A bad landing page will “kill” even the most targeted visitor and he will leave your website. With more PPC ad networks are putting a lot of emphasis on “Quality Score” and related pieces it becomes even more critical to have a great converting landing page.
1) Call to Action
Are you telling your visitors what to do or do you let them decide what they should do (most likely leave your website using the wrong exit)? The visitor needs to recognize immediately what the (landing) page is trying to sell him/her. Be careful not to over-do it, because you do not want your sales pitch to be lost in the middle of a freakin’ “image war”.
2) Match the look and feel of the existing website.
Under no circumstances a landing page should be totally different in design than the rest of the website. Make sure all links to other pages of your website, open a new browser window so that the landing page stays open at all times.
3) Place the Sales content above the fold.
The fold of a webpage is the point where a visitor would have to scroll down inside the browser window to see the remaining content of the landing page. Landing pages should stick to a 800 x 600 resolution to meet 99% of all screen resolutions still out there.
4) Content on Landing Pages.
If your landing page is mainly made from a sliced Photoshop image there is not much that helps to determine the quality of your landing page. It is highly critical to have actual text content on your landing pages to help Google and the other PPC networks “read” your landing page properly and to assign a quality score.
5) Page Navigation.
Make sure all links to other pages of your website, open a new browser window so that the landing page stays open at all times.
A landing page needs to be considered a part of a website. Include a link to a “Sitemap” as well as a link to an “About us” page. This type of links apparently makes the impression that the landing page is really part of an overall website and not just an “add on”.
Since the implementation of the Quality Score by PPC advertising networks many advertisers have seen their minimum bid prices go through the roof, because their landing pages do not meet the quality standards required nowadays. The “bots” of the PPC networks scan the landing pages and the surrounding pieces of the website to determine if the requirements of the quality rules are met or not. If your landing page is mainly made from a sliced Photoshop image there is not much that helps to determine the quality of your landing page. It is highly critical to have actual text content on your landing pages to help Google and the other PPC networks “read” your landing page properly and to assign a quality score.
