Landing Page vs. Website Homepage: When Do You Use Which?

If you’re like most business owners, you’ve probably spent a lot of time working on your website. You’ve created all the important pages, making sure your homepage has several calls-to-action that point visitors to your Work With Me or Contact page, and you've got a page on your site that talks about what you've got to offer.

But, then you hear about landing pages and how they help convert visitors into customers and you start to wonder if you should've created a landing page instead.

If you’ve been wondering what is the difference between a landing page and a homepage, you’ve come to the right place. In this post, we’ll explain what a landing page is and what a homepage is. We'll look at how they're different from each other, and explain when you should use a homepage and when you should use a landing page.

Landing Page vs Homepage vs Website

If you turn to the internet for answers, you'll inevitably run into comparisons and explanations that muddy the waters when it comes to landing pages, homepages, and websites. While it’s true that there are some similarities between those terms, there are also a number of differences between them. Let’s explain what each does.

Landing Page Definition

A landing page is a page that's focused on getting visitors to take action. It’s a page that's created with the sole purpose of getting traffic from several sources or, in other words, it’s the page you link to in social media campaigns, email, and paid advertising campaigns. A landing page has limited or no navigation and talks about a singular offer such as a product, app, service, lead magnet or any other offer you’re currently promoting.

An example of a landing page comes from LeadQuizzes, a company that specializes in helping you create high-converting quizzes for lead generation purposes. The page does a great job of using their ideal customer’s pain points to get attention along with a bright orange call-to-action. You’ll also notice they use several trust signals such as testimonials and partner and publication logos.

Homepage Definition

A homepage is the first page on your site. A great homepage will give an overview of what your company does, build trust with first-time visitors, and provide the next logical step for your visitors that you want them to take.

Consider the homepage for the Slack app. As soon as a visitor enters their homepage, it’s immediately clear what Slack does and what the visitor should do. You can also easily access other pages on the website and see all the features that Slack has to offer.

Website Definition

Finally, your website consists of several interconnected pages that have all the details about your business, ways to get in touch with you, and it may also have a company or business blog, a support section or forum, knowledge base, and more. Your website can also have one or more landing pages, depending on the nature of your business and marketing efforts.

Here’s a brief overview of differences between landing pages vs homepages vs websites:

How You Can Create Landing Pages, Websites, and Homepage

Whether you’re trying to create a landing page, a full-blown website or a homepage, the good news is that you don’t have to worry about hiring an expensive designer or learning how to code yourself.

Thanks to numerous templates and Content Management Systems like WordPress, anyone can create a good-looking and high-converting landing page. Various third-party marketplaces such as Envato Elements have dozens of HTML landing page templates that are easy to update and use. HTML templates are a great choice when you want to get your landing page up and running as quickly as possible.

But, if you need more functionality or the possibility to turn your landing page into a website later on, then a WordPress theme is a better choice. You’ll find plenty of responsive landing page WordPress themes on Envato Elements.

Envato Elements is a great resource that gives you unlimited access to hundreds of templates and other assets such as stock photos for one low monthly price.

To see more examples of useful themes and templates, review these articles:

• 

  31+ Best Responsive WordPress Themes (For Sites in 2022)

  

  Brenda Barron

  19 Jan 2022
• 

  25 Best Responsive HTML5 Landing Page Template Designs for 2022

  

  Brenda Barron

  01 Mar 2021

When to Use a Landing Page and When to Use a Homepage or a Website

Now that we’ve covered the differences between a landing page, a homepage, and a website, let’s take a look at when to use each one.

