Despite using an all-in-one marketing automation tools, marketers often complain about landing pages and the conversion. Hence marketers prefer to opt for a landing page tool that will give them better functionality, support and focused community. For a marketer like me with least programming and design knowledge, I would definitely need a dedicated landing page tool to create a highly customized and convertible landing page. Hence, in my quest to get the best out of my landing pages, I tried two of the most common landing page tools- Instapage and LeadPages; so this blog post compares all pro and cons of LeadPages vs Instapage.
Landing Page Building: The Rule Book
Off late, landing pages are mostly being used for online ad campaigns. The landing page captures user information like name, email, phone number and so on. Many landing pages have forms embedded on the page (also known as click through pages) while many have a call to action button placed which redirects the users to the form. Recently, I published an article on landing page building tools: 2 Best LeadPages Alternatives You Should Use Now.
In my previous article, like I had mentioned: A landing page is usually used for collecting information. Some common places landing pages used are:
- To request a demo
- For some special promotion
- To offer a reminder
- To conduct survey
- To sign up for a "coming soon" product; and so on.
You can retarget your visitors using a landing page with Facebook ads. Facebook gives this amazing option of providing visitors with coupon code or offers when they arrive via the landing page being used in the campaign. Similarly, landing pages can be used on twitter too to get more inbound traffic.
To create a landing page, there are some rules that must be followed. The sole target of a landing page is not just to create it but to optimise it so that maximum conversion can happen. To optimise your landing page, you must follow these rules:
- A catchy headline that will resonate with your targeted audience.
- A call-to-action button strategically placed for the audience to click.
- Lucid and attractive design so that journey of your visitor from your landing page to performing the designated action is smooth.
Now that we have established that optimizing a landing page is mandatory and the sole aim of creating one, I will start with the main area of this post: LeadPages vs Instapage.
LeadPages and Instapage: An overview
Before I start with the comparison, it is important to mention that choice of tools varies from user to user. It might so happen that my choice may conflict with that of another marketer. Usually, a tool is reviewed and compared on the basis of few particular criteria: user interface, feature list, price and on-boarding journey.
LeadPages and Instapage, both are very similar in terms of feature list. They both have features like:
- A/b testing
- Analytics and reporting
- Automated emails
- Campaign management
- Content personalisation
- Custom HTM and CSS
- Design templates
- Drag and Drop editor
- Lead capture tools
- Social sharing widgets
- WYSIWYG builder
Both these tools have very minute differences. For a simple landing page that can be handled with someone with least HTML and CSS knowledge, LeadPages is befitting. If you want a landing page with customized fonts, background, shapes and other page elements, Instapage editor is perfect. On comparing the two tools, I realized that it not hugely about how different they are in terms of features. It is more about how each tool works under each feature category.
Both the tools have WordPress plugin to publish your landing page for your website running on WordPress. The templates are mobile responsive and they both integrate with many platforms.
LeadPages vs Instapage
For a beginner to roll out a landing page in few minutes, LeadPages will be easy just like Instapage. However, Instapage has more customising options. The best part is, customisation does not stop at changing a theme colour or text in Instapage. You can actually build a landing page from scratch with its powerful editor. To be honest, this editor is equally easy for a beginner as well as an experienced designer.
Without much ado, I will start with the in-depth comparison of the two landing page building tools.
Landing Page Builder - LeadPages vs InstapageLeadPages allow you to build a simple landing page in few minutes. The host of templates are designed to serve specific purposes like subscription to an email list, signing up for a webinar and so on.
The drag and drop editor that allows you to add page elements like
- Copy
- Autoplay video
- Headlines
- Countdown timers to create a sense of urgency for better conversions
- Exit pop-up to get visitors to sign up when they are about to leave.
The landing page builder of LeadPages is simple but it has certain restrictions in terms of design and customisation.
Instapage has all these features mentioned above. Along with that you can
- Add custom HTML and CSS
- Add JavaScript
- 100+ page templates to choose from
- Third party landing page templates from ThemeForest
- Build landing page from scratch
- Customise fonts (5,000+ premium Google and Typekit webfonts)
Page elements are listed in top toolbar in Instapage. Unlike LeadPages, you can add modal pop-up boxes. A modal popup box is displayed on the top of the current page.
Parallax Scrolling Feature: Instapage offers this advanced design technique that helps you create a 2-Dimensional illusion.
Images can be edited. You can also get hold of stock photos with a one time payment. Instapage integrates with Bigstock to give you royalty-free 31 million photos, videos and vectors to add to your landing page.
The best feature to me is the Page Version History.
A/B Split Testing - LeadPages vs InstapageLeadPages provides a quick A/B test launch. You can create variations and test which one works for you. From the LeadPages UI, you will get an overview of the conversions and other metrics indicating which one is performing better.
It is the same with Instapage. Here you not just get an overview. Rather, Instapage automatically divides your traffic between the two campaigns and highlight metrics like conversion rate, unique visitors, total conversions and points of improvement for each version.
