Quick Tips to Improving Your Landing Page - Part 2

In the previous “Quick Tips to Improving Your Landing Page”, I covered the topics of less navigation, keeping it simple, monetizing your forms, info requests and to keep testing. Here are a few more ideas and examples on how you can improve your landing pages for pay per click campaigns or whatever type of marketing to you are aiming at.

CAPTURE EMAIL:
Depending on the type of landing page you have, this may or may not be effective. If you have a landing page with a straight form that sends the data to another advertiser, this isn’t important. However, if you have a built content site and is full of content pages, you can heavily benefit from adding a big subscribe box right at the top of your landing page. Unfortunately, the average visitor to your web site will only stay for a few seconds and leave, probably to never return again. If you are able to offer to something in exchange for their email, you can stay in contact with them as long as they are a subscriber. Don’t lose your site visitors, try to keep them for the long haul.
- Aweber is the most preferred source for auto responders and newsletters.

KEEP THE SAME LOOK & FEEL:
If you are creating a landing page to bring users from search engines to your landing page, then sending the traffic to your advertiser page, you should try and keep them consistent in the look and feel. By doing this, you will give the user the feeling that they are still at the same web site and not being let into a form process or confuse them with completely different looking sites.

A lot of people have been making money the Zwinkies and Webfetti offers on NeverBlueAds. There have been a ton of landing pages created for this campaign, but the ones that perform best are the ones that match towards it’s content and keep the same look and feel. Below is a comparison between a page created by a marketer, then the page they are sending their traffic to, which they will earn commissions on. Notice how they have the same color and image setup. I have seen much better examples, this is just the one I decided to use.

User Generated Landing Page vs. Offer Landing Page = Same Look

TESTING HEADLINES:
Did you know “On average, 8 out of 10 people will read headline copy, but only 2 out of 10 will read the rest.” (source: CopyBlogger) Depending on what your headline says, it can heavily change your conversions. Always remember, your headline make or break your campaign results. A proven example is “Discover the Secrets of Making Money Online” vs. “Learn the Secrets of Making Money Online!“. When you use the word “learn” you are telling the user they will have to put forth some effort, with “discover” they are simply finding the information or process. Test and play with your headline and you can see some big shifts in conversion rates.

GIVE TESTIMONIALS:
If you have a landing page which is trying to sell a service or product to users, give real life examples and testimonials. I wrote in the past how consumers prefer choice and security when buying online. When offering testimonials on your site, you also giving your user some incentive and meaning of quality behind whatever you are trying to promote to them. If you aren’t currently using testimonials, setup a new landing page with them and see how it performs.

MULTIPLE TESTING BEFORE GOING LIVE:
After you have created your landing page, the first thing you will want to do is go live with the campaign. Before doing so, you should send your landing page to a bunch of different people, marketing friends (whom you trust), family and other daily web users. What may seem like a good place for a submit button or click here link to some, may not be seen by others. Everyone looks at things differently, so get a general feel for where your web site is going and how they will react once they get to your landing page.

There are still plenty of quick tips that can be used to help improve landing page conversions. Feel free to comment with any suggestions and I will also follow up with more of my own.

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Awesome Marketing Books from Awesome People

Maybe it’s something in the air, or just great timing… but a bunch of my good friends all recently came out with new books (both ebooks & paperbacks). Though I much prefer to listen to audio books on my ipod, (since I can work at the same time) these books are just killer and have to be read. Most of you already know that I’m not a big fan of ebooks, because so often they are filled with recycled material that doesn’t help the majority of us, but the two featured ebooks on this post have been very useful and I find them worthy of promotion. As for the paperbacks, I’m still waiting on their arrivals and releases. I approve these books and I’m sure you will too!

101 Wines, by Gary Vaynerchuk
Gary is the star of WineLibraryTV.com and has amassed a huge cult following over the past couple of years. What started with his own father’s liquor store, has turned into one of the most watched and visited Wine & Entertainment sites online. So why am I talking about wine on a marketing blog? Gary is amazingly emotional and passionate about what he does and gets this industry. Gary is a celebrity among wine enthusiasts, internet marketers and every day people, this is nothing to not like about this guy. Gary will also be the keynote of Affiliate Summit West 2008, just to give you an idea of how awesome he is. (I’m currently waiting on the arrival of this book, so I can start reading it)
- Buy & Read Gary’s Book through Amazon.com

Search Engine Optimization: Your visual blueprint for effective Internet marketing, by Kris Jones
Easily one of the best speakers and marketers I’ve ever known, Kris is a master in his field and one of the best in the world. Through his blog, you can read more on how Kris was contacted by Wiley Publishing and the massive efforts he put forth to make sure this book deserved to have his name on it. As Kris intended, this book not only covers SEO, but also has two chapters on ppc marketing and talks briefly on Google Analytics, Monetizing Site Traffic and Social Media. I’m also waiting on the arrival of this book to start reading, and is now available through Amazon.com and can also be found in most book stores.
- Buy & Read Kris Jones’ Book through Amazon.com

