(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

A panel of experts spoke about landing pages at the ACCM conference in Orlando. The panel included American Eagle veep Tim Walter, DMinSite sales and marketing team lead Karen Crist, and Budk World Wide VP of Ecommerce Gavin Galtere.

When developing landing pages, Walter said there are two obvious places to start: paid search and email. "Don’t only do Google," he said. "If you do you’re leaving a lot of dollars on the table."

Email is the cheaper route, and allows more freedom and speed in testing. "Paid search is more difficult because it’s not in your face," said Walter. As might be obvious, email puts a marketer’s message directly in front of the consumer whereas search requires not only the consumer to actively seek out but to not be blind to advertisements.

As an extension to that, Crist noted that landing pages should not be subtle. She prefers the "buy it now" approach, especially with smaller ticket items for sale that don’t require a lot of research.

Knowing the intent of the consumer then, plays a big part in developing a landing page. Galtere echoed this sentiment by admonishing marketers to make sure the landing page matches where the consumer expects to be taken. "I hate to see someone come in and hit the search button immediately. That’s making consumers work too hard.

Between the three of them, they delivered a pretty nice set of tips for getting the most out of landing pages. They are as follows:

1.    Get top-level buy-in for strategic projects; not all projects produce immediate sales, but have more strategic implications for the business.

2. Create urgency, such as a deadline to increase CTR and conversion

3. Print destination URLs on pages in your catalog

4. Sepertate CSS and data points for ease of use

5. Make sure landing pages deliver on a promise that drove the shopper to the site with consistent products, benefits, offers and branding

6. Split test different paid search landing pages

7. Split test different email landing pages. Don’t throw consumers to a category page, but a specifically designed page using the email messaging, creative and extended product offering

8. Track key performance on all pages

9. With landing pages – think like a consumer

10. Test, test, test

11. Have a platform that enables marketing staff to market.

12. Be prepared to make changes fast

13. Optimize landing pages for natural search with readable URLS (no special characters), included on site maps, no Flash, no duplicate content

14. Keep landing pages up longer than you think. If you are working with outside agency to host, require minimum of 3-6 months hosting

15. Look at competitors landing pages. Your customers are likely searching multiple sites for a product. See what they are seeing.

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

Rok Hrastnik, the International Internet Director at Studio Moderna, discussed some unusual approaches in a session called "Surprising Email Tactics for Maximum Response."  One of his first points was that, "when it comes to email, sales should not be first.  Readership should."

 Rok Hrastnik

Hrastnik has found that a monthly combination of three editorial-driven ezines and one sales-driven email works best.  With the ezines, going beyond the brand is necessary – he recommended including a high readership article, a practical how-to article, a brand-related promotional article, and a brand-related non-promotional article.

"Find something your audience wants, is interested in," Hrastnik emphasized.  In the case of a mattress company, this turned out to be tips relating to sex, health, and wellness.

Then optimize your emails for different audiences.  Men and women won’t have identical tastes, so the gender split is one thing to look at.  Just forget about 100 percent direct measurability, he suggested, and instead "embrace email as an indirect sales powerhouse . . . something that will generate sales in the long run."

RSS can be useful, as well.  Companies can offer things like transactional feeds, product feeds, customer support feeds, editorial feeds, and sales support feeds as ways of keeping consumers interested.

In the end, Hrastnik stressed, "There is a lot to gain if you think about how to go beyond your current email strategy."

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos. Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

Sure, the session at ACCM 2008 was titled “Maximize Your Web Catalog: Search Optimization, Content & Analytics,” but the real value comes from knowing how to completely make your site irrelevant to the engines, and thus to potential customers.

Matt Bailey, founder of SiteLogic, covered several topics where unary webmasters caused themselves and their sites unnecessary grief. Accessibility, for example, became a big deal for retail chain Target’s website.

Target made its site in a way that left it less than useful for sight-impaired visitors using screen reader software. Images and image maps lacked any alternative text a screen reader could use. That earned Target an embarrassing lawsuit from the National Federation of the Blind.

