As many of our readers here have no doubt seen, SEOmoz was the first participant in Roberta Rosenberg's Landing Page Makeover Clinic. Scott's been hard at work today generating a landing page that helps to meet these criteria and with a bit of luck, we can use Roberta's assistance to ramp up premium membership. Since this is SEOmoz and we pride ourselves on transparency, I'll start with a few stats from Indextools to help illustrate the issue:
The above stats show stats from <undisclosed time period> with a conversion rate of ~0.14%... fairly pathetic
Extrapolating from these numbers, we can see that increasing SEOmoz's conversion rate even a fraction of a percent would yield an incredible increase in potential income for the company - far greater, in fact, than a huge boost in rankings at the engines. If Google sent SEOmoz 10,000 extra visitors per day, it wouldn't be nearly as valuable as increasing our current conversion rate by 1/2 of 1 percent.
And that point, brings me to the purpose of this post...
While the practice of organic search engine optimization and Internet marketing in general is to attract visitors who are likely to convert (interested in our subject, searching on our topic, etc.), the conversion process is one that occasionally is overlooked by even the best in the industry. At SEOmoz, I'm definitely ready to admit that this has been a weak point for us on both our own sites and in client projects in the past.
There's some great places you can go to learn about landing page optimization in the blogosphere:
- Jon Mendez's Optimize & Prophesize
- The Eisenbergs' Grok dot com
- The MindValleyLabs Blog
- Copyblogger's Roberta Rosenberg
Landing page optimization is fundamentally different than SEO, though, which you can easily discover from reading through various posts discussing the comparisons of techniques in particular industries and niches. What works in one industry won't work in another and what works for visitors who clicked a paid search ad won't necessarily convert as well for a visitor who clicked on an organic result. The only real rule is that there are no real rules - the practice requires testing, creativity and ruthless refinement using analytics.
It's a fascinating subject and one I hope to explore more here at SEOmoz. We'll obviously be working on it for ourselves, and potentially testing a few client sites to boot.
One of the fundamental problems that I struggle against is the personal affront I take to most successful landing pages in our particular line of work. Let me share some horrifying examples:
- The SEO Elite Software download page
- The Buy the SEOBook page
- The Optilink Software sales page
The objectives at pages like these are simple:
- Appeal to base emotions like fear, jealousy and avarice
- Leverage hooks like "what the professional SEOs don't want you to know," because, naturally, if you're not ranking well, it's because of a conspiracy to prevent it and not out of ignorance or lack of effort
- Mislead viewers into believing that the "secret" will make it "easy" to achieve all their goals
- Motivate with hype and sound bites rather than educating and relying on an intelligent decision
This type of marketing copy is damn effective. Aaron Wall told me his conversion rate after switching to a page format like this has sent his sales skyrocketing to unbelievable proportions. Yes, this saddens me, but it's also inspiring - if they can do it, so can we, right?
Well, maybe. But we've got to be willing to sacrifice a bit of self-respect and dignity to get it done.
UPDATE: A couple of points of note - we promised a price raise on SEOmoz premium memberships today, but we're actually going to wait a week until Jane's brilliant, long-awaited premium article on social media marketing is released. At that time, the price will rise to $49/month & $399 for a one year membership. I'll try to make notice of this on the homepage and the premium page tomorrow.
We need to think more outside of SEO. Think supermarket. Nothing there is coincidence. It's one big landing page. Conversion is crucial in an industry with low profit margins such as grocery retail, for example. The layout of a store has been planned, tested and refined over and over again. Think about it: How does a typical customer "flow" through a store? What is he/she supposed to see on their journey through the store and catch their eye? (Look at the shelves next time you go: Where do they put their best-selling/most expensive items?) Where do they put the free samples of new merchandise? How do they get you to come back for more? Think of a landing page as a grocery store.
I love that analogy because it is oh so true! The majority of stores that you go to have the same general layout because we humans are creatures of habit.
Has anyone gone into a store when it is being remodeled? You spend so much time wandering around confused trying to find everything you came for, that you just resign yourself to a few "important" items, and by the time you do find them, you just bolt to the checkout, and swear to yourself that it's now gonna be a Safeway day whenever I need more groceries?