AdSense Secrets 4, by Joel Comm
As much as I don’t like ebooks, Joel Comm is one of the masters at writing and knowing Google Adsense, and he is one of the few out there that gives ebooks a good name. I’m still making my way through this 232 page ebook, but have already gained a bunch of ideas and plenty of motivation to start trying a few of his ideas out. I just printed out the ebook on 50+ sheets of paper (4 mini pages per paper), so I can write notes on everything that I like and want to implement. I definitely recommend picking this ebook up, especially since it’s only $9.95. It would be hard not to make back your initial investment several times over with this one. (eBook comes with a $29.95 monthly subscription, unless you cancel within 30 days)
- Buy & Read Adsense Secrets 4 on PDF ebook

Killer Domains: a Resource for Finding the Perfect Domain Name for Your Blog, by Daniel Scocco
Daniel from DailyBlogTips.com just released his ebook which focuses on finding the perfect domain name for your blog. It’s funny the book was just released, because I’ve spent a lot of time over the past two weeks looking into domains and trying to pick up some older ones through expirations and domain auctions. Through “Killer Domains” you’ll read about the process of thinking up a name for your blog and doing the proper keyword research to target towards your audience. You’ll also discover plenty of resources on where you should purchase your domains and how to secure your name in the long run. I’m still reading through this 55 page ebook, and for those who aren’t heavy readers, this ebook is compiled with pictures, data keyword charts and is written extremely well and makes it a very easy read.
- Buy & Read Killer Domains on PDF eBook

ProBlogger Book: Secrets for Blogging Your Way to a Six-Figure Income, by Darren Rowse & Chris Garrett
Even everyone’s favorite money making blogger, Darren Rowse, now has a book of his own out. What’s the book about, as Darren says on his site… “the title really says it all“. The book is still waiting to be released, but you can pre-order your copy through Amazon.com, or signup to the official book web site and read the first chapter for free! I’m looking forward to the release of this book as well.
- PreOrder ProBlogger Book through Amazon.com

Just writing this recap and review on five books that came out, it took well over an hour, so imagine how long it would take to read through them all! As I read each of the books, I will try and come back with more tips on what was covered and what new discoveries I received from each book. Check back soon as I may have a few of these up for grabs in the next couple of weeks! If you have already read any of these books, or are in the process, feel free to leave a comment and let others know what you think.

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Quick Tips to Improving Your Landing Page

Landing pages will play a very crucial role in your success as a pay per click marketer, and how you lay out your landing page can make all of the difference. Here are a few quick tips on how you can improve your landing pages and possibly increase your conversions. Remember, if you can split test your new modified landing page (after changes) vs. your original land page design, do it! If you continually modify your landing page with improvements or ways to better serve your customer/traffic you can heavily increase your earnings. How much more would you be making if you increased your conversion rate by only 1 or 2%?

REMOVE SITE NAVIGATION:
In most cases, when you have someone visit your landing page, you do not want them to jump around your site or possibly click and link and leave to another. If you have any type of site navigation that is distracting your site visitor from the one or two tasks you want them to take, remove them! If your navigation or site information is important and needs to remain on your page, place them near the bottom.

KEEP IT SIMPLE:
As much of a marketer or designer that we are, keep your landing pages simply and extremely easy to navigate. I know I can pretty much tell 100% of the time what parts of a web site are advertisements and what is trying to get me to go into a lead process, but that is because that is what we do for a living. Keep your web site simple and to the point.

AUTO-POPULATE & OPTIMIZE FORMS:
Another step to keeping your landing page simple. If you are using email to promote a campaign, or working in a co-registration type process, you should be able to collect previous information from the user and auto-populate that into your existing page. Not only will this save the user time, but it will heavily increase them in filling out the form if they only need to click SUBMIT or enter a couple more fields.

There are so many landing pages and forms out there that aren’t optimized. Don’t you hate when you go to a site and the TAB button isn’t working on the form and you have to click to each field! Imagine how badly that is killing conversions. If just 1 or 2 people out of every hundred get annoyed and leave, that is lost money. Allow your users to jump around the form process using the TAB button.

DON’T ASK FOR TOO MUCH INFO:
Why are ZIP and EMAIL campaigns so successful? Simple, they don’t ask for much. (on the first page at least). If you are looking to gain subscribers for a newsletter, ask for their email… it isn’t important to collect their full postal information if you are only emailing them. Also, too many forms out there have a RESET button… what’s the point, I don’t think many people out there are filling out the whole form incorrectly then need a button to reset it all over. In more cases than not, people will accidentally click the RESET button instead of SUBMIT. Once they click RESET, they will be so angry, they will probably just leave your site. REMOVE RESET BUTTONS!

