2. Landing Pages
A landing page "can" be your home page, but it can also be any other page with an action. You don't always need to link to your home page. In fact, Google and the other search engines Like to see links to internal pages. This increases your website's Domain Authority.
For more on Domain Authority, Page Authority and so on, please see this link;
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/training/moz-toolb...
There are several methods to pre-qualify your website traffic with PPC (Pay-per-Click), Content Marketing, Affiliate traffic, Social Media Marketing, Viral Marketing, Video Marketing and more. But, having effective and highly-converting landpages are equally as important.
There is a psychology surrounding what makes a solid, high-converting landing page. Perhaps it can even be referred to as an art. What makes someone click a button? What makes them insert and email address to sign up? What makes them want to answer a survey question?
As you can imagine, much research has gone into these questions above. There has been a bunch of folks way smarter than me that have studied this and helped companies create higher conversions and increase ROI (Return on Investment). You don't need to re-create the wheel here, No Way!. But, learning a few of the key points can certainly help you save some money and a lot of frustration. But, I digress... sorry! Onward.....
SideNote - Learn more about creating Landing Pages here:
https://my.wealthyaffiliate.com/training/how-to-ad...
Like you said psychology, visuals, catchy marketing, continuous monitoring and improvements to your CTAs , your keyword approach related to relevancy , ( does the way the person arrives to your site make sense based on what you are actually selling or promoting) are all very important parts of the CTA puzzle.
You only have so much time for your reader to make that decision.
So many folks out there do not even have well defined, and easily seen CTA icons.
The easier the process is to your visitor, and the more clear cut it is, the more likely he or she will move forward and make a purchase.
Thanks again for the training PJ.