What Is a Landing Page?
This month, I’m covering profiting in the recession AND how to create landing pages for your business in the Monthly Mentor Club print newsletter.
Normally I like to mail out the newsletter on the 10th, but I’m going to be mailing tomorrow (the 7th) for November for a couple of reasons. First of all, for some reason the mailing service I use was slow last month and the issues came late (not sure why this happened). The second reason is I’m going to be up in New Hampshire the next couple of days with Glenn Livingston and Fred Gleeck creating some new audio products through Monday.
Here is an excerpt about what a landing page is. The newsletter goes into much more detail about tests I’ve done on my landing pages…and what is working RIGHT NOW.
Everything must be tracked and tested to produce the best selling materials. You’re going to find in your tests that the best pulling website is almost never your normal home page. It’s a unique landing page you develop for the campaign you’re working on.
This is most common with Google Adwords, but it really applies to ALL of your marketing. The more specialized and targeted your landing page is, the higher conversion you can create.
For example, I work with clients who have multiple landing pages for the SAME product. I’m not talking just a few changes. I’m talking about a completely different headline and intro. I’m talking about the benefits we focus on being different. Once you get into bullets, you would see that many of them are used on all landing pages, but they are presented in a different order.
Again, even though landing pages apply to all forms of online advertising, I’m going to use Adwords as the example because it’s easier to explain.
In an Adwords campaign you will be using many different keywords. You’ll find if you research the market (possibly using surveys through Adwords), that they have different mindsets based on what keywords they’re using.
In general the shorter the search phrase, the earlier they are in the buying process. For example someone just thinking about golden retrievers might type in “golden retrievers” so they can learn more information. Someone closer to finding one might type, “Golden retriever Indiana breeder” to find a breeder in their area (yes, I have golden retrievers on my mind since I just got a new puppy recently).
The closer someone is to a buying decision, the more specific and focused they become on their searches.
You may also find that your market has a totally different mindset based on the terms they’re
searching. For example, let’s say you sold a dog training ebook. You could easily write a “general” salespiece to put on your site. But for any better conversion you could target the landing page
specifically to certain dog breeds or problems.
For example if someone was searching for housetraining you could work that into the headline
and the intro of the site (while keeping much of the information the same). For keywords centered around “biting” you could again focus the headline on that subject along with the intro and working into the more general information.
Or you could target specific dog breeds such as a landing page for “golden retriever training” or “rottweiler training.” While 95% of what you have would be the same on both pages, you might change all the photos on the page and the intro to the sales copy.
You might even find that purchasing URLs for each of those breeds ends up producing the best results (so something like “goldenretrieverdogtraining.com” may be one of your many domain names).
Even a slight change in your Adwords ad (such as the URL) can make a huge difference in the clickthrough numbers. This in turn drops your cost per visitor and the conversion you need on the landing page to be profitable.
This is why when doing Adwords you achieve your best results with small very targeted ad groups. If you have a keyword phrase in one of your ad groups that’s worth the time you will even want to break it out and put it in an ad group all by itself. This way the ad used can be specific to that keyword only.
You will find the same rule applies to the landing page. If you’re using one single landing page for ALL your Google ads, you’re likely throwing away money somewhere in the process.
This also means you could have different landing pages for all your ads. Are you running an email special to your customer only list? Well you could set up a vip.html version of your landing page with
the discount featured (and instructions for your customers not to share that link with anyone else).
Have you purchased advertising on a specific blog? If so, your headline on the landing page could mention the blog the visitor just came from and tie in your offer to that site.
We talk a lot about personalization in online marketing, and it really applies here. The tighter you can focus your site and make it appear relevant to your visitor the better you’re going to do.
That’s what landing pages are all about!
Subscribe to get the full issue now…
Related Entries:- Beginners Guide to Tracking Your Stats
- Where’s the Traffic?
- Free Multivariant Testing for Blogs
- Do You Practice Specifics?
- Copywriting…the Vital Business Skill!
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10 Responses to “What Is a Landing Page?”
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You’re right Terry. But I have recently discovered many type of landing pages. I first thought of the APX but then realized the Coduit works just as well. I’m looking forward a manual that teaches in depth on the types of landing pages and their uses and of course how to write a proper presell. Do you have any to recommend?
Landing pages are definitely a great way to build your list (and your business!). There is also a huge opportunity out there in doing landing pages for business owners. I’m looking forward to the newsletter so I can refine and test my current ones with your strategies.
Hi Terry,
As always, your newsletter hits right at home. I am working on a landing page now and can use all the help I can get.
I look forward to receiving it and highly recommend it to everyone.
Greg Nemer
Terry,
You’ve really hit upon (along with email) the bread and butter of a copywriter. It is through the generation and testing of multiple landing pages that you can position yourself for a wider appeal for many different audiences. Kudos for bringing this information out (and making my job easier!).
Also, congratulations on your new dog! It’s always exciting to add a new member to the family.
Terry, I have never met you but have played a CD with your dynamic info I purchased from Fred Gleeck several times. I have oodles of respect for your work. I appreciate, very much, the concise and easy to understand explanation on landing pages. I plan to stay on your list as well as sign up for your newsletter. Keep up the great work and hope the product production time is successful and look forward to seeing and having an opportunity to invest in the results.
Creating different landing pages based on what the user is searching for is definitely worth it, even though that may take up some time.
Thanks Terry for the free excerpt of the newsletter.
Great!
Welly Mulia
having a great landing page is extremely important to keep eyes on your page as long as possible!
A well build landing page could make a difference changing your site’s visitors in buyers or clients.
In PPC campaigns, landing pages help you to get a better quality score, get a better price per click and convince your users that they found what they were looking for.
I think landing pages are really important in campaigns, prices differ of your landing pages; I think as you do that that one single page for all the ads is wasting some money (not throwing, but wasting) somewhere in the process – why do I say that? It’s because your clicks could be cheaper if there are customized ads for different landing pages; bringing traffic to one page is less than bringing traffic to all pages but more than not bringing traffic at all.
I have been examinating out many of your articles and i can state pretty nice stuff. I will definitely bookmark your site.