Kreative Webworks, Inc.

Landing Page Love… Optimization in 2013

Landing page design is more about psychology than anything else. The idea is to persuade a visitor to your page to do a very specific thing (give you their contact info, request a demo, or the holy grail of marketing… a transaction).

What is the goal of any marketing campaign?

The obvious answer would be to generate leads. Whether it is organizing an event or advertising on television or in the print media, the end goal is to generate leads that can be converted into sales. Every branding activity that a business engages in has to support this objective.

This brings us to the next question;

What is a landing page?

Simply put, a landing page is a web page that helps businesses capture leads. It is different from a Home page, which usually serve as the doorway to generic information about the various products, solutions, and services offered by the business. As such, a typical Home page has too many elements vying for the visitors’ attention. A targeted landing page will work towards compelling a visitor to take the specific and desired action.

There are several ways a visitor can be directed to your landing page:

• Search engine results link when someone runs a query for your keyword
• Clickable links in your pay per click ad or other online advertisements
• Links pointing to this page incorporated in social media posts
• Email campaigns providing links to this page
• Organic search engine optimization (SEO) campaigns throw up links to this page during relevant keyword searches

The impact of your landing page can be measured by analyzing the number of visitors who convert. Tools are available to measure the number of visitors. These tools will also provide you information on the means by which they landed there – was it your SEO strategy or your PPC campaign or your social media activities or even your direct mail campaign. 

If your campaigns are attracting a lot of visitors but none are converting into leads then the problem might lie with your landing page. The solution lies in enhancing and optimizing your landing page to maximize conversions.

Types of Landing Pages

Depending upon the objective you want to achieve, your landing page can be of two types:

• Informational landing page: If you want to present yourself as a thought leader then you can create an informative landing page, which displays content that is relevant to your visitor. Ideally, the information should center around the keyword that brought the visitor to your landing page in the first place.
• Action-oriented landing page: This is a landing page with a clear call to action.  It could be oriented towards convincing a visitor to buy a product or capture contact information through an online form. If making a sale is the objective, you have to ensure that previous interactions with you provided the visitor enough compelling reasons to do so. If capturing information is your goal then you can do so by offering valuable content.

How to Optimize Landing Pages in 2013

A good landing page needs to target a particular action. Leading visitors to your Home page, for instance, can prove confusing. The visitor might have been searching for information on a particular keyword. Now unless your Home page immediately offers information related to that keyword it is likely to leave your visitor confused. More often than not, this will result in a quick exit from your website, and thereby, a missed opportunity for you.

You need to be very clear about what you want your visitor to do once they land on your website. Only then can you increase the possibility of converting your traffic into actionable leads.

Below we have listed a few measures you should take to optimize your landing pages in 2013.

1. Singular purpose: You need to be absolutely clear about the targeted traffic and the action you desire from them. Minimize distractions.  Eliminate unnecessary copy, graphics, form ?elds, and links. Provide clear and simple call to actions. Do not confuse your visitor. Make it easy for them to focus on your call to action.
2. Short lead form: Visitors hate filling forms, so the longer your lead form the more the number of visitors who are likely to drop off. Keep it short. Capture only information that is necessary to stay in touch. 
3. Relevancy of content: Ensure that the content on your landing page is relevant to your keyword. Highlight the benefits of engaging with you for business. Ideally, your landing page headline should match the link your visitors clicked to get there.
4. Call to action: Make sure your call to action (CTA) is clearly visible. Use directional cues to direct attention to your CTA. Have CTA links spread across the page in order to make it easy for visitors to take action whenever they are ready.
5. Responsive design: Think like a user. Test your page to check whether it provides information that is relevant to the keyword they used. Is it visually pleasing? Is the messaging consistent throughout?
6. Transparency: Visitors will always be wary about sharing their contact information. Clearly state what you intend to do with the information you collect. Ease any concerns they may have about the information falling into wrong hands. Highlight your contact information such as phone number and address. Provide links to your social media handles at the bottom.
7. Test thoroughly: Creating a landing page is only the first step. Use real-time A/B or multivariate testing to continuously test the various elements on your landing page and determine what resonates best with your visitors. Improve your page accordingly.

Landing Page Webinar:

On April 25, Chuck Bankoff, Director of Web Services for Kreative Webworks will be conducting a public webinar where he will outline the common mistakes businesses make when it comes to their landing pages and why these can instantly kill your campaign conversions.  In addition he’ll also share 6 steps to effective landing page design that will help ensure your overall paid advertising success.

You can register at: www1.gotomeeting.com/register/824345448

Mobile Websites are Dead. Long Live Mobile Websites!

