Mapping out a landing page design may seem simple, but that's almost never the case. Rather, while a landing page can look unassuming, it's often the product of intense scrutiny and constant tiny performance improvements. That's because even great marketers are liable to introduce simple design errors, and these can undercut the landing page's potential to drive leads and conversions.

Here are some of the most common — and frustrating — mistakes that plague landing pages.

Landing pages play a central role in turning website traffic into conversions. Most companies use landing pages to welcome incoming referral traffic to their website and its offerings, but those landing pages may not be working for brands as they should. Marketers understand that landing pages wield incredible value, but when landing page best practices aren't followed, they often fall short of their potential.

This misstep shouldn't be acceptable for any brand. Landing pages are used by too many digital marketing channels for marketers to risk lose potential conversions. Established best practices and innumerable case studies offer an easy-to-follow road map when designing these pages and help explain how they complement other digital ads and related marketing content.

For brands looking to boost their conversion rate, here are four essential changes to your strategy:

Following Steve Jobs' comments in 2010, Apple insisted that its iOS software wouldn't continue to support Flash long into the future. That opened the door for a new coding language designed to build rich digital content for the Internet's consumption. Today, that coding language alternative has a name: HTML5.

Released in October 2014, this new coding solution has inspired a lot of debate over whether it's an actual improvement over Flash, and how, exactly, it's able to elevate the ceiling for online content development. While long-term forecasts for this coding language remain high, many developers think it will ultimately provide a more versatile and agile platform for content creation than Flash. Nonetheless, the release of the new coding language has been met with multiple challenges that impede its present stature and give the language a bad name.

Here's a rundown of what challenges HTML5 developers currently face on the long road to a (hopefully) better coding language solution.

As many organizations update their websites based on the latest Web design trends, there is a potential for your site to get lost in the monotony. However, as current developments are all about finding unique ways to connect with your audience, there are more opportunities for you to make your site stand out to a targeted group. Overall, most trends in imagery, layout, color and typography are moving toward a simpler design.

Imagery

As 1stWebDesigner points out, one of the current Web design trends involves incorporating large background images. While you may already be seeing these types of images everywhere, you can give your brand an edge by adding subtle movement. According to 99designs, one variation on this trend is animated storybooking, in which an animation sequence is triggered when a user scrolls to a certain position on his or her screen.

A/B testing, or split testing, is a tool that online marketers use to compare two versions of a piece of content to see which one performs better. These tests may be run on various types of content, including Web pages, banner ads, social media posts and blog entries. A/B tests, which can run for any length of time, give marketers insight into which kinds of key phrases, design elements and calls-to-action are most effective.

According to Marketing Land, U.S. digital ad spending hit an all-time high of $49.5 billion in 2014, and 16 percent of that, or $8 billion, was spent on desktop ads alone. Banner ads aren't going anywhere anytime soon, so it's important to make sure you're using them to your best advantage. Optimizing your banner ads with A/B testing can help you stand out from your competitors and reach your audience in a meaningful way. Here are three of the benefits of performing these tests on banner ads.

When the first banner ads were created, they were very effective because they were original and stood out among more traditional advertisements. According to Fast Company, the first banner ad had a click-through rate (CTR) of 44 percent, dwarfing today's rate of 0.8 percent. Now, Internet users often develop ad blindness because they get bombarded with different types of messages every time they go online. As a result, businesses must reevaluate their banner ad design and content to make sure that this marketing channel remains successful. Here are five ways you might be screwing up your banner ads — and five best practices to employ instead.

It can be difficult to create a landing page design that is both attractive and effective. Here are some guidelines that will help you ensure that your landing page lands you results.

Keep It Simple

You should make your navigation system so user-friendly that your customer can get anywhere with one click. To avoid confusion and keep your user's attention, you should also make sure that the link your user clicks on to get to your website lands them on the page with the information they were promised.

The visual appeal of your landing page also plays an important role in your user's experience. A simple design is most appealing because it is not overwhelming to the user. You should make sure that your design — i.e., headers and color scheme — is consistent across all touch points.

Most marketers know the essentials of banner ad creation: all banner ads should be a standard dimension, feature a call-to-action in a prominent location and include at least one "clickable" element. But it can be tough to design an ad that not only follows this basic formula, but is highly effective as well. Here are three key elements that all great banner ads have in common.

1. Strategic Use of Color

99designs has a helpful color guide that breaks down what different colors represent and how to use them effectively. For instance, they explain that red is the most powerful color and that it should, therefore, not be over used. The design blog also mentions that though colors like yellow and orange are associated with optimism and happiness, you should avoid using them for anything other than a call-to-action button or a creative flourish because these bright colors can be irritating to viewers' eyes.

U.S. consumers are spending more time than ever on mobile devices (last year showed an 81 percent increase in mobile data traffic, according to Re/code), but ConversionXL reports that mobile conversion rates remain low. This is a huge opportunity for marketers who can create mobile Web design that encourages user engagement — and that means more than a pretty typeface.

Try these six practices to turn browsers into shoppers:

1. Plan for Change

Users expect to access their data everywhere and on every device. It's not enough to plan just for smartphones and tablets — you want to use responsive design to adapt to the evolving mobile ecosystem. Create designs that suit these platforms rather than trying to replicate the desktop experience.

As consumers change their shopping habits, automotive advertising strategies are also transforming. EMarketer reported that automakers and dealers in the U.S. will have spent about $6.15 billion on digital advertising in 2014, an increase of 18.8 percent from 2013. But are they spending their budgets the right way? While marketers have made great advances, new trends suggest that automotive marketing techniques must reflect the way consumers leverage mobile, video advertising and other touchpoints to enhance their shopping experience and get the best deal.

Retargeting Cross-Shoppers

Think With Google reported that 72 percent of all auto purchase searches in 2013 involved some form of cross-shopping by the consumer. The good news for auto marketers is that you can leverage cross-shopping behaviors to ensure that your inventory is part of the consumer's evaluation process. Retargeting and remarketing are great ways to drive increased returns to your website by cross-shoppers. New research from the National Automobile Dealers Association shows that 83 percent of consumers say they're most influenced by dealer websites when they begin their auto search. This is a huge opportunity to use paid search to drive consumers to your website and leverage retargeting best practices to entice them to return once they've checked out other dealerships.