How You Can Break The Adwords Bank… Wait I Mean YOUR Bank.

The Landing Page

There are millionaires being made this very minute. They are using what is called PPC (pay per click) and if done right, it can make you a ton of money, but before you throw caution to the wind, remember this, it can also break your back (read bank account), quicker than you can write the next text ad.

One (not the only one) key to an effective PPC (adwords, yahoo, msn) ad campaign is to have an effective landing page.  Okay, now that begs the question, “What in the heck is a landing page and how to I make a good one”?  Don’t worry, that is the focus of this post and we’re going to do our best to steer you in the right direction.

First let’s deal with a simple definition.  A landing page is what a visitor comes to when they click on a link.  In the most basic sense the home page of your website is a landing page (we can also call it a destination page), but for this post we’ll be talking about designing a specific landing page for a specific product.

The landing page you create MUST be highly targeted and deliver to the visitor exactly what they are searching for.  What do I mean?  Simply this, if someone clicking on an ad about effective football betting, you better make certain your landing page deals specifically and in-depth concerning the subject.

I use a tool called Google Goggles to help determine if my page is up to par, and if you have a small amount of money to invest, it’s a handy tool.  Not mandatory, but handy.  In days past, to run an effective affiliate marketing campaign, you could link directly the product in question, Adwords (or the big wigs at Google) have effectively put a stop to this by implementing what is called the quality score.

Quality score and your landing page go hand in hand and is effectively the same thing.  Google will look at your landing page (and other data) and determine if your landing page is up to their standards.  If it passes their test, you can obtain your clicks for less money than someone who has a poorer landing page.  Adwords (assuming your pick the right product) is a proven business model and it does work, but just as there are tips and tricks of the trade in every business, so also is this true with adwords and one of the crucial points is the landing page.

Okay enough theory let me show you how to do it.  I’m going to stay with the ever popular “dog training” niche and show you how to craft a good quality landing page that will likely pass the Google Goggle test, a good quality score and low bid price.  It’s pretty simple really… STEAL!

Did I get your attention?  Hope so, cause being a blogger I am 100% against plagiarism. That said here’s how to legally steal some good quality information and get yourself a great landing page.

1. Visit the site of the of the product vendor first.  They may already have a suite of information, graphics and email templates that you can use.  I’m going to promote the “Sit Stay Fetch” which is an outstanding product.  Visiting their site I see they offer…
   1. Text and logo links (probably not much help)
   2. Banner ads and buttons (helpful for a landing page, but not mandatory).
   3. Product images (these we could certainly use on our landing pages).
   4. A list of keywords that work (now this is potentially valuable information).
   5. Articles (Okay, this is it, this is what we’re looking for and while we would most likely want to change (re-write) the article someone, they are in all likelihood quality information with most (not all) of the work done for you)
2. Ezinearticles (or any of the good article directories) simply do a search for “dog training” (or whatever niche you are promoting) and you’ll find hundreds of articles targeting your niche.  Now being a writer and keyword researcher, I have to remind you of their TOS which instructs you to leave the author information (including links) intact.  Does this mean you shouldn’t use the article, no it simply means to exercise some common sense and be certain you won’t lose your visitor to a competitor.

On the landing page you can then make a decision to several things.

1. Capture the visitor’s name and email so you can keep in touch with them in the future.
2. Simply link to the actual product page with your affiliate link embedded (more on this in a separate post).
3. Offer an incentive if the visitor buys through your link.

This is certainly not a definitive post on landing pages, but it should get you pointed in the right direction.  If you have other questions or comments, scroll down click comments and ask away. Tim

Good communication skills are paramount to successful sales

He says tomato, I say tamato.

First and foremost I want to give credit to David Bullock who first mentioned having a keyword conversation, thanks David.

Go back in time a bit and you’d find me pounding the keyboard as a struggling screenwriter, some said I had talent, others said “don’t give up your day”, goes with the territory and I developed a tough skin.  Either that or get my ego trounced on daily.  Since those days, I’ve been writing in one form or another fairly continually.

What I did learn from those days of rejection letters (and the occasional triumph) was how to communicate an idea to an audience.  Since I never got Spielberg to return my calls, let’s leave Hollywood Land, and turn our attention to keywords and crafting a good landing page.