Landing Page vs Homepage: When to Use Them

As mentioned earlier, landing pages are usually used for marketing campaigns, when your sole focus is on promoting a product or a service. As such, you’d use landing pages in the following situations:

• When you’re launching something new. This includes launching a new product or a service or even as you’re launching your business. This allows you to focus on a single important action for the page and get the visitors to take that action.
• When you’re running a marketing campaign (Facebook ads, Google AdWords, etc). Given the nature of landing pages and the fact that they offer minimal distractions, it goes without saying that your marketing campaign will convert a lot better when visitors land on a page that aligns with the goal of your marketing campaign. You'll be able to convince them why they should sign up, show them social proof, and get their information without confusing them with all the other services, products, or offers you've got as a business.
• When you’re promoting a lead magnet or a webinar. The goal of promoting a lead magnet or a webinar is to get visitors to sign up. A landing page designed with that specific purpose helps convert visitors in the same way as the landing page designed for a marketing campaign converts.
• In place of your homepage on social media platforms. While your homepage can be used in social media bio, you’ll have a much better success of turning visitors into followers with a dedicated landing page tailored to each social media platform.

Contrary to that, you would use your homepage whenever you’re listing basic business information on platforms and places that require your website link. This can include signing up for a product, providing your information to another business, and similar.

Landing Page vs Website: When to Use Websites

As you’ve seen from the example above, in some cases, landing pages can be used in place of a website. However, that doesn’t mean that you can scrape your existing website and replace it with the landing page in the hopes of getting as many customers and clients as possible. A well-designed website still has its place and merits. In particular, use a website whenever:

• You’re trying to provide an interested party with more information about your business
• When you’re trying to direct them to a specific page or blog post on your site
• Whenever you want to explain your mission, vision, ways to collaborate, and more

With that said, keep in mind that you can use landing pages, homepage, and a website together. In fact, many businesses are using landing pages together with their website, depending on what marketing campaigns and promotions they're currently running.

Landing Page vs Homepage: Design Considerations

Before we conclude this article, here are a few design considerations to keep in mind when it comes to landing page and homepage design.

Landing Page Design Tips

Use the following landing page design tips to grab the attention of your visitors and improve the conversion rate.

• Eliminate distractions. Your landing page should be focused on the one action you want your target audience to take. Remove all the distractions such as links to your social media profiles, other pages on your site or any external websites.
• Make your call-to-action highly visible. Use a color that contrasts nicely with the other colors on your website. You want your call-to-action to stand out so there's no mistaking it. Another tip is to use several calls-to-action, especially if your landing page is long.
• Focus on benefits, not features. No matter what you’re promoting, make sure to focus on the benefits of your offer. People are more interested in how your offer will help them than an in-depth overview of all the features
• Provide social proof. Your landing page should include testimonials from people who've already tried and implemented your product or service. You can also use other trust signals such as logos of places you’ve been featured and secure payment icons if you’re promoting a paid offer.
• Use thank you pages to generate more views. Your thank you page should confirm a successful signup and then invite those new leads to share your offer (your landing page) with their network. Alternatively, consider inviting them to join your network such as follow you on a social media platform or join your community such as a Facebook group.

Homepage Design Tips

When it comes to your homepage design, a few of the landing page tips apply here as well. This includes using social proof and making sure your call-to-action buttons are highly visible. However, there are a few tips specific to homepage design that you need to keep in mind:

• Make it clear what you do in a headline. Your main headline should make it very obvious what you do and who you do it for. This will help eliminate bad leads and visitors who aren’t a good fit for your services and at the same time pique the interest of your ideal client
• Include your photo or photos of your team members. A photo of you or your team members will add a personal touch to your business and brand and make it easier for visitors to trust you
• Keep your navigation simple. While your homepage should make it easy to access other pages on your site, keep your main navigation simple. Ideally, you want no more than five navigation items. If you've got other important pages that you feel are necessary for the main menu, consider using a drop-down menu so the extra pages appear once someone hovers over a menu item.

Choose the Right Landing Page or WordPress Theme Today

Landing pages are a great addition to your website as they can help you promote a specific product, lead magnet, service or other offer and get as many conversions for that offer as possible. They're an excellent way to build your list and start a sales conversation. If you’re looking to create a landing page for your offer, be sure to check out our landing page templates on Envato Elements. Why not download a template or WordPress theme today and get started?