Hence, my vote is to Instapage. It is obviously much more helpful to know how much traffic each version has generated and converted, than to get an overview. I think it helps in quantifying my efforts a lot more. Instapage is much more detailed. Also the integration with Google Analytics makes it much more easy to install using JavaScript code manager.
Mobile version - LeadPages vs InstapageLeadPages provides templates that are responsive on mobile devices. You will not miss out on traffic hence.
However, Instapage templates is not just mobile responsive. You can actually download the Instapage app on your iOS or Android device.
Recently, LeadPages acquired Drip, an email marketing tool. You can read about Drip here: Best Mailchimp Alternative Tool: GetDrip.
LeadPages integrates with
Instapage integrates with
While Instapage offers more customizing options like page layout, fonts and styling, I feel LeadPages take a lot less loading time. Instapage is little heavier that can impact on your performance at times when you are working with many design elements at a time.
The Deciding Factor: PricingI fully agree that pricing is like nailing the coffin. This is something that plays like the last deciding factor, atleast it does for me. So, let us look at the pricing details of both the tools:
LeadPages provide three plans, both on monthly and annual basis.
You can check the features available for each plan here.
Instapage offers a free 30-day trial unlike LeadPages. The paid plans start from $29/month when paid annually, and goes up to $127/month.
Basic plan : $29/month when paid annually
Professional plan: $55/month when paid annually
Premium plan: $127/month when paid annually
All of the Instapage's plans has the following features:
Drop in pixel tracking, CRM integrations, and Mobile Responsive landing pages. You will also get SEO friendly features, Marketing Automation Integration, Email Integrations. All landing pages are WordPress compatible.
To know the feature lists available under each plan, visit the pricing page.
Who wins?
Both LeadPages vs Instapage are touted as best landing page building tools in the market. Starting with a host of templates and easy on-boarding, both these tools are great.
However looking minutely, I will always prefer Instapage over LeadPages. I would like to have more fonts, styling options and also option to create a landing page from scratch. If you are judging in terms of speed and simplicity, I would recommend LeadPages. But if you are like me who can compromise a little on time for a better visually designed landing page, Instapage takes the cup. Also not to forget the host of integrations that Instapage offers.
Instapage: More Uniqueness
In the previous article on Best Alternatives to LeadPages, I had already mentioned about Instapage Squeeze Page, Splash page and Lead Generation system. What I didn't mention is how Instapage is best for Facebook advertising. Instapage has a section in its blog dedicated to Facebook advertising.
Despite Facebook lead ads, marketers are using lead forms to capture leads. You can use a Squeeze page to capture leads from Facebook. Instapage notes down some noteworthy case studies in their blog on How to use a Facebook Squeeze Page to Capture Email Addresses. One such case study is that of Don't Sweat the Small Stuff.
Instapage landing page is deemed as the best tool for Facebook advertising. However, along with Facebook and Twitter, Instapage landing page builder comes handy with Instagram as well. Instagram generates instant 'likes' and 'followers' because of the visual contents. A visual content will always appeal more than a plain text. Driving by this concept, Instapage can help you generate 400+ Million users via your landing page. Here is an example of how Fast Food Restaurant A&W redirected its campaign.
You can offer incentives like Everlane did. This gives you an option to tap a particular section of audience who prefer Instagram over Facebook and Twitter.
One of the blog posts that I really liked is where Instapage author Ted Vrountas has explained why a landing page is better than Facebook Lead Ads. He has pointed out 7 reasons that completely make sense:
- People are more comfortable in filling out a landing form
- Trust building with users begin through a landing page
- Quality vs Quantity: Landing page will always beat lead ads over quality
- A/B testing with leads ads is not possible
- Creative content is limited in a lead ad
- Lead ads often fail to collect valuable information
- "You won't be able to include these leads in website custom audiences" - A very vital point by the way!
Instapage keeps on updating and renovating. With every update, this tool gets better.
The recent update of the New CSS Editor is really cool. Now you can "get maximum flexibility and precision from Instapage".
The moment you enable the CSS module, the normal editing panel that you see becomes inactive. Rather, it comes with ore-filled standard CSS that you are comfortable in using with. The uniqueness of the editor lies in its ability to isolate CSS styling to ever single page. Adding to his, you can now also add additional properties which were absent previously. To know more about how this new editor functions, you can check the update announcement in their blog: Create Pixel-Perfect Landing Pages with New Instapage CSS Editor.
Along with the CSS editor, there are three more new features that got added very recently:
- Alignment and distribution
- Grouping
- Automatically generate mobile responsive pages
Instapage's new feature updates are thoroughly based on giving you much more design precision. With perfect alignment tools and mobile responsive alignments, Instapage is surely ready to outgrow other competitors in the market.
For more information on the updated features, check here.
I would always place Instapage over LeadPages. For me, Instapage is an advanced and better version of LeadPages. Rest, I guess every marketer has their own choices. Let me know which one do you prefer. Also if you come across any other point of differences, let me know below in the comments sections.