A good example of good "flow" to a store is Wal-Mart. They all look the same(blah) but it helps guide the customers along. Why can Wal-Mart be hated by mom and pop shops, its employees, and yet still open up stores in Cancun and other "remote" places where they honestly shouldn't be? They have everything you could possibly need in a one stop shop...and they are dirt cheap! Excuse me, reasonably priced...Sorry I get money every time I endorse a company positively...cha ching! Besides that though they make so much money off of people and their impulse buying! "Call's to Action" are everywhere you walk, always bombarding you with more and more products. People walk in for a T-Shirt, and end up leaving with the shirt, a new digital camera, some 5 dollar movies, and a big screen on layaway. I am not saying it is a perfect example, but it gets the job done pretty good for the Mart. They just oversaturate themselves in the market, but that is another story for another time...
I knew there was a reason why they stuck DVD's, batteries, and even socks in giant bins right next to the checkout...
Damn you Wal-Mart! You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell!
Great analogy, especially when you consider the amount spent every year are measuring and testing the status quo.
And these aren't just short term concepts, some of the projects in this industry are formulating direction that may not be implemented for 2-5 years from now.
As shoppers, we often take grocery stores for granted, that things just get placed where there is room. In many cases, this is quite far from the truth. Not just endcaps and "lobby" areas, but in aisle placement and traffic patterns are all studied and taken into account.
Grocery stores might as well be ant farms of urban planning.
Aaron Wall's sales page is horrifying, huh Rand? You do know I wrote that particular page, don't you?
All I can say is, you should have seen what it looked like before (and I'm sure you did), and you ought to see how much Aaron now makes in a day from book sales. A hired copywriter's task is to make the client happy, and Aaron is definitely happy.
People buy things based on emotion Rand, whether you like it or not. They may rationalize it with logic, but that comes second, not first.
Am I a fan of the long sales letter format? Actually no. I don't use it for any of my own projects. But the reason I rewrote Aaron's sales page for him was because it was really bad before, especially in presentation. I think the next step for Aaron would be to try a different approach, but he's making too much money at this point to care.
I saw both sales letters and I can say that yours is so much better.
The problem, at least from a professional SEO perspective, is that Aaron is implying his book offers the same value proposition a professional SEO consultation would give you.
This is like saying that buying your furniture and having it transported and installed at your place, is the same as buying and transporting all the parts; and assembling them by following the instructions of a manual.
It is working for Aaron and I am glad he is doing so well.
A lot of "professional" SEOs have started their careers with Aaron's book, so that implication is justified if people use it as a training manual, right?
Again though, I did a *rewrite* of the sales letter, not a start from scratch. The theme was already in place, and frankly, it's compelling.
Brian,
I agree with you. It is funny thing is that I blogged about this Yesterday, and I used Aaron SEObook as an example.
I do not feel as bad as Rand with respect to the sales letter. I think the most important aspect, as you said, is that it is working. The message is compelling to the readers he wants to attract.
Rand might not like it, I might not be moved by it, but I guess we are not the type of customer Aaron is looking ;-)
Brian, I think Rand meant "horrifying" in the generic, long-form-pages -are-always-horrifying, sense. As you said, it works and we're going to attempt to create something as effective as what you've made for Aaron.
Brian - I'm expressing my own personal distaste, not criticizing your work, which has clearly done amazing things for Aaron's conversion rate. :)
I don't think that we should get caught up in those long landing pages that seem to be scary. The important advice is to make a landing page that stays on message and provides minimal opportunity for leakage.
Take this example of a short landing page this page is strong – it has a single message, it bullet points the features first, offers a guarantee to protect the e-mail, and uses the right column to reiterate the features. Unfortunately it does not call out benefits.
When you are redesigning your pages for conversions remember that you don’t need lots of information, you only need the important information: How does the user benefit, what does the user get, and how the user is protected.
I’m really curious to see how much sales does a page like this generate. I'd add some "cool features" these landing pages have in common:
I blogged about it some time ago
You got it, it works. And damn how it works. :D
Oh dear God, when you put it like that, they sound even worse because every point you mention is true!
