Day 2 of SES Chicago proved to be a much slower day, but I think many of the attendees needed the “break”.  The biggest session by far was Tim Ash’s “Landing Page Optimization”.

This SES Chicago recap will cover my favorite session of Day 2, Tim Ash’s presentation on “Landing Page Optimization: The 7 Deadly Sins”.  My primary reason for attending this session was to listen to Tim Ash speak.  I was told that Ash was an engaging speaker and he did not disappoint.

My recaps will include some useful tidbits that I picked up during day 2 of SES Chicago.  Tweets were made from @marketwire as well as my personal handle @shinng using the hashtag #seschi and #rt2eat.  So what is the meaning of the latter hashtag?  Well, the creative marketing team @marketwire wanted to give back for the holiday season so we decided to take advantage of the Marketwire presence.  For every ReTweet of our tweets that include the hashtags #seschi #rt2eat, Marketwire will be donating $1.00 per RT for a max contribution of $500 to benefit the Greater Chicago Food Depository.

SES Chicago Session – Landing Page Optimization: The 7 Deadly Sins

Moderator:  Sage Lewis (SageRock)
Speakers:  Tim Ash (SiteTuners)

The effect of the miserable morning commute to downtown Chicago was quickly forgotten thanks to Tim Ash.  He immediately set the tone by asking which of the audience members had children.  A few dozen raised their hand.  Of those that had children, who thought their baby was ugly.  Of course, everyone immediately put their hands down.   Ash pointed out that everyone has seen an ugly baby.  So get to the point right?  Ash’s point: your baby is ugly.  Don’t be “ignorant and blind”.  As it relates to landing page optimization, if you ignore your landing page, you will make less money.

• For every $83 spent on drive to a website and acquisition, $1 is spent on landing page.
• CPA (cost per acquisition)=CPC (cost per click) / CR (conversion rate)
• “The camel” analogy
  • Often times, there is a struggle about which department should design the website.  The analogy used by Ash was “the camel” as in, “a horse designed by committee”.  When multiple departments end up having input into the design, the end result is not a good one.
  • So the question was posed, who should design your website?  Answer choices:  agency, boss, webmaster, marketing, IT
  • Correct answer:  Your visitors should design your website which means you need to look at your landing page analytics.
• Optimizing a landing page is improving conversion.
• Landing page testing is not optional.  Fix your money pages.
• Never let the BPU (business prevention unit=IT) make the decisions
• Eliminate the HIPPO (highest paid person’s opinion)

Top 7 mistakes to avoid in optimizing your landing page

1. Unclear call to action
   • The visitor should not be asking, “what am I supposed to do?”
   • The landing page should answer the question, “what do you expect me to do”
   • The obvious standard: if the call to action on a landing page is not obvious, then it is costing you a lot of money.  In other words, if it’s not obvious, it’s not happening.
   • Get rid of splash and flash landing pages to avoid distraction
2. Too many choices
3. Asking for too much information
   • Example: if I’m downloading a white paper, why do I need to input my name?  All that’s required should be an email address.  /Nick Shin – I have to disagree.  All landing pages should include a name and email address field at a minimum.  In the white paper example, you are capturing the user’s information because they become a lead, which means you will want to contact them in the future. Right?
4. Too much text
   • The “Charlie Brown-wahwahwah” analogy – too much text is like Charlie Brown saying, “wahwahwah”
   • Strike out all adjectives and all unsubstantiated claims
5. Not keeping your promises
   • One of the worst things you can do is deceive and/or confuse your visitors.  Make it straightforward.
   • Example: The Consumer Reports “bait-and-switch” – In one of Consumer Reports’ PPC ads for reviews, the ad’s call to action is to click the button to read reviews.  When you click on the ad, the user is directed to a landing page that you must “join now”.  The user is expecting to read the review, but instead the user is asked to join in order to read the review.  Not good.
6. Visual distractions
   • Keep the content clean and don’t do entry popups.
   • Leave the creativity at home when creating landing pages.
   • If you emphasize everything, nothing will be important.
   • Example: take a look at newyorkbarbells.com.
7. Lack of trust
   • Move trust symbols up.
   • Example (unfortunately I don’t remember the company): On one company’s website, instead of having the widely accepted method of putting a company logo in the top left hand corner, this one company placed their “trust” logo and centered their company logo.  The “trust” logo was one of those SSL/secure logos that is widely recognizable.

At the end, Tim provided a list of websites that will help you optimize your landing page for improved conversions.

• AttentionWizard.com by Tim Ash’s SiteTuners – attention heatmap
• Crazy Egg – build heatmaps and track clicks
• ClickTale - web analytics
• Google Website Optimizer
• UserTesting.com – usability testing
• userfly – usability testing
• Litmus – compatibility testing
• FeedbackArmy – usability testing
• Cross Browser – compatibility testing