As marketers, we love to use fancy words to describe the things we do (and we also like to change ‘em up a lot). Content isn’t long-lasting, it’s evergreen. You don’t need a marketing funnel, you need a flywheel. And don’t even get us started on growth hacking.
But as buzzwords come and go, you’re likely to come across an outdated or unusual phrase like “squeeze pages” for the first time and wonder—hey, what the heck does that even mean?
It doesn’t help that everyone seems to have their own definition of what a squeeze page actually is. Some people say it’s a type of landing page. Others say it’s an overlay, like a popup or splash page.
Well, we’re here to set the record straight with…
- The definition of a squeeze page
- The difference between a squeeze page and a landing page
- Squeeze page best practices
- Squeeze page Examples
What is a squeeze page?
A squeeze page is a type of landing page marketers use to collect just email addresses from visitors with an opt-in form. You “squeeze” or encourage visitors to provide this info by presenting a special offer, gating valuable content, or restricting access.
Squeeze pages are usually quite short, but they almost always include:
- A headline that clearly communicates the benefit you are going to provide.
- Supporting text that gives enough information for the visitor to make a decision.
- An embedded form that includes just one or two fields (typically, name and email address) so visitors can take action without leaving the page.
And the thing is, squeeze pages sound like they’re a lot more annoying than they actually are. (Nobody wants to be squeezed … that just sounds uncomfortable.) You shouldn’t coerce visitors into doing anything they don’t want to do—the best squeeze pages offer up something really valuable in exchange for that email address. It’s a worthwhile, non-spammy trade.
More like a gentle hug than a squeeze, actually. (But I guess a “gentle hug page” just doesn’t have the same ring to it, does it?)
Editor’s Note: While they can also capture first names and emails, popups and sticky bars aren’t technically squeeze pages. The difference is that you direct traffic specifically to squeeze pages for lead generation, whereas popups and sticky bars typically convert traffic that’s already going to a website page for another reason.
Squeeze page vs landing page: What’s the difference?
A squeeze page is a type of landing page—one that is specifically designed to capture visitor email addresses (versus other types of information). So this comparison isn’t so much like apples and oranges … it’s more like comparing apples to a very specific type of apple.
Both landing pages and squeeze pages pack everything you need onto a single page. They’re both great for targeted campaigns when you’re trying to get visitors to take a certain action. And they both usually only have one main CTA, so you can easily track conversions.
That being said, there are a few key differences between landing pages and squeeze pages:
Editor’s Note: Despite their differences, you can easily build both landing pages and squeeze pages using the drag-and-drop Unbounce Builder. Check out some high-converting templates to get started on yours today.
Do squeeze pages work?
Squeeze pages typically see some of the highest conversion rates out of all the different types of landing pages. Visitors have already expressed their interest by clicking on the page—so really, you just want to make it as easy and seamless as possible for them to enter their email address and get what they came for.
And while “squeeze page” might be an uncommon phrase these days, marketers still love to use them for lead generation campaigns. They’re powerful because they’re so easy to create and duplicate, which means you can spend more time testing different elements on them, figuring out what works for your audience, and optimizing them for conversions.
In this case, the juice really is worth the squeeze.
How to create a high-converting squeeze page (6 best practices)
Squeeze page design is a lot like landing page design, just even simpler. An effective squeeze page will only do a few things, but it should do those things incredibly well.
Consider these the squeeze page basics.
1. Create an irresistible lead magnet or offer
The first thing you need to do is create a great lead magnet or offer. After all, you’re asking somebody to give up their email address—one of the most important and private pieces of contact information they have. You better be able to offer up somethin’ real good to them in exchange.
Here are some of the most common lead magnets or valuable resources marketers use to attract leads on squeeze pages:
- A newsletter
- A contest or sweepstake
- A coupon or discount
- A printable checklist, whitepaper, or report
- A free webinar or video course
- A podcast episode
- A template, worksheet, or online tool
When creating your lead magnet, always consider your audience and what your brand can offer them that would be genuinely useful. A raw dog food company, for example, might want to create a guide with different recommended diet plans for different dog breeds. Lean into your area of expertise, and make something that folks won’t find anywhere else.
Editor’s Note: Looking for something a bit more outside-the-box for lead gen? Be sure to check out our other article, 10 Creative Lead Gen Examples Sources from Marketing Legends.
2. Clearly visualize the benefits
The downside of locking up your lead magnet behind a form is that visitors won’t know how amazing it is until they actually get behind your gate. This means the heavy lifting is on you, dear marketer, to showcase all that value upfront and help prospects visualize the benefits of what they’ll receive.
Take a look at this example from Growth Tools for their free lead magnet tool, Attract. This page does an excellent job of showing how the tool works, and lets you know exactly what you’ll be getting in exchange for your email address. Right underneath the main CTA is a large, full-page GIF that shows the tool in action—including editable templates, and customizable designs. The copy below goes into more detail about how easy it is to use the tool, and what you need to get started.