We are going to test at least one of these cheese-tastic long form sales pages. It's actually somewhat painful to write the copy for them, but the numbers don't lie, they tend to convert very, very well. We'll see.
Scott something tells me the SEOmoz landing page will still end up looking a lot less spammy than most. I can't see you using every one of these tactics even of you do use a few.
I'm looking forward to all the red and yellow highlighting, of course.
I'm working on the world's first monkey-rowed speedboat. SEOmoz, got anything relevant?
Wicked post, thanks Rand.
Monkeys like two things: Bananas and Meth. Supply them with enough of both and that boat'll go.
Land page optimization more rewarding than SEO? Why not do both? Run some multivariate testing on your organic traffic? :)
Before you ask...no, you don't have to risk your rankings.
Of course both are important. If you don't bring any traffic, landpage optimization is worthless and if you spend $XXXX in Adwords buying traffic but your landing page is not good enough, your conversion rate will be low and therefore, waste money.
"Well, maybe. But we've got to be willing to sacrifice a bit of self-respect and dignity to get it done."
Don't do it, period. Those landing pages are an abomination and an eye sore.
I also appreciate SEOmoz allowing us to take a brief look at your landing page make-over review. We have been tooling around with landing page optimization, but suffer from analysis-paralysis.
With our landing page optimization exercises, we are hoping to increase the number of quotation requests that we receive daily, thereby hoping to improve our sales as well. Improving our sales and closing techniques is a whole other story.
We have offered a stripped down version of our online quotation request, and an expanded version as well.
The stripped down version accounts for approximately 10 to 1 on quote requests.
Great article, and thanks for sharing.
I have to agree fully with Classa here. The appeal of SEOMoz for people in this community is that you guys stay away from that format. I think the demographic of users that you are trying to appeal to see past that style of landing page.
You have to keep in mind that the long form, sales letter style landing page is not intended to attract people who are already involved in SEO or aware of our brand. It aimed moreso at informing and attracting the VAST numbers of people who engage in somekind of online marketing effort but are, for the most part, totally uneducated or very green to SEO.
For those people, even the blog posts and comments might go over their heads, it's necessary to make an emotional plea to convince them of the value and importance of SEO and our products in particular.
I agree these kinds of sales pages can be painful to endure for a ssavvy reader, but they do have an audience and they do tend to produce results. But then again, we will be doing some testing to see if that theory holds true.
"It aimed moreso at informing and attracting the VAST numbers of people who engage in somekind of online marketing effort but are, for the most part, totally uneducated or very green to SEO ... I agree these kinds of sales pages can be painful to endure for a ssavvy reader, but they do have an audience and they do tend to produce results."
Yet - these kinds of sold people will be painful to endure for a saavy membership?
I look to the future, and see hordes of unwashed barbarians storming into our peaceful village. Where's the Conan who will save us?
Even as a copywriter, I have mixed feelings about online sales letters. I think of them as juicy "pulp fiction" style writing that can produce spectacular results. Just like a blog post has to be interesting and on-topic, or a successful Hollywood film has to have tension, climax and release... the current best practices for a winning sales letter are to pander to mass human emotions and desires - often in a very blunt way - in order to leverage them effectively.
I know for a fact that these letters "work" for now, but I can't help but wonder if there ever will be a better way or a new paradigm. I wonder what "Copywriting 2.0" will look like?
I don't like them either, but they work. I've used this style of landing pages for my clients many times over the years, and they always perform better than anything else.
Most of these type of landing pages are based on succesful direct mail letters from years ago. Pre-internet, direct mail campaigns were the only way to really test advertising. Directmail people tested, tested, and tested, and went with what worked best.
If you get someone with this type of marketing, BUT then you follow up with a great product and great service, you will keep your customers..just like any other. This method has been proven again and again to get people to take action.
I'm glad to hear that SEOmoz is doing so well -- I've been away for a while working on actual work and haven't been able to comment as I'd normally like to.
A note about the increase in price -- if you can get it, go for it! I'd love to see stats on lost members though (openness and all). I guess that only puts the idea of a premium membership off the table for me further. When I first hit SEOmoz I desperately tried to get 150 points in a month, but woe that never happened.