KEEP TESTING:
How many of you create a landing page, then go live with the campaign and if it works, it works… I’m guilty! I hate testing, especially when something works on the first try. Testing is the most important part of advertising. especially on pay per click campaigns. Let’s say you currently have a landing page that converts on 2% of your traffic and you are generating 50 leads a day off 1000 visits. If you take the time to play with your landing page and are able to increase your conversion by just 1%, you are looking at a 50% growth and 25 more leads per day. TESTING SUCKS, BUT IT WORKS!

These are just a few tips that may help you in your ppc and landing pages adventures. I will have a follow up post with more “quick tips” and advice later in the month. Feel free to add any additional advice in the comments area.

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The Gaming of Twitter

It wasn’t till recently that I really started to use Twitter, but I’ve heard about the site and people using it for quite a while. When I last used Twitter about a year ago, it just seemed boring to me. Now that a lot more people are using the network, I think I find it a lot more useful. With the increase in users, I’ve also seen some new sites and ideas popping up over the past couple of weeks. Let’s take a look!

Can You Really Sell Your Twitter Account?
The most recent news to stream across all internet news sites and blogs, is the eBay auction from RocketBoom founder, Andrew Baron. This is either an awesome idea for a link bait, or how to massively grow your Twitter following. Since posting the auction, Andrew has been more productive with his Twitter account and posts to his followers, “Starting to get kinda attached to this account all of a sudden“. With the eBay Auction currently at $1525, will Andrew sell all of his contacts and possibly just create a new account? I’m not sure, but either way, he has received a ton of link bait and promotion for his antics, which either way, will make for a good story afterwards.

TwitterMeThis: Follow, Answer Questions, Win Cash!!
My friend Jim Kukral is always stirring up some new marketing ideas and how to make marketing more “fun”! Most recently Jim created a Twitter account and went live with TwitterMeThis.com. The concept of the site/twitter account, is to have a nice following of Twitter users, then each day (sporadically) Jim sends out a question to all of his followers. The first person to get back to @TwitterMeThis with the right answer wins $5. While others are skeptical on the concept and even a spoof video was created, in the end, the success or failure of TwitterMeThis, will be decided by it’s followers.

More Newcomers to the Twitter Game
Just as I was browsing around for a few Twitter resources today, I came across PollDaddy and TwitLinks. The concept behind PollDaddy is pretty simple and useful, as you can quickly create a poll and post it as your Twitter status. TwitLinks takes a different approach and just created a whole new site where they profile the big name Twitters in the Tech News Industry, so you don’t have to scroll through all of your Twitter follower’s comments if you just want the big tech Twitters. Lastly, even Shoemoney has even found a way to use Twitter to get rid of some of his unwanted office supplies and gifts. Each day he will offer up something new along with some quiz questions to select winners.

So as Twitter is getting bigger, the options and gaming of the network is also coming into play. What will the future hold for Twitter and will we continue to see monetization by others to try and benefit all of the Twitter users for good… or evil?

While you’re at it… Follow Me on Twitter!

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Free AOL Disks, Domain Names and Kicking it Old School!

I started making money online sometime around 1996 I’m guessing, and before I ever came up with the name MoneyReign, I had a whole stream of free hosted sites and usernames I would use. When I first started to make a few bucks online, it was through AOL internet access. Whenever you made a new account with a free AOL disk, you’d have to make a new username. The first few years passed, as did many free AOL accounts (remember those free AOL disks!) as did many various usernames. None of the usernames really stuck, and the money wasn’t in serious amounts yet, so any checks coming in would just be made out to “Zac Johnson“. It wasn’t till I finally came up with the name “MoneyReign” that I would finally stick with my company name, eventually incorporate it (around 2000) and buy my first domain, moneyreign.com, in 1998.

Today I was doing some domain research and looking to pick up any nice domains I could find for sale, or that were about to expire. I then did a few data reports on a bunch of domains that I own. To my surprise, the one day I’m actually pulling some stats on my domains, I see that MoneyReign.com was registered 10 years ago TODAY! I remember how cool it was to finally have my own domain and finally get off the crappy AOL member pages and Geocities/Tripod sites. I also remember how we were all hostages to Network Solutions and their $70 domain registrations, and that $70 was so expensive!

Over the years, MoneyReign.com has been everything from a free stuff site, a stock site, an online book store and a portfolio/directory for my other sites. Recently it’s just been a placeholder site for my company name/site and a listing for this blog and contact info. I’m sure I have most of the versions all saved on my old computers in my basement. It’s so funny to see how things change over the years. (I should throw up one of the old school designs and see what people think! )

Setting up your web site and buying a domain is easy now a days and only takes a few bucks, but if your old school, you probably have some stories to tell! What are some of your oldest domains and how long did it take you to go from a free hosted web site, to your own domain?

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