Five Steps to Building Landing Pages that Convert

Posted on June 6, 2011 by Solomon Thimothy

Creating a successful pay-per-click campaign (PPC) depends on the right combination of elements. The first element is targeted keywords. Your actual ad copy and ad are the next important element. A third, and often overlooked, element of an effective PPC campaign is the intelligent use of landing pages. Using landing pages for your campaigns increases conversion rates and can be the determining factor that renders your paid search ad campaign successful or simply mediocre. Below are five steps to building landing pages that convert.

Your Homepage Should not be Your Landing Page – Most business owners make the mistake of thinking that this is the best page to direct potential customers to. While it may be the best introduction to your company, a PPC campaign requires a targeted page that elaborates on your unique offer or promotion and nothing else. Your homepage has too much information that may distract, confuse and overwhelm potential customers, sending them away before that very important conversion.
Use a Simple Design - Your landing page should only contain pertinent information to your offer or promotion. Avoid having a navigation bar that will lead visitors to new pages or away from what attracted them to click on your ad in the first place. Essentially, a landing page should not have sub-pages. Instead, it should be all contained in one page or use tabs or pop up windows.
Keep Call to Action Above Fold – Just like a newspaper, you want the most important part of your landing page to be visible above the fold. This means that your message will be seen without requiring visitors to scroll down your page. By prioritizing content on your landing page, you take control of what your visitors behavior and increase your potential for a better conversion rate.
Use Keywords Throughout Your Landing Page – As mentioned, keywords are very important to your PPC campaign. Your landing page too should contain those same keywords throughout. This adds relevancy to your message and makes your search ads and landing pages a cohesive message. This higher relevancy also lads to be rankings from search engines.
Use White space and Eye-Catching Buttons – Don’t jam pack your landing page with details, graphics or gadgets. White space is important as it makes the page less cluttered and provides focus for the reader. Likewise, using eye-catching call-to-action buttons with descriptive texts draws visitors in.

Ensuring that your PPC campaign is a success depends on the right balance of various elements. A well-designed landing page reinforces your search ads and creates a path to converting visitors into customers.

For help with landing page creation or to request more information about our search engine marketing services, contact us at 1-888-ONE-IMS-1 today.

7 Essentials for an Effective Landing Page

Posted on February 16, 2011 by Solomon Thimothy

Landing pages are the new era of internet marketing and advertising. The effectiveness of landing pages is precisely proportional to landing page’s ability to provide the promised offer. Generally used side-by-side with web-based advertising such as Pay-Per-Click (PPC) marketing, landing pages need to offer value, directness and essential information. Here are some building blocks for effective landing page designs.

Less is More
Before you start brainstorming about all the things your landing page can do, remember that your landing page is a microsite. Having too much content, too many images, or too many things going on will only detract from the original purpose of the website. Stick to things that are essential to the effectiveness of the landing page.
Create Smart Copy
Copy is everything. Make sure that your ad creative and landing page work harmoniously to emphasize your brand promise and value proposition.
Benefits, Benefits, Benefits
Think benefits when choosing content for your landing page. What’s in it for your customer? By speaking in terms of benefits, you create a strong case that will lead to higher conversions.
Deliver on Your Promises
As with any promise, it is important to keep the promises you make in your online advertising. If you offered a special promotion, reduced price or free download, make sure you deliver on it when visitors land on your landing page.
Have a Clear Call to Action
There is little room for mistakes in landing pages. One of the most important elements of a successful landing page is creating a clear call to action. This will ensure that visitors will do exactly that which you want them to do.
Use Forms Wisely
It must be stressed that landing pages offer a brief opportunity for you to connect with prospective customers. When using online forms for visitors to submit information, make sure that what you are asking is relevant and necessary. Overloading visitors with long questionnaires or forms will only lead to them abandoning your page.
Track and Measure
Measuring and evaluating the effectiveness of your landing page is essential. Take advantage of A/B testing and measuring tools to decipher the effectiveness of your landing page. This will help create a more efficient landing page that will result in better conversions.

Landing pages can be tricky to create, but offer an incredible opportunity to grow your business.

Top Three Pay-Per-Click Campaign Mistakes

Posted on February 2, 2011 by Solomon Thimothy

When done correctly, a Pay-Per-Click (PPC) campaign can create qualified traffic for your business. Aside from being able to control your spending, PPC campaigns allow you to target your ads to those specifically searching for your products or services within your specified geographic area. That means you receive more qualified leads, which mean higher conversion rates.

Here are the top three mistakes to avoid when launching a PPC campaign.

1) Directing Your PPC Ads to Your Website’s Home Page
While one of the reasons behind PPC is to bring more qualified traffic to your website, visitors don’t want to arrive at your website only to keep on searching for what they need. Your PPC ads should be targeted to a particular product, service or promotion you are running. This means that when someone clicks on your ad they expect to be led to more information about that specific product, service or promotion. They certainly don’t want to arrive at a welcome screen only to have to search once again.

Rather than directing traffic from your PPC ads to your website’s homepage, opt for using search engine optimized landing pages or microsites to deliver a more powerful message.

2) Writing Generic Copy for Your Ads
Writing the ad copy for your ad is one of the hardest parts of creating an intelligent PPC campaign. Using generic or general content is ineffective and does offer a compelling reason for visitors to click on your ad. Since search engines’ advertising platforms restrict the number of characters your ad may have, make sure you choose your ad copy wisely. When writing your ad copy, make sure it’s relevant and compelling.

3) Not Taking Advantage of Ad Testing Capabilities
All major search engines offer ad-testing capabilities to allow you to assess the effectiveness of your ads. Google, Yahoo! and Bing allow you to create different versions of your ad, varying from as little as one word or a phrase to a completely different ad, to find the most effective ad.

Take advantage of ad testing capabilities to increase the effectiveness of your ads and your overall click-through-rate.

Creating a successful PPC campaign is a little more complicated than at first sight. However, careful planning, research and expert guidance can make a difference. Avoid these top three PPC campaign mistakes to achieve better results.

Want to ensure the success of your PPC campaign? Schedule a free consultation with one of our Google, Yahoo! and Bing certified internet marketing specialists today.