I know you've added value to the premium membership, but it's not readily apparent. The idea of the Q&A is cool -- but it just took me a dozen clicks to find it, and it's not sorted in a way that is interesting or usable for me. Hit me with the social proof from the start, right on the homepage '15 new answers this week in the Q&A). Consider a box on the homepage with 'Premium Content Members are Enjoying This Week:' with new articles, answers and more right there. Show me what I can't have and make me want it. That's one way of appealing to my base emotions (jealousy) without threatening me outright.
Good ideas, Bud!
You guys are definitely rainmakers in your industry and I love following your success. Keep on!
I think that your search visits are looking for something specific from one of your articles. That said, I'm not surprised why you are not converting as high. If you were getting traffic through keyword: search marketing subscription or the like, then you should be converting.
I also think that it takes a few times to land on SEOmoz organically before someone fills out a sub. Throw in the $100= sub fee, then the numbers just goes down.
Instead of a one-page scare tactic, you might consider:
1) 30-day free trial (with or without credit card)
2) Summary available logged out, full article logged in
In both cases, you capture email at the very least. You're now in full control of getting the same visitor to come back multiple times and build trust. You can also promote your services to then and ask them to pay.
- David
hi rand,
If you want people to sign up for your tools and articles, you need to show them how it will make them more money in their business or for their sites. At present it's not completely clear how it will make a return on investment. People see information available on forums for free and can't understand the value or difference in your service. At least that was my impression at first. I signed up because I do SEO for a living and value the sounding board and info since I don't care for conferences.
I'm looking forward to seeing your results on the landing page experiments.
You may also want to provide more substantial info for paid members than is available in the general blog. Something on a more regular basis. It seems like the general public gets information all the time but the premium members get large but very infrequent updates.
Make your case for ROI and show the value and people will sign up. If they don't, it's because they can't afford it or justify the expense. Good luck!
I must admit that I too have focused most of my efforts on SEO rather than SEM... so it's good to see that SEOmoz is starting to discuss this sort of stuff more as it forces encourages me to get off my butt and learn more about it.
A couple of months ago Shoemoney used landing pages as a topic on his Net Income show - How landing pages can make or break you
Just like everyone else I can't wait to see the end results.
This is a great post! This is exactly what I'm working on. This is exaclty what is so cool about SEOmoz. It seems that whatever you're working on there's something on their site that is relevant to what you are doing!
Ah ha. I was hoping I didn't stay up late for nothing. Love your posting hours Rand, fits well within mine and just perfect for right before bed.
I believe testing is the ultimate key here. Try one thing, keep what works and then try something else. It can be confusing since the general rule, "if it ain't broke don't fix it," still applies in Landing Page optimization.
A/B split testing, heatmaps, clickmaps, G's Website optimizer ...
They are all good landing page testing tools that can help to improve the conversions on nearly any type of site.
I agree with you about the pages that seem to work so well, they are ugly and I can tell they are selling me something. For me, it just doesn't work, but I can see how the average user would be blown away by some of them. Aarons is a good example and I have always wondered why he structured that page in that manner, now I know.
I am glad you put your site out there to get a review, some links and feedback from other industry pros about the layouts and possible hangup's your visitors might encounter.
Keep up the good work Rand, hopefully I'll see you at 1am tomorrow morning!
Changing the price at the same time you are making other changes to increase conversions will make it more difficult to see what is working and what is not. Keeping all the variables the same while changing another one is very difficult.
The problem with a lot of landing pages is that they lose trust very quickly because they just look so spammy. Even the Seobook one looks spammy to me although I have no doubt it converts well.
Another key point is to not just use the same landing page for all countries. I know this might sound strange/ignorant/insulting but people from the UK seem much less spam tolerant in terms of landing page styles than other places, we simply don't see sales letter style pages anywhere other than spam sites and nobody I know from the UK would ever buy from one.
I seem to remember suggesting geo targetting to Brian Clark when he redesigned the seobook landing page.
That is interresting mad4. Everything I read says sales letter style landing pages convert best.
