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Add me on SphinnMost of the time, when we think about our landing pages, we’re thinking “what will give me the highest CTR?”. We don’t always think too heavily about pre-selling an offer and how to focus on higher conversion rates once the visitor does in fact click through. In some niches, you do need to pre-sell the product, and you want the visitor to look around your page - and they will. They clicked an ad to YOUR site, they’re not going to think in their head “Okay this is a landing page, I’ll just click through and it will get me to where I want.” That being said, this article is just going to be a short list of a couple tips and tricks you can use in your pages to give them more credibility. The more the visitor trusts you, the more likely they are to whip out their credit card.
Tip #1 : Using a “Last Updated On”
EDIT : For some reason the PHP isn’t displaying properly. So the first and last tags are [ and ], in your code you’re going to want to replace them with < and > and it will work.
With a little PHP magic, we can add a “Last Updated On: 10/23/2007″ to the page and have it automatically update every day. The visitor sees this, they know that the information they’re going to read isn’t out of date. Here’s how to do this. Above the html tags at the very very top of your index file, paste the following code :
[?php
$yesterday = date('m/d/Y', mktime(0, 0, 0, date("m") , date("d") - 1, date("Y")));
?]
Now, wherever you want to add the code (usually the top right corner of the page, or above the main text, below the main text, etc), add this :
Last Updated On : [?php echo $yesterday ?]
Voila, you now have done your research and you’re updating your landing page daily.
Tip #2 : Quotes From Credible Sources
Another little trick that some people use is by taking the logo from a very credible source, then finding an article somewhere from that source that talks about whatever product you’re trying to sell. Kind of hard to explain, but really easy to understand with a picture :
This example is taken from ringtones.net. That makes it seem like ringtones.net was a source verified by Forbes, Times, Rolling Stone, and the Wall Street Journal (I cut the image off a little). There’s a pretty high chance that your visitor would trust the Wall Street Journal more than a site from an ad they just clicked on, so it builds more trust.
Tip #3 : SSL and Security Certificates
Want your visitors to trust you? Show them that they’re browsing a secure site and are about to enter their credit card safely. Picking up a license for a security certificate can cost a few hundred bucks a year, but for a higher conversion rate, is it worth it? Sure it is. You can make that few hundred back in a few weeks due to a boost in conversions. For an example, here’s what you can find near the footer of halloweenexpress.com :
Well there you have it, three quick tips to increase the trust-value of your website and hopefully help increase conversions.
October 23rd, 2007 at 1:10 pm
Sneaky :-) I like it!
October 24th, 2007 at 4:02 am
Nice
October 24th, 2007 at 6:07 am
I especially liked the php one and the quotes one. Though the quotes one is a little sneaky, but who cares?!
By the way, you can use Javascript also in writing out the date. Though php offcourse i s much easier…
October 24th, 2007 at 7:48 am
Just a tip so you can replace the [ and ] with < > and it should show up as when you submit the post.
Other than that good tips, I am finding this blog very useful!
Thanks
Alan
October 24th, 2007 at 9:34 am
This was definitely a nice post. Clear and to the point.
October 24th, 2007 at 12:50 pm
Quick question - I’ve had extensive experience in web design, adwords and adsense, but completely new to affiliate marketing, setting up pages to market well (convert well), as well as research the ‘right types’ of keywords regarding a niche.
Does anyone know of a good course that shows the steps on how to get dirty with affiliate marketing? I’m looking for more practical stuff, I understand the theory behind it, and can set it up if I know how to (so, I want to SKIP all the beginner, “welcome to the world of affiliate marketing” stuff)
Thanks gang!
October 24th, 2007 at 1:06 pm
Kunal - check out the “Uber Affiliate Marketing Guide”, it’s the first link under ‘Popular Posts’ in the sidebar.
October 24th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
[...] Source [...]
October 25th, 2007 at 2:33 am
Nice tip like it alot! Off to do some updating :o)
October 25th, 2007 at 7:49 am
Tried using the PHP date function, though it seems to generate some abritrary date in 2008, not sure what’s going on there.
October 25th, 2007 at 11:52 pm
All great tips that should increase conversions. :)
October 26th, 2007 at 8:03 am
Some of the tips can be forbidden by the advertiser or the network. So use with caution. For example, you can’t the secure SSL logo if your page it not secure. Most visitors wouldn’t know this but the way you tell if the page is encrypted if its starts with https instead http. I know some networks which penalize affiliates for using misleading graphics and such on their pages.
October 30th, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Great advice that I will use, thank you for that! I have had a ppc campaign going but haven’t had any sales… yet!
October 31st, 2007 at 9:55 am
I don’t know where I read it but there was a case study that showed an increase in conversion by more than 10% by simply adding SSL to the site.
November 5th, 2007 at 7:46 am
How about no Google Ads for Landing Pages from Search Engines SERPS?
For some people, too many ads is a turn off.
Conversely, I’ve seen many sites having Google Ads turned OFF for returning visitors, to show them their ” loyalty”.
I guess it works both ways.
November 5th, 2007 at 11:42 am
Why not create your own privacy logo. You’re just assuring clients of their privacy…
November 6th, 2007 at 1:26 am
It’s a simple task to create a “self-signed” certificate anyway and most people don’r even really notice. You can do it in cPanel or right in apache. Otherwise, a Turbo-SSL cert is only $19.95 a year from GoDaddy.
November 18th, 2007 at 5:12 pm
Terrific blog. Struggled with the date php with no success, but the point was well made. I change the content constantly so it’s no mountainous effort to add a static date & update it too.
Keep it coming…
December 4th, 2007 at 10:11 am
Great info, I love it!
By the way the code for yesterdays date is giving people problems because it has the wrong open & close tags
December 5th, 2007 at 1:00 pm
This is just solid advice. Thanks I’m going to apply these techniques to my pages.
January 30th, 2008 at 2:39 pm
You could also be clever and make the last updated date some random amount that is the last week and cache it for consistency. So if a user hits the page and the date is more than a week old, pick a new date and cache it.
February 9th, 2008 at 5:38 pm
Tips 2 and 3 are genius. I’m going to use those whenever i can. Thanks man!
-Dave
LetMeAdvise.com
April 2nd, 2008 at 1:56 pm
Wow, I learned two things from this article. Thank you!
April 3rd, 2008 at 8:44 pm
[...] Landing Page Keys To Success Landing Page Tips [...]
April 4th, 2008 at 10:08 am
Good stuff, it’s the little things that make the BIG things.
April 4th, 2008 at 10:07 pm
Great tip Paul on the date. I used that on my landing pages with no luck, but I was putting it at the bottom…I should test what you mentioned - putting it top right.
May 28th, 2008 at 3:21 am
I was looking for this on a forum I’m a member of, forgot it was here :)
Thanks for the tips paul.