatch never shows up in their own test.

• Offer name: does the first screen use the email's exact offer words?
• Price and terms: can a phone reader see the discount and any deadline without scrolling?
• Menu and footer: does the page offer exits the email never mentioned?
• Form fields: does the page ask for details before it shows the offer?
• Button label: does it name the next step, rather than only saying submit?

The most common mistake is one link to the homepage in every email. A subscriber who tapped the spring discount lands on a hero about the company's history, then a row of categories, and has to search for the offer. The right version is a link to a page whose headline uses the email's own words, with the discount visible before the first scroll. Give each distinct offer its own address, even a plain one, and keep the same words in the subject line, the button and the headline. Check the link after it passes through the email tool's click tracking, since the address the browser finally shows should still read as the same offer.

Wrong: the first screen asks for name, company, phone and email before it shows what the offer is. Right: the offer and one button come first, and the form asks only for what that button needs. A subscriber who has just read about free delivery should not meet a seven field form before the word delivery appears on the page. Each field that comes before the offer is a reason to close the page and go back to the email, which is still open in another tab.

Test the path the way a subscriber takes it. Open the campaign email on a phone, tap the button and count what appears before the offer's name. If an image, a cookie banner or a pop-up takes the first screen, the fault is in the page, not in the email. Repeat the test from a fresh session as well, since your own browser holds a cookie from your last visit and skips the step a new subscriber meets. A simulated visitor can start on the link you give it, and the report shows the step where it stopped, with a screenshot.

Campaigns change every week: a new discount, a new product, a deadline that moves. Each change can leave an old page online, or a button in the next email that points back at the homepage. Run the subscriber path after every send, not only the first, and compare where the visitors stopped against the last run.