There was an article I read, i can't remember who wrote it now ( I know this would probably be more creddible if I could link to it here ) but they did a bunch of testing with different layouts, different colors, styles and the result was that the sales letter style converted best of all.
I think I saw the same article or perhaps something similar. I want to say it was on MarketingExperiements where they tested long vs short copy, but that may not be right.
I've generally seen the same advice about sales letter style landing pages. I used to think they all just looked spammy, (Ok, I still do) but after you see enough you figure there's a reason why they all look the same and it's because the work.
This might also be an issue of us being more savvy than typical. We look at these pages and because we understand what the page is trying to do we notice the tricks like navigation and theemotional appeals to fear. The average person doesn't look at the page the same way we do, though and are more likely to convert.
Don't forget laziness. People WANT to believe that there is some way to get rich without hard work, and "For the low low price of $29.95 all their dreams will come true!" Without further effort on their part.
Absolutely. That's why people still buy into some of the email scams sent their way and why people still want to believe if you just stuff a few keywords in the right place you're done optimizing it.
It's the same reason people take diet pills instead of eating right and exercising.
I think there's lots of overlap between the two. A good landing page should benefit customers and lead them to what they want. It hardly needs to be said that a good SEO should be building pages like that anyway. It's a virtuous circle. I'm not sure that there's much difference between the needs of SEM as opposed to pure (onesite) SEO.
I have a hunch that Google are starting to track behaviour on sites anyway (how long they stay before they click 'back' to the SERPS). If that's true then there'll be a natural reward for compelling pages that keep users onsite.
An important point that needs to be kept in mind is matching the seller, the message, the product/service, the buyer, and the need/desire.
In this industry alone, we know this. Price is relative... one can find SEO services for $300 a month... or less, as well as $300 an hour... or more. And in both cases, you can find clients who are extremely pleased and satisfied with their purchase.
So getting all of those pieces sorted out and matching that up to the price, is really what dictates the style of the landing page.
Would you use the same landing page for a spur of the moment purchase compared to a lifetime commitment?
What about a B2B situation versus a B2C?
What about a product costing $29 versus $299 versus $2,999 versus $299,999?
Maybe. But maybe not. Like anything else, you may get the round peg in the square hole, but you'll never know for sure which is optimal until you test both.
I am so pleased to see you give this topic the attention it deserves. A good landing page can have an enormous impact on conversions, a poor one can be money down the loo. It's really that simple, and it depends on both the market and the target market, though the fact can easily be generalised across most industries actively participating in online sales today simply from diverse published research. Thanks.
Rand, I think you should add the Internet Marketing Center (MarketingTips.com) to your list of sites using spammy landing pages. I posted on their blog once and asked them if they were so reputable why they weren't going to be attending an SES conference. No response. Go figure.
-Wildman
500 premium members? Math, anyone...
I can only imagine 2007 finance report improve over 2006 :-)
Landing page optimisation fascinates me.
5 years ago I ran a very successful french rentals site (which has since been purchased from us and ruined so I'll not link to it) and we played with landing page optimisation a great deal.
Our biggest success came when we placed our big ugly enquiry form (the goal of our operation) slap bang in the middle of the page.
It wasn't pretty. However the summary of the property was at the top of the page and the description was below the form.
So to learn about the property they had to scroll past the form on every page.
We found familiarty with a form is great for generating enquiries.
Our referrals went through the roof
Can any one of you genious people explain the steps for landing page optimization.
Like in organic we consider Title, Description, H1,Keyword density,inbound links etc.
Same as in Landing page optimization what are the important factor and any tool to check this.
Wonderful post to bring up. Getting traffic is certainly important, but getting visitors to act is paramount to success. We definitely want to concentrate on powerful "calls to action" to help increase our conversion rates. I like the fact that you brought up increasing your conversion rate would be more valuable than increasing the visitor count. Concentrating on core numbers like that really help increase the value of each and every page on a website.
So, there´s a follow up to this suggestions?
Please, answer.
Kind of a bit late to the game in responding to this, but felt it would be worth .02 just in case. I agree Rand, that the examples you've given are some pretty damn cheesy pages and the fact is - they will be an affront to many. People like yourself for example - would never buy from a page like this.
