Creating an opt-in, landing page, or “squeeze” page can seem like a daunting task at first. Watch this video to understand the four key components to creating a successful website opt-in for your top-of-funnel give-away. Oh… and let me know your thoughts!
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All the best,
–Todd
A lot of folks ask me what a landing page is. And it’s a very good question. As usual, there is a lot of conflicting, ambiguous verbiage around the definition. There’s “squeeze page”, “home page”, “web page”, and “landing page” all of which can mean the same thing–depending.
Strictly speaking a landing page is any page of your website that your visitor finds first. Because Google and other search engines usually index your entire site, that first page could be any page within your site.
However, we tend to think of our site as a journey. One that leads our visitors to the information they’re after. So we tend to think of a landing page as the first page of our site–the one that the “Home” menu selection takes our visitor to. For example, the page that is displayed when you visit the front page of my site, www.StrategicGains.com. This page tends to be the first impression and the presentation for the top of your funnel business model. It’s the most important page on your site. It’s primary function is to encourage visitors to opt-in for your free offer.
A landing page of this nature is much like a squeeze page, except that, being part of your overall site, has navigation on it so visitors can, if they choose, navigate away from your front landing page. A squeeze page would most-likely not have any navigation, with the only action visitors can take is to fill in your opt-in form.
To maximize the effectiveness of your landing page, follow these three essential tips:
1) Focus on benefits. You can list features or services, but be sure to answer the question, “so that…” when you do. For example, Widgets are bright orange and glow in the dark (feature part)… so that you can walk safely at night (benefit part).
2) Get your opt-in “above the fold” as close to the top of the page as possible.
3) Everything on that front page should be benefits of getting your free opt-in offer.
Make that page ALL about your offer so visitors will be encouraged to sign up!
In today’s world, a “real” business plan is only necessary for getting a bank loan or venture funding. Additionally, they are typically too slow and too corporate for the style of agility needed for an online business.
There are two primary resources I turn to whenever I’m looking at creating a “business plan”:
1) Guy Kawasaki, The Art of the Start.
2) Ben Mack, Think Two Products Ahead. Paying special attention to the “Legendary Branding” section.
Specifically, Ben Mack’s Lengend Platform enables you to have a “business plan” on a single page that keeps you focused and razor sharp.
As I’ve mentioned before (e.g. in SEO is an Ongoing Effort ), there are two aspects to search engine optimization (SEO): on-page and off-page. However, before we can perform that optimization, we have to know what keywords and key phrases we’re optimizing for. Therefore, all SEO efforts begin with keyword/phrase research.
Basically, you want to get a list of 100+ key phrases that are relevant to your business ranked by search volume and understand the competition for those phrases. Sounds daunting doesn’t it? Bear with me for a second. There are numerous tools out there, each with their own strengths that can help with the task. My favorites are:
These can help you drill into what people search for when they are looking for you. That’s important–your goal is to discover what people search for when they are looking for you. Not how you think about looking up your business. Think like your customer and use the tools to come up with at least 10 phrases that people would use to find you. Rank them by search volume. Now you have a foundation to start on.
There is soooo much information out there about how to create your web presence! It is confusing and often conflicting–inducing a lot of stress. Here’s a tip: don’t sweat it! Relax about the technology already. The single-most important facet of your website is the opt-in and compelling free offer. If you want to stress about something choose to stress about that. Make your offer compelling, talk about benefits and give value away in exchange for an email address. Period.
I hear you saying, “But ‘big’ sites rank better!” Bah! Total bunk–well, ranking doesn’t matter right away. What should you do with the other 47 pages of valuable content you’ve gathered and created? You’d like to create an equivalent 47 individual web pages navigable by your visitors, wouldn’t you? Take my advise–throw it all out. Keep your navigation simple. Don’t waste your time creating those individual pages full of content your visitors will never see.
Now that I’ve got you all riled up, take that content, chop it into bite-sized, digestible pieces and begin to post it on your blog. Utilize appropriate tags and categories so your viewers can sort, index and access it various ways. Schedule entries to show up later (preferably on Monday thru Friday), entering several blog entries per sitting until your content is all entered, categorized and tagged on your blog. Your readers will love you for it.
Products for sale are a different story of course, but that’s a topic for later…
There. Isn’t that easier? Say ahhhh….
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