Landing Page - What I do not Understand !!!

7 replies
  • PPC/SEM
  • |
Hi,

I am trying to work out the reason for a landing page if your not collecting emails.

Here is what I see.
- I have a campaign and get 100 clicks. If I send that to a landing page I may get a CTR to the offer of around 20% (optimisitc?). I have wasted 80 of those clicks without even using the sales page of the offer. Of those 20 clicks going through I might convert 50% (again optimistic?). So I have 10 conversions out of the 100 clicks.

I know I get annoyed being passed from sales page to sales page and usually don't buy. Also I know I can't make a sales page as good as the direct link..

I assume the logic is that the first lost 80% will not buy anyway so we are trying to capture their information for a later date (retargeting pixel or email list) to put either the same offer or a different offer in front of. Is this the only reason? Because then I can use them in a solo list and either promote to them or offer up my list to make money from them.

Can anyone give me a detailed answer on why we use a landing page ? Or have I got it right with the retargeting/email list angle?

Thanks.
#landing #page #understand
  • Profile picture of the author toptips44
    Anyone got answers to the above ?

    Another question. When your first testing an offer should you even have a landing page ? If that offer doesn't convert then you are wasting valuable time setting up a landing page which will be thrown away.

    Should you first test say the offer commission with direct linking (assuming it is compliant with your ad network) on an offer and if you get no clicks then move on without even using a landing page. Or should you always create a landing page regardless and use it ?

    Looking for any advice.
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    • Profile picture of the author techppc
      Originally Posted by toptips44 View Post

      Anyone got answers to the above ?

      Another question. When your first testing an offer should you even have a landing page ? If that offer doesn't convert then you are wasting valuable time setting up a landing page which will be thrown away.

      Should you first test say the offer commission with direct linking (assuming it is compliant with your ad network) on an offer and if you get no clicks then move on without even using a landing page. Or should you always create a landing page regardless and use it ?

      Looking for any advice.
      you are right i think but most advertisers will not allow you direct link so you have to create landing page for about 90% of offers . Second what i have learned so far is just a sales page targeted to your audience will not work and most people will bounce from it .so you have to build something like lead capture or email capture and then use that to promote your offer.i am also a newbie here looking for answers .
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  • Originally Posted by toptips44 View Post

    I know I get annoyed being passed from sales page to sales page and usually don't buy.
    You just answered your own questions there.

    I don't know why people use the term "landing page" to mean a page they create themselves. Every page on the web is a landing page.

    If you do affiliate marketing and using PPC to drive traffic, I don't see any reason not to send that traffic directly to the affiliate's offer. That's what I'd do if I did AM. While I could create my own page, and maybe do a better job, I would not like doing so for every offer I'd like to promote. That's a lot of work.

    The main reason people recommend to have your own page instead of going direct is for collecting emails. You could send other offers to your list. There are a few problems with that in my mind.

    First, if you have this "landing" page just to collect emails before showing the offer, you'll have a lot less response. So if you pay for traffic, you are seriously cutting into your profits. It also is against most PPC policies.

    The right way to do this is having your own sales page and gather emails for further offers. In my view, you need to use this list properly. I would not send just any other offer. For example, the product is something for cars. Don't send emails to the list for computer offers or anything else not related to cars. I would create a newsletter myself. This is a lot of work of course since you need to know about the subject and be regular. I may not care or know about cars for example so not the one to write a newsletter. But I do want to sell car products so I would not bother to collect emails. I would send directly to the offer, provided I believe it is a good sales letter and would get me commissions.

    Would 80% not buy? Yes, it's more like 95% in most cases. In other words, only 5% would buy. That's also a main reason to collect emails but also, having your own page, you could have a remarketing campaign. So there's advantages and drawbacks to both using your own page and direct linking.
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    • Profile picture of the author dburk
      Hi toptips44,

      First let me say that Lucid nailed it when he said "Every page on the web is a landing page". However, to be more precise, within the specific context of advertising, a landing page is any page that you select to land your ad click traffic onto.

      There are many different types of landing pages. For an Ecommerce website, that has a catalogue of products, a product page or product category page might be the best type of landing page. With a single product or service you typically might have an offer page. In some circumstances an offer might perform better if you use a pre-sell page before sending them to the offer page, don't make the assumption that presell pages are always a bad ideal, because that is not always true. Some people use squeeze pages for landing pages when their only goal is lead capture. There are a large variety of landing page types, and you need to consider those that serve your business goals the best.

      When choosing a specific type of landing page it is generally wise to research your market to see which type of landing pages that your top competitors are using. There is no single type of landing page that works best for every product/service, and things that work well for one campaign isn't necessarily going to work well with another, even when they are very similar products, or services. As with nearly everything in marketing you need to test landing page types, as well as value proposition types that you present on your landing pages.

      If you are doing affiliate marketing you should never assume that you "can't make a sales page as good as the direct link." Most affiliate offer sales pages are not that great. They don't need to be. The merchants are not spending any money on the affiliate traffic, there fore it is not their money that is wasted if their offer page has a rotten conversion rate, it's your money and they don't have to pay one red cent if you waste a month worth of ad spend on there sub-par sales page.

      If merchant sales pages were really that great why would a merchant be using affiliate marketers? If they are so great at marketing they could do it all themselves and keep all the profit. The fact is that many affiliate merchants really suck at marketing, and when they do, often they only way they can make a go of it is to use affiliates to sell their product for them.

      Face facts, you rarely ever hear of an affiliate marketer that is doing well if he isn't good at marketing himself. Sure, you might find a great offer page that converts like crazy and the merchant keeps the page up for a long time so that you can make a lot of money. You might also pick the winning lotto numbers and win a million bucks. All you need is an incredible amount of luck. Or, learn how to market well and make your own luck.
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  • Profile picture of the author KinneyJ2014
    If your landing pages need a little "oomph," then read on to see 17 beautiful examples of landing page inspiration from around the web.


    "Good artists copy. Great artists steal."

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  • As Don said, don't assume you can't do a better job creating a sales page than what the affiliate has. Of course I understand if you don't want to do that.

    There are however some major players that make use of affiliates. I believe Netflix started that way. It's a way to reach a lot of people quickly. They had the resources to put in place resources for affiliates, including having a great sales page. The little guys don't have that luxury but it's still in their best interest to have a good sales page but unfortunately most don't. I don't think as Don says that they don't care, simply that they are not aware and what they don't know is hurting them. A few of course probably just rely on the affiliates for the marketing.
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  • Profile picture of the author toptips44
    I appreciate the responses. Thanks for the advice.
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