However, if your intent is to build a base, I say - do whatever works best to get it done - as long as you stay within the realm of truthfulness. You need not worry about the cheese factor, as long as it accomplishes the means to an end. At the end of the day, the only thing you really need to be concerned with - and that which should make you sleep easy is that although you serve up a somewhat cheesy landing page, SEOmoz has the good sto back up the promise - and that's what counts.
I would just like to say that I've just signed up for the premium membership but not because of the sign up page which was a nightmare to navigate... way too much info and so ugly.... So please strike me off the stats for new sign ups (because of the new and unimproved signup page.)
I've been visiting semMoz for years and now my Search Engine Marketing business in Sydney is taking off I can afford to spend some cash with seoMoz. Best pennies I'v spent in years!
It's also terribly hard for me to disregard design to raise conversion rate. There is always a line between effective landing pages and long term and loyal customers, specially if you are selling a service and not a product.
You don't necesserily need to motivate with hype, motivating people to make the intelligent decision can be equally effective, at least in my experience. For example you don't have to use a title like " What the SEOs are not telling you - The easy road to Rankings" but you can use something like "If you are serious about your website we can help, if you are looking for Magic Ranking Pills you will have to wait for an FDA approval" or something not as stupid as this but something that will catch the visitors attention and make him read your ad copy.
We've finally stumbled onto one of my favourite SEO hobbies. Copyblogger has been great for setting a foundation on landing page optimisation, from there (and as you mentioned) it's all creativity, IA and analytics.
I have no problem accepting clients put great importance on maximising sales conversions but losing face (frankly coming off as a bad 90's salesman) to do it?
Can't wait for SEOmoz's landing page, I suspect those ads Mystery Guest published may come in handy... :D
Great post Senor Rand because sadly most people forget about the "after" SEO procedures...once we get the traffic, are we compelling the user to stay? And convert to a "sale"? And even if they don't convert to a "sale", are they leaving informed? Or happy enough to revisit the site at a later date? Or are we just bringing in mass amounts of traffic to a page that really has no Call's to Action? And overall causes the user to freak out, back out and never return again? That's a worst case scenario but you get the idea. Senor David is right about why seomoz has become so popular though...Quality information for beginners, novices, and the elite alike.
Everyone should always remember that if you want to keep people coming back you need to make sure that your site is either fun or informative, which graciously you seomozzers provide both for your users. When the site is either/or, and better yet has both aspects to it, you find that your unique visitors will increase as well. Off of word of mouth because it will always be the most "reliable" cheap marketing around. Until we get more telepathic powers that is...
I know I always recommend the site to everyone I meet because I support my fellow Pacific Northwesters, and the other sites honestly do not compare in how the knowledge is dispensed. Just too bland honestly...like eating plain bread when I need my PB&J!! Thanks for my PB&J seomoz!!! Now if I can only get some milk...
I don't know why that concept is so hard for many people to grasp...Make it fun, and they will come...If they learn, they will return...I like those catchy phrases I just came up with...And I'm selling catchy phrases and jingles as a side job...Anyone?
Just kidding...or am I?
Does anyone know what the five fingers said to the face?
Ah well back to the coffeepot...
Slaaaaaap!
The marketing for SEO Elite reads like the worst kind of info-mercial. You'd only need to chage a couple of words and it could be a pyramid scheme selling steak knives. Notsomuch with Mr Wall - I think what he's selling has genuine value, despite the hyperbole.
I just don't know with that kind of marketing; it might boost your sales in the short term but I honestly don't believe it creates loyal customers, professional respect and long term growth.
Chris - yeah, Aaron's isn't nearly as bad, which is why his doesn't have a link condom on it :)
I agree with Chris. If you put up one of these low quality sales pages you are going to be targetting people who probably don't know anything about SEO, rather than appealing to people who are already involved.It depends on who you want to get.
Personally I feel what makes SEOmoz better than SEO Book is you guys have started a little community here. SEO Book has cut back on its community by removing the URL in the comment post.