Having an effective keyword conversation with the person reading your ad is mandatory; not only will this give you a good CTR (click thru ratio) and lower your ad costs, but you’ll achieve more sales, and a greater ROI.

Let’s take a closer look at exactly what is happening in the mind of someone using a search engine.  David Bullock speaks of the keyword conversation this way…

“A keyword is an historical conversation that has deep meaning for the visitor. There is time, effort and thinking behind every search. Your goal is to resonate with that thinking.”

I’ve heard another internet guru speak of congruency, quite basically meaning don’t confuse or mislead the person you’re trying to convince.  While some of us speak (or write) with more eloquence than others, it’s not so much how you craft a sentence, as how you communicate an idea.

I’ll use the tried and often duplicated example of “dog training”; by itself, what does it mean?  Do you want to train your dog to win a show or simply to obey a simple command?  This is the beginning of and the essence of the keyword conversation.  If someone goes to a major search engine and types in “dog training”, perhaps they simply have an interest in dogs, and would like to know a bit more about their passion.  On the other hand, if someone were to type “teach your dog to sit”, then we can begin to have a conversation with that person and have the beginnings of what could be an effective landing page.

The first example is most likely someone with a casual interest, while the second example will be someone with a specific need.  And it this need that we can capitalize on with our keyword conversation.  Using our simple keyword tool “dog training” yields the following results…

dog training
hunting dog training
crate training a dog
dog potty training
dog agility training
dog training collars
dog leash training
k9 dog training
dog obedience training
dog training collar
free dog training tips
dog training tips
dog training career
dog grooming training
dog training pietermaritzburg
career dog in training
career in dog training
dog training supplies
service dog training
rescue dog training
bird dog training
dog behavior training
free dog training
house training a dog
dog training schools
career dog training
dog crate training
dog training dvd
dog training equipment
sled dog training
dog training school
dog training tools
therapy dog training
dog training encinitas
dog training fetch
training a dog
dog house training
guard dog training
gun dog training
basic dog training
dog training mission bay
dog training products
in home dog training
training your dog
dog training courde
dog training video
dog field training
don sullivan dog training
dog boarding and training
dog training accessories
dog training devices
orlando dog training
training dog collars
water dog training
dog training books
dog training classes
dog training seattle
potty training a dog
training a deaf dog
dog training certification
dog training treats
german shepherd dog training michigan
lackland dog training manual
positive dog training
dog training pouch
dog training videos
house training dog
puppy dog training
aggressive dog training
cheap dog training collars
common sense grouse and woodcock dog training
commonwealth dog training
crate training dog
dog training pads
training dog collar
boxer dog training
discount dog training collars
dog and training collars

This is an impressive list (and could be much more extensive), but it is very un-targeted and we’d have difficulty having an effective conversation with that person.  Imagine yourself in a situation and someone asks the question… “I need to learn more about training my dog”.  What would be your immediate answer?  Most likely you’d ask them for more details about what their specific need is.  In example number two below, there are far fewer keywords, however we can quickly zero on what the person specifically needs.

teach your dog to sit
teaching your dog to sit
teach your dog how to sit
how to teach your dog to sit
how to teach your dog how to sit

If that same person were so say… “How in the world can I teach my dog to sit when I want him to?”

Immediately you can enter the conversation with intelligence and offer a helpful suggestion.  In cyberspace, since we don’t actually know the person, we’ll be crafting words, phrases and landing pages that cater to a specific need and we certainly might have more than one.  In fact we’ll have pages that cater to…

Teaching your dog to sit and stay
Housebreaking your puppy
Stop excessive barking
Etc.

Does this mean you can’t have one product that satisfies multiple problems?  Certainly not, one product may be the solution to multiple problems, and that is where your ad, article or landing page will specifically deal with a problem.

Custom Crafted Keywords

Think again of that person asking a question… “Can anyone help me train my dog?”  Very broad statement, and if you were to answer… “Well I know how housebreak a puppy”, would you be solving the problem?  Maybe, maybe not. The person might answer, “No, my dog is a year old and I need help with aggression”.  Conversation over and no sale made.

In a personal setting you could certainly explore the problem further, and maybe offer constructive advice.  On the net, you need to have this conversation in your head (ahead of time) and construct your ad and landing page to answer a specific question.

When you learn to do this, not only with your CTR (click thru ratio) be higher, per click lower, but most importantly, your conversions will skyrocket.