Building a MailChimp Landing Page

This tutorial is on building a landing page in MailChimp.

The first landing page you build will take more time, but it is well spent. Your second and third landing pages will go much faster, and as you build up a series of these, you will be building landing pages from your own saved templates. Travmarket will be building your first template for you, but remember you must change up all of the Template’s language, text, and graphics to fit with your agency’s approach to marketing.

It is a very good idea to have everything you will use in the construction of your landing page in a folder where you can easily access the material as you build it. This will prevent you from having to work simultaneously on design work and copywriting. You will still make adjustments, but much of the work will be completed before you begin in MailChimp.

Have a good idea of what you want your end product to look like. Use our templates, but develop your own style with your own branding, colors, and language. Many of the recommendations we provide are stylistic, and some are best practices, and we will try to convey which is which as we go along.

Notice our landing page is very simple and to the point. That is the purpose of a landing page. No distractions and no additional menu. 

Begin by going to Create from your MailChimp Dashboard and choose Landing Pages.  Name your Landing Page in a manner that clearly designates its purpose, and select an audience. 

Next, you choose a Template to work with. In this example I am going to choose a very simple design and build the Landing Page. You can also work from this example that is in your account under the title “MultiGenerational Family Travel” by selecting Campaigns and choosing “Replicate” and then editing it to fit the landing page you want.

So using, in this instance, the simple MailChimp Template, let’s see how to create our masterpiece. Note that your logo appears immediately from your Content Folder. On the right are the “Blocks” which are the various elements that appear on the landing page like images and text. The “Style” section allows you to set defaults and to change the appearance of elements you place on the page.

One of the free tools I suggest you install is the Eye Dropper Color Picker for Chrome. It allows you to easily choose a color from any source, like your logo. You can find and install it from the Chrome Extension store. I will use it now to pick a suitable color from this logo for my headline. Now I am going to change the color of the text in the body to black instead of gray. I am also going to turn off the “Mailchimp Badge.”

I grab the Image Card element block and add it to my Landing Page under my headline. I now upload an image of my ebook which I have saved in my folder. I go to the settings menu, and place the text to the right of the image. Note that the system autosaves for you, but I still recommend saving frequently.

Next, I make the background of the Image Card white, but that means I will also have to make the text darker. I then past into the image card the text I want to use and properly align it.

I move the form further up on the Landing Page and adjust the element settings. I want to make the form simple and easy to fill out with no information I do not need to request. I want to change the call to action from “Subscribe” to “Receive Your Free Guide.” This is in keeping with good Persuasion Architecture. My call to action tells the reader what they are going to receive. Then I change the confirmation message and the button color. I make the button round for aesthetic effect, and add a drop shadow.

Next, I paste in my bottom block of text, size, and align it. I have an untested theory that using the third person on the landing page and then following up in the first person in subsequent emails assists in Persuasion Architecture. I am eager to get your input on that theory.

Now, I paste in my headline. I highlight my logo by selecting it and adding a drop shadow and then add a drop shadow to the entire page. I set off the form by adding a background color. 

Next, I increase the font size in the lower Text Element. I also add a call to action in a blue box. A few more adjustments to text size and alignment.

I now add the social links at the bottom of my Landing page.

OK, this looks pretty good. Now, let’s dive a little deeper into the mystery of Persuasion Architecture, which refers to the way you use language to assist the client to continue to move through the buyer’s journey.

First, Let’s look at the headline. The family that travels together states specifically the interest of the reader, that is why they clicked on your ad to begin with. The “I have Learned” indicates maybe the reader is about to learn something from a more experienced traveler. 

The next two paragraphs states all of the benefits of family travel. Who doesn’t want great memories and bonding with the family. The call to action and the form come next. The form is simple easy to fill out. The calls to action remind the reader that the guide is free.

The last paragraph is in the 3d person. This is a technique that establishes authority and credibility.  When you edit this to fill in your own, simply put your best foot forward. Use a little bit of humor, but demonstrate your background and authority in a friendly way. Then as a favor, please provide comments. Then, I remind them what they are about to receive and that my contact information will be provided as well, encouraging future conversation.

Practice building your own landing page. Do one from scratch, and one from the template based on multi-generational travel that we just built together. Remember to make a copy of this one and experiment with the copy, not with the original.

The next tutorial establishes the “Settings” for your landing page and the one after than is the automation necessary to deliver the ebook to the client.