Internet Advertising

Sarah Worsham / Jan 27, 2009

Landing Pages are Key to Converting Sales

landingegmb757lover One of the most common problems we see with our clients is landing pages that are not converting website visitors into customers. Many clients will spend quite a bit of money on advertising, but fail to complete the transaction on their landing pages. Often visitors will be just directed to a home page, which is a bit like dropping your 5 year old off at the mall and expecting them to be able to buy their own tennis shoes.

When you’re designing your landing pages, you need to put yourself into your customer’s shoes. What information would you need to make a purchase decision? A landing page needs to have all the information that a customer would need to make a purchase decision – ideally it also lets them make a purchase right there.

If you have a wide range of products, you’ll need to have multiple landing pages which target each one. The same for multiple target audiences and advertising. Think of a landing page as a one page print ad – you really need to engage the customer, entice them with your offer, and get them to take action.

It may take a bit of time to get a landing page that you’re happy with. Make changes and then give them some time to work. Take a look at your statistics and see what’s working and what’s not. Good landing pages will be well worth the effort (with a side benefit of a bit of seo juice).

(photo by egmb757lover @ Flickr CC)

Technorati Tags: landing page, seo, advertising, ads, marketing strategy, internet marketing, internet advertising, business, marketing

Sarah Worsham / Jan 26, 2009

Do you have Effective Advertising?

advertisingskyworkmedia If you can spare some cash, a tight economy is actually a great time to do some advertising to expand your brand’s reach. Your competitors may be pulling back on advertising, which makes this a good time to steal some share from them. All of this is meaningless if you don’t have effective advertising.

I’ve seen many clients who have pretty good click-through rates for their ads (especially Google AdWords), but when you take a look at how much they’re paying for a conversion (usually a sale), it often is more than the product is selling for. Here are some tips to make your advertising more effective:

Tout benefits to the customer.
Be clear and to the point.
Make your brand stand out.
Don’t be obnoxious – avoid too much movement.
Ads should lead to an effective landing page.
Make information needed for purchasing clear and consistent.
Minimize clicks for whatever action you want people to take.
Target your ads to places that actually have potential customers.
Don’t try to trick your customers.
Be attractive – your ad and landing page (and website) need to look good.

What else makes for effective advertising? Please share any ideas in the comments below.

(photo by Skywork Media @ Flickr CC)

Technorati Tags: advertising, ads, marketing strategy, internet marketing, internet advertising, business, marketing

Sarah Worsham / Dec 23, 2008

Best of 2008 – Advantages & Disadvantages of Rich Media Ads

Rich media ads with which viewers can interact and may contain animation, audio and video. Rich media ads can be powerful way to convey your message, but these types of ads have some advantages and disadvantages:

Advantages

Communicate more information – through different types of media (audio, video, interaction). Rich media ads can have video, audio, animation and even small applications or games.
Collect more information – either by programming in more sophisticated analytics or simply by asking for information.
More clicks – As annoying as these ads are, they are more likely to be clicked on because they catch people’s attention (please follow IAB guidelines), at least during the first week or so.
Powerful branding – Even if the ad isn’t clicked on, viewers are still more likely to see and remember the ad than traditional display advertising.

Disadvantages

May slow down a website – These ads tend to be larger in file size, which takes longer to download. Even with faster Internet connections being more prevalent, you should be aware of your audience and how many are on slower connections. Even with faster Internet connections, an overly large file or many rich media ads can still slow down a website. If your website is too slow, people will just go elsewhere.
May annoy – Since these ads tend to be more visible to viewers, they also can quickly become more annoying. So stick with the IAB guidelines and place ads for short time periods (no longer than a month) to maximize the effectiveness of the ad.
More expensive – They are more difficult to create and require a higher skillset. These types of ads are usually more expensive to place on a website as well (because of the larger file size and annoyance factor).
May be blocked – Although most people have the software installed necessary to view these ads, it is fairly easy to turn off this option in most browsers and in some ad blocking software. However, as more websites use the same technology to increase their interaction and functionality, viewers are less likely to block the ads.

If you are aware of these advantages and disadvantages, you can make an informed decision about purchasing these types of ads (or allowing them to be displayed on your website or blog).

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