With web traffic from mobile devices set to surpass that from desktop computers in just a few years, how can mobile websites be dead? While mobile traffic will continue to increase, what’s coming to an end is the practice of building a separate mobile version of a site. New technology now allows us to create one website that will elegantly adapt itself for smart phones and tablets by using responsive website design.

Anyone who has tried to navigate a conventional website on their smart phone knows how frustrating that can be. Most of them just aren’t “thumb friendly”. The solution until recently has been to build a separate mobile version of a site with a simpler design, less content and larger more finger friendly navigation. The site server would recognize when a visitor is coming from a mobile device and serve up a stripped down version of your website. Since the mobile site would have a different URL (often with an “m.” added to the beginning) mobile sites have sometimes been referred to “m dot” sites. 

A responsive website will recognize the type of device you are on and adapt its size, scale and features accordingly. It can add, change or even delete features based on the capabilities of the device. This not only makes for an improved user experience but it eliminates the need to maintain and update multiple websites saving time for webmasters and marketers. You can also expect to lower your bounce rate and increase the time users spend on your site. The major search engines have made it clear that they prefer you maintain one URL, so responsive design is now the best practice for SEO as well. The initial development time for a responsive site is greater but that’s investment that’s should pay off over time. While it may or may not be worth the effort of updating existing sites to make them responsive, if you’re developing a new website it’s most definitely the way to go.

 

About Vin DeCrescenzo

Vin is the Digital Marketing Director for WSI Online Solutions. He has over 15 years of experience in Digital Marketing and is both a Direct Marketing Association and Google Adwords certified search engine marketer. Vin is a graduate of Colgate University with a Degree in English. Prior to starting his career in Digital Marketing, Vin worked in Film and Television and as a journalist in his native New York City where he still resides. He travels frequently to South Florida and throughout the country to consult with businesses and organizations on how they can benefit from Digital Marketing.

 

Your SoLoMo Digital Marketing Strategey

SoLoMo Marketing for the Savvy Business

SoLoMo (Social, Local, & Mobile) combines social media networking with mobile devices, and its location information.  SoLoMo is now bringing new marketing opportunities to businesses.  The mobile statistics in favor of SoLoMo marketing are staggering to say the least; where 90% of people researching products from their mobile phones are taking action within 24 hours of their search- This according to an article in In2 Communications. 

There appears to be a huge untapped mobile market, because few businesses have built mobile friendly websites. Even if businesses have mobile friendly websites, they are only beginning to exploit the mobile phone location marketing that is now possible with some of the latest Google mobile search engine capabilities.  Maybe some businesses are counting on SoLoMo being a passing fad on the way to the next marketing focus.  The businesses that jump in now have the advantage, while competition is at a fairly low level.

Mobile Internet users are rapidly expanding in 2013, and by the end of 2014 the number of mobile searches online is expected to exceed the wired Internet searches.  Businesses in almost every vertical market need to consider what mobile devices can do to expand their business.

Sometimes businesses are focusing in on just the social and mobile aspects, but they are still counting on the fact that people keep their smart phones with them at all times. Those mobile users are searching online where ever they happen to be.   A recent case study for a retailer demonstrates this in an article – How a Retailer found Mobile Success On Facebook Through Socks and Stories.

  What is iEmSoLoMo marketing and is it on the horizon?

So what additional marketing opportunities are on the horizon?  According to an article in Emarketer, there is a big push to expand SoLoMo further by adding email marketing that is mobile device sensitive. So I thought everyone could already get email on their mobile phones- what is this new thrust into mobile sensitive emails?  Companies worldwide are designing their emails to render differently on mobile devices- and then integrating their mobile marketing efforts with email marketing efforts. 

In addition, I think Apple should also jump on board with the Email marketing addition to SoLoMo, so that we can coin a new term and call it iEmSoLoMo.

Does this mean every time I come near a favorite restaurant or shop that I might receive a location sensitive and maybe time sensitive email for specials they might be having that day?  Will this change my mind about where to eat dinner or what items I might look for in shopping?  Maybe when several friends in my social networks talk up their recent purchases, maybe these influences will help buying decisions.  Businesses with a significant social media presence are counting on the social networking word of mouth advertising to expand their sales force.  Certainly the best sales, reviews, and referrals come from customers discussing items with other potential customers.

 

Combining Social media with Social Media Marketing

In addition to SoLoMo and Email, what happens when we combine the strengths of multiple social media marketing efforts together?  So do we have a SoSoLoMo marketing effort or something more exciting?  In a recent article in Social Media Examiner, some guidelines were given for driving more YouTube Views with Pinterest.  The article suggests that all our YouTube videos should be pinned on Pinterest. 

