No matter what type of offline direct marketing campaign marketers conduct, studies by leading research firms consistently indicate that more than a quarter of all audiences invariably wind up searching for more information online—partly because marketers themselves induce this behavior in their calls to action and partly because consumers turn to the Internet to research marketing offers.
As such, landing pages play tremendous roles in serving consumers’ information needs and closing sales. In their recent white paper, Consumer Retail: Utilizing Landing Pages for Integrating Online and Offline Advertising Programs, LeapFrog Interactive’s Art Director Jeremy Williams and Director of Interactive Marketing Michael Wunsch share a few pointers on how to craft these sales tools for better results:
• Engage visitors immediately by placing copy and graphics that deliver on the promise conveyed in the offline marketing above the fold. This key messaging should be quickly located without the need for excessive scrolling or navigating through links. In fact, links to other pages should be minimal and tightly focused to conversion paths.
• URLs promoted in television and radio campaigns can be difficult for consumers to remember accurately. For these landing pages, purchase alternative spellings, including possible typos, of the URLs used, and redirect these pages to the correct entry pages. Another fail-safe move is to place a link on your homepage that connects to the landing page in the event that consumers forget the promoted URL and seek out your main site; label the link clearly, such as “TV viewers click here.”
• Landing pages for direct mail campaigns perform best when marketers use PURLs to customize the selling process. By targeting the consumer’s specific interests in the mailing and then following through on these insights on the landing page, marketers can better understand the prospect’s needs and deliver more useful sales information.
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