Failing to use redirects for changed URLs provides an easy way to send search crawlers into oblivion, taking your site’s presence with it. The 301 redirect says this URL doesn’t exist any more, Mr. Spider, you want this URL instead, forever afterwards. Temporary URL changes use a 302 redirect.

Then there’s inconsistent linking. Optimize those title bars to help avoid the perception that you’re presenting duplicate content. If you can hit the same page in different ways, search engines might decide to exclude all of its instances as duplicates.

URLs filled with useless unreadable characters present people with an unmemorable page. Fall out of love with icky URLs and make them something that a regular user recognizes right away, and sees its value. Don’t forget a nice favicon, either.

You may have tons of data available for a product or service you sell. Balance is the key. Too much information, like too many different products on one page, dilutes the presentation to the visitor.

If you really want to turn visitors into one-time arrivals, make calls to action obscure and unclear. Navigation that states what it does and does what it states keeps people makes it more likely that online shoppers, who frequently research products over and over before making a buy, will come back to reinforce their wants before making a purchase.

Bailey cited one task e-commerce site publishers need to succeed, and that’s analytics. “Number one thing you can do to increase your sales is use analytics,” he said, claiming over 70 percent of retailers do not use analytics.

“If you are not doing analytics, you are losing money,” said Bailey. You don’t really want to leave money on the table. Do you?

Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

Landing pages serve a number of functions and can be used for branding, lead generation, education and ecommerce. Landing pages drive revenue with 6 out of 10 used to sell specific products or services.

Branding starts with a readable URL. A readable URL reinforces branding. Seventeen percent of companies send clickers to the homepage instead of to a landing page that is uniquely relevant to a specific campaign. Nussey said, " Visitors must know immediately they’re in the right place and their time won’t be wasted."

Forty-five percent of landing pages don’t repeat email promotional copy, while six out of ten landing page designs matched the look of both the email and the company’s site.

Popular landing page designs differ from top email designs. Landing page designs should focus on controlling the visual path consumers take. Simple designs help lead a page visitor directly to a call to action.

Remember to think about the impact of resolution settings, different computer resolutions render designs differently. Design for low resolution so all customers can see the copy immediately.

You only have 8 seconds to grab a customer’s attention so keep scrolls to a minimum. Images grab attention during the critical 8-second window. Nussey said, "Simplicity almost always wins."

He added, " Computers are going to go from enablers to enhancers in the next couple of years."

Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

You can check the popularity of links using Yahoo’s Site Explorer, Netconcept’s Link Checker and Thumbshots Ranking tool.

 To check page rank use the Google Toolbar for IE or Firefox, the Google Directory, which only works for pages that are listed in DMOZ. You can also use PageRank Lookup tool from SEOChat and PageRank search tool from SEOChat.

When it comes to getting links Spencer said, "Don’t do anything you wouldn’t want to tell your family or a Google rep about."

Seth Besmertnik, CEO of LinkExperts talked about link building for structure. The ideal structure includes a critical mass of links, well-designed page and a well-designed internal structure.

Paid links have a bad reputation because they have been search spam. Aggregator and spam sites tend to be very aggressive and thoughtless and do not consider the user.

Besmertnik said," Always be a good Internet citizen and make sure you are doing things that are good, valuable, and provide a good experience."

Neil Patel, chief technology officer, Advantage Consulting Services, said the keys to success include learning and following rules and providing valuable content. He said to participate in the community and to build relations which you know matters.

Patel said," Social media may not be valuable for every company." You can find out by researching your target audience, listing goals and researching your competition.

Rhea Drysdale, Online Marketing Director of Less Everything, said the top tips for link building were time, money and experience. If you don’t have time, money or experience you can spend 15 minutes a day practicing link building techniques.

Do your homework and come up with a good strategy. Exhaust on site optimization and establish tracking methods using Google alerts, Yahoo Answers and Tweetscan.

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

Rob Key, the CEO of Converseon, pointed out in an ACCM session that approximately 92 percent of journalists use search engines to research stories, and 84 percent of adult Internet users use search engines on their own.  This is not a small or stupid group with whom complaints won’t register.

