Inside Tips On Creating A Successful Landing Page
 by: Joe Balestrino

Landing pages are important to anyone running a pay per click campaign. Some people may disagree. In fact I know there are some people that believe that they have no use for them. These are usually people that have not even attempted to try them. Even huge corporate companies use pay per click. Some have taken the route of making all their “buy” pages landing pages. What is a landing page and what are the benefits?

Landing pages have everything a visitor needs to make a decision and purchase. All on one page. Is this necessary? Couldn’t you just link to the home page?

If you did that then the visitor now needs to surf to find what they want. Trust me they won’t. It is easier to hit the back button and try another site. Landing pages go hand in hand with your ad. If your ad is mentioning a specific product then, the link should take them to the page featuring this product.

Your site’s landing pages should be accessible from your site map. It needs to be index but, does not need to be found by visitors.

Some inside secrets:

Some people will bail from your landing page without scrolling down the page or reading the content on the page. Whatever, layout you decide to go with keep that in mind. If visitors do not find what they need within 10 second they may bail the page. Make sure your photo, content and “call for action” are in immediate view of the visitor.

Use the same heading on your landing pages. This will help reinsure that they are on the right site. Use words in your hyperlinks. Links tend to catch visitors eyes first. Use this to your advantage. Links can be whole sentences if so desired. Bold any words that may be of interest to the visitor. Words such as free, guarantee, low prices and other similar words will guide the reader to where you want them to see. Also, visitors will jump through hoops to purchase your product. Just do not make them jump too often. Make your forms simple and easy to fill out. If your form takes longer the 1.5 minutes to fill out, you may lose the sale.

There are some small factors that can make a difference in sales. Try:

• Changing colors

• Lower shipping charges

• Reinsure buyers with a money back guarantee or BBB seal

• Do not offer too many navigational options.

• Content needs to be simple. Just list what the visitor needs to know make a purchase.

• Make it as easy as possible for the visitor to make a speedy purchase.

• If you can give them the option to call you. Especially, if you offer 24 hour service.

Test other layouts. Try adding different photos, text, fonts and colors. Make each landing page different. Then compare your clicks vs sales. The landing page with the highest conversion may be the one that works best. Then, implement the same layout to the other pages. Your conversion rates should move up. Remember to keep your pages simple. In this case less is more. So, keep a close eye on your conversions and adjust accordingly. You should see your ROI increase.

About The Author

Joe Balestrino operates http://www.mr-seo.com a full service SEO/SEM company that caters to large and small companies alike. Visit his site for a free evaluation. You can also read his two blogs at http://mr-seo.blogspot.com/ and his SEO News blog at http://mrseonewz.blogspot.com/.