Certainly building an audience in one social media network and cross linking to another social network will build new opportunities. However, businesses should not ignore the building mobile device market place when exploiting Social upon Social marketing efforts.  By itself the social crosslinking can be powerful, but what happens if one pulls a Foursquare into the mix, or other social, mobile location information.   Will the opportunities get more interesting- or just more convoluted?  The opportunities may depend on what market vertical your business is in, and whether mobile location can be exploited to build marketing excitement.

Can the savvy business jump ahead of competition with high powered SoLoMo marketing efforts?  We certainly are running into more SoLoMo creative marketing efforts every day.  Don’t let your competition come up with all of the creative ideas, build some new ones into your next marketing effort- So Go So So Lo Mo!

 

Mark Colestock, a digital marketing strategist at WSI DigNet, helping businesses with their online marketing needs.

Digital Marketing Differences: What plays in Orange County doesn't work in Warsaw

I’ve had the good fortune to train other digital marketing consultants around the world and I quickly learned that what works in the US, doesn’t play well in South Africa, or Columbia or in Amsterdam.

I’ve been to a lot of countries, but never to Central Europe, so I asked my colleague Mateusz Wisla to weigh in on the subject of Internet Marketing in his region.  What I learned from his insightful article is that any brand looking to expand into another country might be served well by employing a local consultant as part of their team:

3 things to consider when starting your Internet Marketing campaign in Poland and Central Europe 

When I talk to my colleagues within WSI operating in other countries I am often surprised how different is the Internet Marketing landscape in Poland and other Central European countries from that present in US, Canada or Great Britain. Of course there are many marketing tactics that work all over the world, but if you want to promote your company successfully (both B2B and B2C) you must be aware of the key differences and aspects that need to be localized. Here I would like to name a few of them.

But before that, I would like to share with you a few statistics to present how the Internet Marketing market is growing here in Poland. As you can see on the below graph we observe significant growth rate in budget spent on Internet -it shows you how significant this marketing channel is here. It is in line with the trend that is observed in almost every place in the world: Despite of the crisis, marketing budgets are moved to the online space and are growing.

Always remember about cultural and language differences!

This is truism but believe me, it happens all the time – companies want to implement the same approach towards every market they target, and you know what? It doesn’t work! Let me give you some example: when I was on one of my first WSI trainings in Toronto (back in 2010) I spotted Old Spice Commercial: The Man your man could smell Like for the first time – this was really great video. But I was shocked when after a year the Brand launched the same campaign in Poland (only text was translated). What do you think was the result? Complete failure – I think only marketers put some attention to the campaign, just to criticize it J Comparing to US or Canada, Poland is a homogeneous society – if you want to attract masses you must show something that is close to them. Moreover, we do not have Caribbean beaches in Poland and oysters are not a part of our day to day menu (at least not of the majority of society). For Old Spice even the translation sounded really weird – without this flow that we all liked in the English version.

Ahh, translations. Effective marketing campaign requires great, convincing copy – but it means something totally different in each region. It is not just a matter of good translation; it is about the text that sounds right. In Central and Eastern Europe we are much more allergic on the texts, that are full of marketing incentives, call to actions – we found them too offensive and, as a result, we are repulsed  by them. The border is blurred – I know, but you have to be careful with that.

Here you can find a link to the polish most popular MEM – we call it forfitter (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fFxdDCIAS6c)  - this is a video of Polish guy living in US who was feeding a alligator with a chicken. The language he uses is a mixture of polish and English – for us its hilarious J Here you can find other videos that were created after that (songs, covers of movies etc.): http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=forfiter . Do you find it funny? Now maybe you know better what I mean by cultural differences?

One more thing that I would like to underline is the following: do not rely on automatic tools like Google translate if you are going international, especially outside English speaking world. Majority of those great technologies we use these days started in English speaking world and it really takes time till the quality of other language versions is similar.

This brings me to the next point.

Search Engines usage differs between countries – the whole SEO landscape is different

In Poland more than 97% of all searches are done via Google. When we think about SEO or PPC we do not consider anything else here. Looking at the region this is almost always a rule. The exception are Czech Republic with Seznam and Russian speaking countries (Russia, Belarus, Ukraine etc.) with Yandex. The reason for that lies deep down in the past when Google was concentrating on English language and Latin alphabet. In Russia you have Cyrillic, in Czech Republic the Latin alphabet is pretty localized (42 characters) and Google was not doing a good job in presenting the relevant content.

To be honest, Google algorithm is here a few generations behind, especially in terms of contextual content analysis. Also the localization of search results is not so strong here as in US. However, I do not want to go much into technical details in this post. From business point of view search engine optimization and pay-per-click campaigns work on the same basis (people looking for answers, products or services land on your website), but the processes and tools used to optimize the Internet presence are a bit different. So you cannot just copy-paste keywords and action plan from your local campaign when you enter the different market.

