As promised, here is Number 3 of my all time, Top 5 Landing Page Optimization Recommendations (see Numbers 4 and 5):

#3 Landing Page Optimization Recommendation
Choose 2 strong product or service benefits to test

Testing to improve your landing pages and improve conversion can be a daunting thing. What do I test? Where do I start? It’s like trying to make a cake without the recipe. Most companies get together with staff and then guess what their customers need to see to make a purchasing decision. Understanding what compels your customers to go from a click to a conversion is one of the most important aspects of improving your website performance. Take 2 strong product or service benefits and test them against each other. Test the content in the headline and in the body copy. You can use Google Website Optimizer to execute the test. Other than very expensive focus groups, this is the best way to discover what is most important to your potential customers and what they need to see to compel them to complete the sales cycle. You may be surprised at what you learn!

How to start:
*Choose your top 2 converting landing pages
*Choose 2 things to test (headline, body content, image, etc.)
*Implement test
*Track results
*Launch your new landing pages with the best converting site elements

#3 Landing Page Optimization Recommendation
Choose 2 strong product or service benefits to test

Stay tuned in the next couple of weeks for #2 and #1!

Try it and send me a comment about your progress!

When we engage with a new client, one of first content strategies we recommend, regardless of online objectives, is implementing a blog.

In the wise words of my best friend, “Why wouldn’t ya?”. If you have reasons you think would prohibit you from starting a blog, leave me a comment and I’ll see if we can dispel your fear.

Top 10 Reasons & Strategies for Starting a Blog:

1.
Reason
It is the easiest way to publish content.

Strategy
Use WordPress to host your blog (or blogger, or typepad) Inexpensive or free tools.

2.
Reason
Its the easiest way to communicate one on one with your customers.

Strategy
Create a mission statement for your blog so you have a purpose.

3.
Reason
If youre content is good, your content will go viral.

Strategy
Get involved with your online community so its easier to make your content viral

4
Reason
Its great to be known in your online community as an expert.

Strategy
Spend time on other blogs within your online community so youre known for being a respectful, contributing member.

5
Reason
It’s a great way to understand your customers’ needs.

Strategy
Read all comments and incorporate feedback into your business goals.

6
Reason
It’s a great link development strategy.

Strategy
Create an interesting, entertaining or funny blog that will generate buzz for your blog (and brand).

7
Reason
It’s a smart way to get your team involved in your brand.

Strategy
Have a regular post where other authors can contribute. (SEOmoz does Whiteboard Friday, great video content that I watch religeously).

8
Reason
It’s a great way to syndicate your content.

Strategy
Optimize and publicize your content with Feedburner (use the email subscriptions widget for folks who aren’t comfortable with RSS readers).

9
Reason
It’s a great way to grow your house list.

Strategy
Once visitors have signed up for your blog, ask them if they’d like to receive other content (newsletters, white papers, etc). Just be sure you do it at the right time and after you’ve created value for them.

10
Reason
It’s a lot of fun!

Strategy
Have fun and be creative when you’re writing your blog posts, your enthusiasm and love for your brand will be contagious;)

Speaking of enthusiasm and love for blogging, read this great post 17 Habits of Highly Popular Bloggers.

Big thank you to Chris Elwell, Claire Shoen, Danny Sullivan and Chris Sherman for allowing me to present at SMX West.

It was a great experience and I was happy to meet Damien and Fionn. Hope to see everybody at SMX Advanced in Seattle.

SEMPDX hosted their 2nd annual SearchFest yesterday. Speakers included Rand Fishkin of SEOMOZ, representatives from Google and MSN as well as a host of talented Search Marketers from around the country. I was pleased to see some local friends from Hood River and I met a lot of new people, either learning about search for their company or their own agency.

The conference focused on search strategies such as link development, social media marketing, website usability, analytics and even international SEM. It was fun to see how some local entities are using search marketing to grow their businesses. Dan Harbison of the Portland Trailblazers shared how they’re using their website to increase visibility of the team, improve public perception of players and even sell season tickets.

I presented on Marketing 2.0 Issues including Online Reputation Management issues that occur using Social Media Marketing. Though all three panelists have vastly different client bases, a lot of our recommendations were shared-spend time researching the social networks you’d like to engage, have thick skin, have fun, be a good community member, don’t spam, give more than you take. Marty Weintraub of AimClear had great advice for dealing with bullies, while Janet Johnson shared insight into helping companies with B2B focus leverage the power of social media marketing.

For those of you who missed it, shame on you and plan to go next year;) but know that SEMPDX holds great networking and educational events year round. Check out their upcoming schedule.

Also, big thank you to Benjamin Lloyd of Amplify Interactive and the whole SEMPDX team that made the event possible!

Though our business focus is Search Marketing, at the end of the day our job is to help our clients grow their businesses online. It’s not enough just to help drive traffic to a website through natural search, the traffic to your site needs to convert.

For some companies, conversion is a sale of a product or service, for some it’s getting the visitor to call and schedule an appointment. Regardless of what you want people to do on your website, it’s important that you create a website that asks people to do what you want them to do. If you want to improve the performance of your website, do try these 3 strategies:

1) Be a visitor to your own site, try to sign up for a newsletter or order a product. Was it easy, what would you do to improve the process? Think about your website goals through the eyes of your visitors.

2) Look at your website analytics. Make this a regular part of running your online business. Look at your statistics, how many people visit your site monthly? What is your bounce rate (define)? What is your conversion rate (define)? What are people doing on your site? Where do people abandon the order process?

3) Choose one element of your site to test or improve. Once you’ve reviewed your analytics, choose one important page on your site and make a change that you discovered during your website analysis. For example, if visitors are abandoning after they get to the credit card page, make sure instructions are easy to understand. Do you have authorize.net or other respected credit card processing companies seal? Is there a link to your satisfaction guarantee or return policy?

Make a commitment to spend a couple of hours each month being a visitor to your own site. Create a process for champion/challenger improvement and testing of your landing pages. These simple changes can have great impact on your bottom line.