As a result, Key said there "really isn’t an option but to join and engage in this conversation to protect you and your brand."  Litigation isn’t the preferred method of communication, either, since it’s likely to draw more attention to the issue.

Instead, Key suggested creating a cross-discipline team, and coming to understand how your company and brands are searched.  Establish a SERP visibility benchmark, fully optimize your content across domains, and then join the conversation.

Websites, blogs, affiliates, and the social media ecosystem can all be used to respond to critics.  In regards to that last group, Twitter and Wikipedia are popular, although it’s not wise to edit the online encyclopedia’s entries about your own company.

Finally, Key emphasized that even after a problem has been resolved, it’s important to continue listening to consumer-generated media, and you should always respect the rules of a venue.

 Lee Odden

Lee Odden, the CEO of TopRank Online Marketing, then pointed out that even big corporations like Wal-Mart, eBay, and Dell have to pay attention to search engine reputation management.  He recommended monitoring keywords like company, executive, and product names in addition to terms like "sucks" or "scam."

Odden’s favorite reputation management tools include Trackur, Yahoo Site Explorer, Rank Checker, Search Rascal, Google Alerts, and TweetBeep.  "Search Reputation Management is absolutely something that has to be proactive," he stated, and "the bottom line is create and promote content."

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

The most valuable asset you have is your customer list, not your brand. Once you have customers the goal is to retain, reactive and move up the ladder.

Trollinger said analysis is important when it comes to mail frequency by segment and overall drop level response. Most catalogers do not mail their customers enough.

To build your customer base contact customers more often and have a first time buyer strategy, along with reactivation customers who have been inactive.  Put all your numbers into a master plan.

Use a contact chart so you have a visual display of how and when customers will be contacted. Combine all customer points into one reference document so you have an integrated view of the customer communication experience.

When it comes to executing your plan Trollinger said, "The big thing is if you plan it, do it." He also said to do a post campaign analysis.

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

The contextual search advertising market levels the playing field to a point for online marketers. Bidding and budgets play a big role, but as Ryan Gibson noted, one may be able to derive some extra benefit from PPC programs.

First things first, though. Hammer out a list of specific keywords, ones that people use to find your site and pages. Gibson suggested only testing 3 to 10 keywords per SKU a site has, to take the pulse of search-driven traffic and gauge what works.

Negative keywords help control what search drives to your site, and against your PPC budget; use them wisely. Matching remains important to the effectiveness of keywords. Gibson said exact matches offer twice the value of broad-matched keywords.

When creating ad copy for the landing pages where your throngs of PPC visitors will hit, Gibson tipped people to echo the user’s search string. This makes the lead into the ad copy a more natural feel for the visitor.

Doing this properly motivates people to shop where they have arrived. Ad copy on the landing page should tell them why they should shop at the destination, while including offer details like promotions for shoppers.

Gibson said testing means more than evaluating a click-through rate. Look at overall conversions and efficiency too: are people moving in an orderly fashion through the checkout process, or are they wandering around to different places on the site to find what they want?

Keep in mind the habits of shoppers. Since it’s easy to do, they may make multiple visits before purchasing something. The higher the price for the item, the longer they will probably take to consummate the deal.

During the question and answer session, Gibson acknowledged the cost question within the context of budgeting for ad campaigns. As long as it is profitable, spend and keep spending, Gibson said.

Being aware of profitability requires time for managing the campaign. Being aware of daily, weekly, and monthly reports keeps one in touch with which campaigns are profitable.

Remember what we mentioned about people making multiple visits before converting on a buy? Trends may be having an impact, especially in the context of product reviews. In other words, you not only have to know your inventory (how else can you provide quality customer service?), but you have to know what people think of a particular product.

Knowing these things helps produce profitable campaigns along with prudent spending decisions. Even the richest businesses refuse to spend indiscriminately, and neither should smaller businesses either.

(Coverage of the ACCM conference continues at WebProNews Videos.  Keep an eye on WebProNews for more notes and videos from the event this week.)

