Avoiding the 7 Deadly Sins of Landing Page Design
Tim Ash, SiteTuners.com
tim@sitetuners.com
http://www.sitetuners.com/downloads.html
http://www.landingpageoptimizationbook.com

Your landing pages have problems and they're ugly. You have conversion issues. Deal with it. Learn from this and make them better. You've been ignoring the issue, your conversion rate is low, and you don't care. You should. Let's fix them.

Cost per click has to keep up with cost to convert, so as the clicks cost more you MUST convert more visitors.

Upping conversion rate by 20% will double your profits.

A camel is a horse designed by committee -- your customer should be designing your website. Not IT. Not marketing. Not your boss. Your customer. Repeat after me...

HIPPO effect -- highest paid person's opinion, over-rules sanity and breaks sites/landing pages everyday.

Smaller page, two big buttons, some logos down left side, limited copy on the main part of the page.

Cut anything below the fold. Keep it to one pane tall, large buttons, cut text.

Need to have tech to allow for large tests of your landing pages, multi-variants.

Positive interaction between headline and picture is key. They make each other better. It's not the picture, it's not the headline, it's the context.

Google Website Optimizer is a great tool for doing multi-variant testing in 30 minutes by adding some JavaScript.

Tweak in headlines, numbers of photos, and check the combinations in Google Website Optimizer.

A/B split testing is easiest -- split traffic between 1 or more new versions. At random show visitors one of 'em, and go with the one that gets the best results.

Tim Ash recommends Krug's "Don't Make Me Think" at #oms09

StephanieSAM #0ms09 Design your website to 1025 px. Manage to the highest common monitor usage and ignore the rest at the edges.

Your home page is a landing page -- JennyLemmons: "Home pages serve many masters: main function should get users to self-select into a role" Tim Ash #oms09

7 Deadly Sins of Landing Page Design

1: Unclear call to action. Make it clear and easy, what to do? Anything that's not easy/clear is losing you money. Any hesitation about what to do is costing you money. Don't make people think!

2: Visual distractions: where are you supposed to look? Make it clear. Entry pop ups? Just say no. Avatars popping up to chat with you? Kill 'em. Or test it, don't waste time.

3: Too much text -- do you expect them to read everything? Kill all text that's not 100% needed.

Nobody reads on the web -- call to action, a few sentences, lead them to what needs to be done/what you want them to do. Paragraph text does not get read.

JennyLemmons: "nobody reads on the web... Paragraphs on web are like Charlie Brown's teacher voice" -Tim Ash #oms09

halvorson: People scan *before* they read. They'll happily read relevant content that's well-constructed, contextual, actionable. #oms09

4: Lack up up-stream continuity. Where did they come from, what's the context of their visit from blog post/PPC ad, etc. Fulfill your promise when they hit your landing page.

5: Long forms. Keep your forms short, sweet. Only collect what's absolutely necessary to complete the current transaction. Every field you add to a form is a drop in conversion.

6: Invisible Risk Reducers -- Do I feel safe to act? Don't put trust symbols below the fold.

7: Lack of Trust Indicators -- Why should I trust you? Need endorsements, logos, testimonials, short, other people had a good outcome. I don't want to be the test case. As seen on, as used by, trusted by, logos of schools/states down the left side, who else loves this product/service?

Any media mention confers a more positive reaction/attachment to your brand or product.

tim@sitetuners.com
sitetuners.com/downloads.html
http://www.landingpageoptimizationbook.com