From a copywriting perspective, this is where it’s important to differentiate between the features of your lead magnet and the benefits. Going back to our example of a raw dog food guide—if you were to just list the features of the guide, you might say there are “10 different diet plans” and “over 1,000 ingredients” listed. But if you were to focus on the benefits, you might instead highlight that this guide will help you “build the perfect nutrition plan for your dog’s unique breed” and “learn what the healthiest ingredients are for your pup.”
In your headline and supporting copy, focus on the benefits that matter most to your visitors and they’ll be more likely to convert.
3. Use social proof to build trust
Marketers tend to skip social proof on their squeeze pages. But testimonials, customer logos, and star reviews are just as important here as they are on any other landing page. Visitors might not know much about your brand or why they should trust you when they arrive on your squeeze page. If they think your lead magnet doesn’t look legitimate (or too good to be true)—you shouldn’t be surprised if they don’t give up their email address.
Try giving away your lead magnet to a few key customers in advance and asking them for a testimonial about what they think. (Hopefully, they think it’s super cool and useful!) You can include this a bit further down on the page to help convince anyone who ends up scrolling down past your main CTA.
4. Keep it brief
While long squeeze pages do sometimes work, in general, it’s best to keep your page short and to-the-point. Don’t start throwing in everything and the kitchen sink in just because you’re excited about the offer. All you really need on a squeeze page is a compelling headline, a bit of copy to whet the appetite of your visitors, and a one or two-field form to capture their email addresses.
If you’re not sure, it’s always a good idea to test at least two different variants of your squeeze page. Try experimenting with one short version and a longer one that goes into more detail. You can turn on Smart Traffic in Unbounce and set both of them live simultaneously to find out which one performs better.
5. Target the right audience (and be precise)
You can create the best squeeze page in the whole world, but if you “squeeze” the wrong people with it then you probably won’t be very successful.
Going after too broad of an audience would be like trying to randomly hug strangers on the street—it’s an unwanted and uncomfortable gesture (plus, you may get the police called on you). It’s much better to go after an audience you already know will be receptive to this kind of offer.
Target the right audience by driving intentional traffic to your squeeze page. One way to do this is through your website. You can set up a popup or sticky bar on popular, high-traffic pages (like your blog) to advertise your lead magnet and start collecting the email addresses of people already interested in your brand.
Another option is to pay for traffic on Facebook and Instagram and use social ads to directly advertise your lead magnet. Once you get a few people who have downloaded the guide, you can refine your targeting with lookalike audiences to lower your cost-per-click and attract people with similar characteristics who are more likely to convert.
6. Keep it focused on the goal
The goal of a squeeze page is simple—capturing email addresses through an opt in form in exchange for something they find valuable. That’s it.
A squeeze page is not the place to present multiple offers, explain how your business works in detail, build complex multi-step forms, and so on.
Keep. It. Simple.
Use minimal form fields, use a consistent call to action button throughout, do not include navigation links that’ll distract visitors, and keep it brief. The more focused your squeeze page, the more conversions your page will generate.
3 types of squeeze pages (with examples built in Unbounce)
What does a good squeeze page look like? While there’s no one-size-fits-all answer, consider these squeeze page examples a good starting point to build around. For each example, we’ll explain what we like about it too.
1. The “regular” squeeze page
Here’s an example of a classic squeeze page, courtesy of the fine SaaS marketers over at Officevibe. In this case, they’re using an Unbounce-built squeeze page to capture email addresses in exchange for a free ebook on leadership.
A page like this has just enough content to get visitors interested in the ebook, and no distractions for them to click away. They smartly call out the main benefit of the ebook right in the headline (“learn how to be a good leader”), and highlight the three big topics covered in the guide for people who are still on the fence. They can experiment with this amount of copy to see how it converts and try variants to see if more copy really does equal more downloads.
But just because the goal of the page is simple doesn’t mean you can’t personalize it for your customers. Officevibe carries over its signature illustrative style to bring forward some of their playful brand personality.
The result? This squeeze page has a conversion rate of over 35%.
Oh, and one other thing: notice the disclaimer underneath the download button? “By clicking, you consent to receive culture and engagement communications from Officevibe.” This isn’t just there as a legal requirement—it’s also a smart way to set expectations for visitors. Now, they won’t be surprised when your follow-up emails start showing up in their inbox.
2. The full-page squeeze
There’s nothing wrong with a quick squeeze, but sometimes adding a little length to your page can make it even more persuasive. Check out this example from Bariatric Eating, promoting their “Ultimate WLS Thanksgiving ebook.” It’s converting at a rate of over 41%!
This beautiful example is full of recipes, coupons, and tips for bariatric eaters around the turkey holiday. But whereas most other squeeze pages would end here, you can actually scroll down to discover a whole second half to this page.