In my oppinion, the question you want to be asking yourself is will filling the site full of people who probably don't know about SEO decrease the quality of the site.One thing that may help you incease sales is to make it more obvious what your site is on the home page. I remember seeing you guys on CSS Remix a while back and thought you were just another SEO company. Its only several months later that I have realised what this site is all about.
You have been successful in such a short period of time because you have put the effort into making a real quality site that you could spend days browsing through. Is it a good idea to go all tacky on us?
David,
I would argue that SEOmoz's value proposition is to provide a community of experts that provide a solid value to the beginner - to intermediate participants in the field. Regardless of the way SEOmoz goes with their landing page they are probably intending to target the first time visitor, or newer visitors that have invested time/trust into the community.
Great Blog Post just in time before my making a landing page for a website.
Waiting to see the changes made on the landing page of seomoz and also the long awaited premium article on social media marketing is to be released just in time my premium membership expiring. :(
I’m curious to see how much sales a page like this generates since I know when I come across a page like this I never buy anything from it just because I rarely trust it.
So does this mean you'll have a post letting us know how it goes - either way whether it works or not?
Rand,
Please remember that you are appealing to a smarter audience. Your message brings the people you want in. Send the wrong message and you will get back the wrong people. Those that relate to the wrong message.
I'd personally hate to read comments from people here asking: "Do I need to remove all my HTML code so that Google can find my page?"
conversion is the single most effective tool for measuring success for any search marketer. landing page testing with effective copy, graphics can just do wonders for improving conversion rates. I consider the marketing hype or story build-up as very important factor in improving conversions. Also, short copy in bullets with benefits of the product work very well. Low on graphics and high on effective copy does the trick.
For capturing leads, B2B, a form on the page itself helps improve conversion rates and for B2C a single Click to Action button prominently placed in the center should help raise conversions. Again, the goal of search should be more on conversions than anything else.
Hi Rand,
I wonder if it is possible to serve different landing pages, at random,
and then to measure the conversion rates for each one?
It might speed up the learning curve, a little like parallel processing.
Good luck
colliman,
That is what you do with Google website optimizer or with the really expensive offering from offermatica.com. It is called A/B testing.
I find Seomoz very true and Honest. I am looking forward to join the Premium Subscription the next month. But i am really sad to see that the Prices are going up. I am a student i really cannot afford its service at this time. Even then the tools that are given by Seomoz are just great and also free.. Thanks to Seomoz for there contribution towards SEO.
Harsha
I'm looking forward to seeing what you guys do to try to improve this. I am fascinated by conversion rates but rarely have the time (or feel like I have the time) to set the tests up properly. Now that we are starting to sell some products and tools via our website, I will have to start to care!
Great article thanks. Rand your audience is most mid to advance SEO's, Aaron Walls sells an Ebook for most SEO beginners. So that type of landing page won't work for you.
We SEO's don't want to read that type of hype, you have built credibility and trust at seomoz.org and the type of audience coming to your site now are looking for that. So don't loose the perspective. If you want that build another site and do it.
As long as what is said is truth I doubt it will scare off anybody.
You should lower the price and/or offer a free trial membership.
Kaib, maybe / maybe not. Lower prices don't always increase conversion rates, especially in the case of exclusive / high value comodities like this. The real goal is probably to convince people emotionally that they want/need this, and they can't get it anywhere else, and that the benefit will be greater than the cost. And of course to whip out the plastic NOW!!
sometimes price is not everything, if anything having a premium price tag weeds out the customers you would rather not have
No to lowering the price. Its not that much at all in reality. I paid $299 for the full year, and would be willing to pay A LOT more if there were additional value added services (hint,hint).
The high price point gives the impression of a valuable service. I wouldn't want it if it was offered $5 a month.
At the most, you can have a more "entry-level" membership that is less expensive to get more people into your sales funnel.
Maybe it only allows access to certain benefits. It would be easier to upgrade someone later to the higher priced services, once they are a paying customer.
Then make some higher level ones...maybe include a mastermind group with Rand, monthly calls, etc.
There are those of us that would pay several thousand a year for a quality resource like that.
I completely agree. We paid for the year and are asking the guys to sort out an agency membership. The more value is, the more expensive it should be. Sometimes the price indicates value...