Search Engines are still the fastest growing internet marketing segment. In the below chart you can find a few statistics about that.

Search Engines usage differs between countries – the whole SEO landscape is different

In Poland more than 97% of all searches are done via Google. When we think about SEO or PPC we do not consider anything else here. Looking at the region this is almost always a rule. The exception are Czech Republic with Seznam and Russian speaking countries (Russia, Belarus, Ukraine etc.) with Yandex. The reason for that lies deep down in the past when Google was concentrating on English language and Latin alphabet. In Russia you have Cyrillic, in Czech Republic the Latin alphabet is pretty localized (42 characters) and Google was not doing a good job in presenting the relevant content.

To be honest, Google algorithm is here a few generations behind, especially in terms of contextual content analysis. Also the localization of search results is not so strong here as in US. However, I do not want to go much into technical details in this post. From business point of view search engine optimization and pay-per-click campaigns work on the same basis (people looking for answers, products or services land on your website), but the processes and tools used to optimize the Internet presence are a bit different. So you cannot just copy-paste keywords and action plan from your local campaign when you enter the different market.

Search Engines are still the fastest growing internet marketing segment. In the below chart you can find a few statistics about that.

 

Differences in marketing mix

Ok, as the last point I would like to name several differences in the marketing methods and tools that are popular and effective here in Poland.  The fact is that we have already had a number of attempts from global leaders who tried to run business in Poland and it didn’t work for them. I would like to name two of them (significant ones):

 

When it comes to social media I must mention that Twitter is almost non-existent here in Poland and it is not because of the platform but due to fact that the whole idea of microblogging is not popular. Of course there are some users who use Twitter, but they are members of few industries like marketing who are early birds in almost any new technology. Take this into account when you plan your social media presence here. I could also name a few more services that are not so popular here: like Foursquare or ITunes.

Luckily, like almost the whole world we use Facebook - really heavily (Facebook is one of the most popular services in Poland) – so at least here the principles for marketing in this medium are the same.

Maybe you have some comments, questions ? I will try to answer the best way I can.

 

About Mateusz Wisla

Certified Internet Marketing Consultant, part of “We Simplify the Internet” since 2010, running a local office of WSI in Warsaw, Poland. Mateusz works with medium and big companies on development and implementation of their Internet Marketing strategies aimed at Lead Generation and Building Brand Awareness. Mateusz, fan of Web Analytics and conversion optimization specializes in international marketing projects helping companies to expand their international presence.

 

pl.linkedin.com/in/mateuszwisla/

Web Presence Optimization: it's not about Websites...it's about Web Presence

If you don't dominate the search results for your own company name, you have some work to do.

How do you dominate the search results for your own company name when your website can only show up one time? Simple, you have to show up for more than one website. The good news is they already exist.

Face it, no company has just one website anymore, they have many websites. Those sites are their LinkedIn profile, their Facebook and Twitter accounts, external company blogs, review sites, Business directories, review sites likes Angie's List and Customer Lobby. Even other websites that mention your company by name can occupy valuable real estate under your name on the search results.

Get Started Building Your Web Presence

There are all sorts of opportunities to expand your company’s web presence...just take a look at the wide range of search results on the Kreative Webworks screenshots. Let's start with some the ones that you have the most control over... Your social profiles.

http://www.kreativewebworks.com/web-presence-examples.html

Step one is to create your standardized profile. You want to establish this upfront so that all your profiles are consistent so the search engines have a high degree of confidence that all those websites you are about to claim are actually yours, and you get full credit. Use your keywords appropriately in your description.

Step two is to "Claim" all your Social Profiles. We use our "Claim You Brand" spread sheet to methodically go through all the top social networks, claim them and keep track of all the login credentials. This is the same tool we use for all our clients. Contact me and I'll be happy to share it with you.

Step three is to go through each of your new web assets and fill out EVERYTHING. And I do mean everything. It's extremely important that everyone of your profiles is at 100% if you want those social channels and search engines to take you seriously. Most of them will have an indicator letting you know your percentage of completion and what's missing.

HINT: Be prepared with pictures and videos to go along with your profile.

Now comes the interesting...but time consuming part...actually doing something with your profile to drive it to the top of the search results. If you have a moderately unique company name and you do a good job of filling out your profile, you stand a chance of making a reasonable showing...perhaps not dominant, but certainly a hit and miss showing with some valuable real estate that you have control over.

In most cases you are going to need to give it a push. Most people don't realize this, but many of the same factors that optimize a web page also work for social profiles:

• Keyword rich content (including your company name)
• Links from other web properties around the Internet
• Updates
• Traffic, comments, Likes, follows, etc.

As you may have noticed on the screenshots of the search results for "Kreative Webworks" it's all about diversification. More content in more places means more customers.