What’s great about this approach is how everything you need is packed in above the fold, but then expanded on underneath. The recipe section is sure to tempt hungry visitors into giving up their email address (that cranberry sauce sounds mighty tasty), while the “About the Author” section builds more credibility.
And of course, the page keeps squeezing you towards the free ebook, right up until the end.
3. The interactive squeeze
Now, here’s a squeeze page that looks completely different from all the other examples we’ve featured so far.
To help promote their “Wellness Collection” of herbal teas, the team over at Herbaly created this powerful lead generation quiz. The goal is to help visitors self-identify whether they might be at risk of diabetes through a series of dietary, fitness, and health-related questions.
Not only does this interactive squeeze page line up perfectly with the Herbaly target audience, but it also converts at a fantastic rate of over 40%. By the time visitors get to the end of the 13 questions, they’re primed and ready to give up their email address in exchange for the results.
5 best squeeze page examples to inspire your own
Beyond the examples above specifically from Unbounce users, we also wanted to share a handful of squeeze page examples from brands you’ll probably recognize for even more inspiration.
1. ClickUp
ClickUp funnels anyone who clicks a “sign up” button to this initial email-only squeeze page first. It’s a less traditional squeeze page example than the others, but still hits the nail on the head.
2. Tim Ferriss’ Newsletter
Tim Ferriss’ 5-Bullet Friday newsletter uses a simple squeeze page that only asks for an email.
3. “Why We Buy” Newsletter
The “Why We Buy” newsletter from Katelyn Bourgoin and Customer Camp uses a simple (yet gorgeous) email-only squeeze page.
4. Creator Science Swipe File
As simple as it gets. Creator Science is using a straightforward squeeze page with a headline, subcopy, opt-in form, social proof marker and an image.
5. Exit Five Newsletter
Noticing a theme? Squeeze pages are excellent tools for newsletters. The Exit Five newsletter squeeze page example follows all the same principles as the last few.
What should you do after your squeeze page finishes, uh… squeezing?
If your squeeze page is successful, you’ll soon have a ton of new email addresses. These are leads that have expressed some interest in a topic related to your business, so it’s in your best interest to follow up with them ASAP.
Here are some steps you’ll want to take after your page is finished squeezing:
- Deliver the goods: Whatever it is you were promising in exchange for their contact information, now is the time to deliver. Whether it’s a free ebook, template, webinar, or something else entirely—make sure you get the content to your new leads as quickly and easily as possible.
- Show a “thank you” Page: Someone trusted you with their email address, the least you can do is say thank you. Use this as an opportunity to tell your visitors what will happen next and preemptively answer any questions they might have.
- Push lead info into your CRM: If you’re using a tool like Salesforce, you’ll want to set up your squeeze page so the leads get automatically routed to your customer database. This will be important so you can attribute where these leads originally came from and trigger eventual nurture.
- Send an immediate email: Set up an automated email that triggers whenever someone fills out the form on your squeeze page. This email should remind visitors why they gave you their email address in the first place, and explain what happens next.
- Follow up with drip marketing: Add any leads that come through your squeeze page to a drip email campaign. This will keep them moving further down the funnel, and closer towards a purchase. You can recommend similar content, offer them promotions, or add them to your newsletter.
Should you use pop up squeeze pages or build standalone squeeze pages?
As we mentioned earlier, the definitions can get a little fuzzy. For the purposes of this question, though, we’ll assume you’re trying to decide whether your squeeze page should live on its own unique URL or be shown as a full-page pop up on existing URLs.
Our recommendation is to build standalone squeeze pages.
A pop up squeeze page can work, but it can also create friction that hurts conversions. By definition, a pop up is designed to “pop up” when visitors are doing something else. This means the intent of that visitor is not to explore whatever you’re promoting on your squeeze page.
On the flipside, if your squeeze page is a standalone landing page, the only visitors that will see it are those that decided they wanted to by clicking on a link. Higher intent almost always means higher conversion rates and more bang for your buck.
5 squeeze page templates to help you get started
If you want to skip the bulk of the building phase and just work from a template, you can use any of the templates below in just a few clicks when you sign up for an Unbounce free trial.
Simple “coming soon” page.
Ebook squeeze page template.
Hype building page with a video background.
Event squeeze page template.
Waitlist building squeeze page.
Create a squeeze page with Unbounce today
The easiest way to create squeeze pages is with a drag-and-drop builder (like Unbounce).
Rather than trying to code something yourself or build a makeshift version by duct taping together some mismatched elements that already exist on your site today, just use a squeeze page builder that’ll let you build exactly what you want without the headaches.
With Unbounce, you can launch your first squeeze page the day you sign up. No submitting a ticket to your (already busy) developers or designers then twidling your thumbs until they get to it.
You can start with a 14-day free trial today and start building custom pages in minutes. You can even start with one of our dozens of proven squeeze page templates to skip the blank-page-stage too.
Get started with Unbounce today.