 Lois Boye-Brayfield

Lois Boyle-Brayfield is the president and chief creative officer at J. Schmid & Assoc. Inc.  In a session titled "Brand – It’s Not a One-Time Thing, It’s an All the Time Thing!" she stated, "Brand is really the perception your customers have of you. . . .  You have to guide it constantly. . . .  The experience you deliver must be consistent on all levels . . . with every channel . . . every creative element . . . at every point of content."

It’s important that consistency not result in dullness, though.  Boyle-Brayfield defined brand promise as giving customers relevant and unique benefits, and said, "The problem is many of us don’t differentiate on one thing and we look the same as our competitors."  Also, "I guarantee all of you have that one thing that is different in your brand . . . .  Your customer won’t know it if you don’t say it."

Try to connect on an emotional level, not by offering the lowest price.  Carefully consider every step, since it’s easier to build a good brand name from scratch than redefine an established, less-positive one.  And again, don’t think that you can wrap up and set aside brand development issues; they require constant consideration.

Boyle-Brayfield emphasized, "If you don’t have a brand, you don’t have loyalty."

Conferences are a big part of TopRank’s marketing and content promotion strategy and it looks like a busy summer is ahead of us. Numerous events are coming up quickly – enough to make your head spin. Here is a summary of our involvement with PRSA, DMA, PUSH, SIS, SES and SMX events over the next 30 days:

05/14/08 – MIMA: Duality Reality – Who Controls Social Media in the Enterprise?
The local interactive marketing association along with inspiration and motivation from Doug Pollei, there will be a very interesting panel of in-house Interactives discussing how large companies (General Mills, Best Buy, Target, Fingerhut and OptumHealth) are adopting and measuring social media programs. If you’re in the Twin Cities this week and involved with social marketing now or in the future, this is a MUST ATTEND event.

05/15/08 – Teleseminar: Reputation Management in a Google World
Crisis communications PR pal Kami Watson Huyse and I will be doing this PRSA Teleseminar for PR professionals that are still trying to make sense out of SEO and search engines as PR tools. More info is available on the PRSA web site

05/18/08 – Search Insider Summit
On beautiful Captiva Island in Florida, MediaPost is holding another strategic, networking focused conference with TopRank’s Online Marketing Blog as a media sponsor. The SIS event is hands down one of my favorite conferences. It’s small, exclusive, high level and full of networking with senior agencies and brands. Visit the SIS site for more info.

05/19/08 – ACCM: Reputation Management – Protecting Your Brand in the Search Engines
The DMA is holding it’s annual ACCM conference in Orlando, FL and together with Heather Lloyd-Martin of SuccessWorks and Rob Key of Converseon, we’ll be explaining the intricacies of online reputation management to the direct marketing crowd. More info on the session page.

06/03/08 – SMX Advanced
Of all the SMX conferences I’d like to attend, this is the one I look forward to most. Due to conflicts, Dana Larson from TopRank will be attending and blogging in my place. This SMX event promises high level content for those already fluent in SEM. More info here.

06/09/08 – PRSA Digital Impact Conference: SEO for News Content
For the PRSA I am presenting a session in NYC for PR practitioners on how to make the most of optimizing the digital assets they have access to. Optimizing news content leads to more effective discovery by journalists researching topics/experts online. Find the 2 day conference schedule here.

06/15/08 – PUSH: The Fertile Delta
PUSH is an annual executive conference for innovators on topics including Economics, Religion, Politics and Technology held by the PUSH Institute in Minneapolis. I’ve heard buzz about this event for several years and am now finally going to attend. Here’s more about the PUSH experience.

06/17/08 – SES Toronto: Twitter – Ultimate Time Waster or Great Tool?
Clearly the writer of this session title has some bias. David Snyder of JRDunn, Chris Winfield of 10e20 and myself will effectively clarify what Twitter is good for and what it is not. I will be presenting results of our Twitter survey as well as a case study and 3rd party tools. Session info here.

If you are attending any of these events, be sure to say so in the comments!

For our coverage of conferences ranging from PR to direct marketing to search marketing, visit our Marketing PR Conferences category.

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