Internet Marketing 101: Basic Elements of Sales Pages

1. Benefits

As I explain in this post, benefits sell, not features. And since benefits are what your customer is looking for you should always start the sales pitch with them.

2. Story

This is the only item which I think is optional, and its use depend on the type of product you are selling. For instance, if you are selling an ebook about weight-loss it would be very effective to include your own weight-loss journey, as this generates empathy and credibility. If you are selling computer spare parts, on the other hand, telling stories wouldn’t necessary help you.

3. Features

Even if features don’t sell, sooner or later on your sales pitch you’ll need to mention them, after all the customer wants to know exactly what he’s getting for his money. The clearer you can make this section, the better.

4. Testimonials

People don’t believe sales pages, they believe other people, and that’s why testimonials are so powerful. Needless to say you should use real people/customers here, and the more descriptive you can be about the testimonials (e.g., who are those people, what are their names, etc) the better.

5. Money Back Guarantee

In my opinion pretty much all products that are sold online should have a money back guarantee. That’s because the customer can’t examine the product before buying it (like he would with a pair of shoes on a store, for instance), and because since most products are digital in nature returning them won’t generate any cost. Apart from giving more security for your potential buyers a money back guarantee will also ensure that you will only have satisfied customers around.

6. Questions and Answers

You might not want to display a huge section of questions and answers on the sales page itself, but you should at least have a link to your FAQ (frequently asked questions). This section is very useful because it allows you to remove doubts and concerns of your potential customers.

7. Call to Action

This is where you will encourage the customer to take action. Usually it involves the information about the price and a big “Buy Now” or “Add to Cart” button. Sometimes your call to action might be different though. For instance, you might ask the customer to input his email address to send him some free stuff before you give him a chance to buy the product itself.