How to Optimize Landing Pages For Google Adwords




Create
Better Landing Pages
The
Problem
When  creating a Google AdWords campaigns, marketers
typically spend most of their time developing their advertisements as well as researching
their keywords and their intended audience. There is often little or no thought
given to where their visitors will be sent when the advertisement does its job
and generates a click. It is common for many less experienced marketers to send
the internet user to the home page of their site, with the hope and/or
conviction that the website will do the rest of the work.
This is
a costly mistake however, since these marketers are overlooking an extremely
vital part of their AdWords campaigns: the landing page a.k.a, the squeeze
page, or lead capture page. A great landing web page is just as essential as
having an excellent ad, targeted keywords, as well as a good strategic bidding
process. By producing an efficient landing page, using good images, colors and
sales copy, marketers can increase conversions, which will make their campaigns
more competitive as well as rewarding.
Bases to
Cover
When
crafting a landing page I have learned to keep in mind the importance of making
it specific to the advertisement that is sending out the website traffic.  It
must be congruent: the colors images and keywords should match, also the
landing page should look similar to the actual sales page or the product or the
homepage for the website that is being promoted.
Just
like everything else, the landing page has to be very targeted. If a visitor clicks
an ad with the  expectation of  a black and gold video mock up, after that you
had better see to it that your landing page has just that. There is absolutely
nothing worse than having a consumer who is ready and willing to buy, and yet
cannot access what he is looking for.  It is akin to burning money in
my honest opinion.
Traps to
Avoid
It is
important to keep things simple and keep clicks to a minimum.  For
myself, the function of my advertisement is to obtain clicks. The role of my
landing page is to transform those clicks directly either into leads or sales.  It follows that I must  ensure that my traffic converts within 3
clicks or less. If the internet user has to click more than 3 times to purchase
the product more often than naught I will probably lose the sale.  This
has happened to me more times than I would like to admit.  Ideally I
try to get my visitors to click just two times, as soon as they see the
advertisement, as well as when on my landing page to get to the sales page.
That’s it: more clicks equals less sales.
It is
also vital to remember that internet users are impatient. You need to give them
what they want with as little effort as possible from their side. For this
reason, it is necessary to constantly to hold your original purpose
(conversions) firmly in mind, as well as to refer to the specific keyword
phrases as well as calls to action in your advertisement, when creating a
landing page.
Close
the Deal Before the Deal
The
landing page or capture page is where you will certainly use the bulk of your
copywriting skills to complete the sale. As said previously, the objective of
the  advertisement is to obtain the
click, while the goal of the landing page is to get the sale. The landing page
where you have all the space you need to discuss all the advantages and features
of  the product or service you wish to
promote. With this being said, it is important to bear in mind that your
landing page is your sales page.
Your ad
did its work by creating sufficient interest in the potential customer to click
through to your lead capture page. Now is the time to hook and attract the
prospect right into your landing page to finish the sale. The best method to do
this is through a good headline. This heading must hook the prospect by
interesting her self-involvement. What’s in it for her? Just how will your
product and services benefit her?  Focus on feelings and outcomes…
how does she feel now?  How will she feel when your product solves
her problem?
From
here on you can elaborate on your headline in your landing page with even more
advantages for your prospect, as well as support these advantages with the
functions of your product or service. Do this throughout your sales copy and
also with subheadings. Ensure you maintain the possibility interest and also
attempt to develop some excitement in your services or product.
Use
plenty of bullets and listings in your copy to show your advantages and
functions. Bullets are basically small headlines. Bullets can be made use of to
summarize all the advantages and benefits that your potential customer will
certainly get from your service or product. It is here that you can create a
sense of need in the prospect by summarizing all the problems they are
experiencing and that your product or service can resolve.
Headlines,
subheadings as well as bullets are really vital facets of your landing page. As
I stated above, internet users are impatient and spontaneous. They often tend
to be in a hurry and also want instant results and instant gratification.
Therefore, they usually just scan the web page. If a surfer is scanning your
web page, they will only read your headline, subheadings, and bullets. It is
important to present all the advantages to the potential buyer included in your
headlines, subheadings, as well as bullets. Obviously there are also internet
users that will certainly review your entire web page, so you will certainly
need to have great copy, which gives better information as well as all the
information the prospect needs to decide.
Images
are indispensable, especially if you are offering an item. In this case make
sure the web surfer gets an excellent, clear image the product. Since your
visitors cannot touch the product it is necessary that they get as much visual
details as they require. Your sales copy should support your images and your
photos need to support your copy. The vital thing is that the landing page is
focused on what the prospect desires. So if the prospect is information on
getting backlinks, then when they click your ad they need to go to a landing
page where they only see photos of mock ups for your video course or ebook plus
well written copy that describes the features as well as benefits of your
ecourse.
The Call
to Action
Eventually,
at some point you will need to convert this interested visitor into a buyer, if
not a lead.  Having said this, it is
absolutely vital to have your calls to action CTA very visible.  The buy button or lead capture form must be
visible near the top of the page and the bottom of the page so the prospect
will immediately see the next step.  I
cannot over emphasize how important this subtle detail is.
Everything
should be visible and obvious and all should be done on the landing page itself.
Do not ask the potential buyer through to one more page and also try to close
the sale there.  Of course this only works if your selling your own
products.  
If your
an affiliate you will need to use your landing page as a bridge to the official
sales page, since google no longer allows you to put your affiliate links
directly in your ad.  But even when using the squeeze page as a
bridge to the actual sales page, you want to convert the buyer even before they
get to the official sales page.  That way they will just scroll
straight to the buy button and pay for the product or service.
Some
Parting Words
Landing
Page optimization is a super important component of any Google AdWords
campaign. The key is to spend the very same amount of time, if not more, developing
your squeeze page as you would do producing your advertisement as well as researching  your keywords. Producing effective landing
pages allows you to boost the total profitability of your campaigns and can be
the decisive factor in determining if your campaign is a success or a complete
flop.

Naturally
this directly affects profits, since by improving the effectiveness of your
campaign can also give you more bidding options for each search phrase and also
produce more web traffic. In the end, optimizing your landing page is an
important part of your internet search engine marketing and must not be
disregarded.