The Ingredients of High Converting Landing Pages

This is a great question often asked by the best bloggers within the industry. For those of you new to the world of blogging, “LP” stands for landing pages, which are often used to get visitors to opt in to a newsletter or subscription list. By having people opt-in, you are increasing the chances of sending follow-ups and building a more personal relationship with the visitor. This helps streamline your bottom line of creating conversions and profits more quickly. However, creating the right type of landing pages does take time and effort, which is why it is important you read case studies to find out what has worked in the past.

Over the years, I’ve had a lot of experience with landing pages and have tested what works compared to what doesn’t. Anyway, let’s look at a few key ingredients of a successful landing page so you can implement these into your blog going forward.

Meets the Expectations

What do I mean by this? The answer is very simple…

The visitor has arrived on your blog because they expect to find value and a solution to a common problem. It’s important that you meet all expectations when creating your landing page because this will increase the chances of getting a person to opt-in. For example, if I write content on “weight loss” and my audiences expects to find diet plans then I won’t be able to convert them with a landing page based on “automotive tips”…right? So, here is the first ingredient…

You have to make sure your landing page meets all requirements and expectations because this will help with conversions. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• Remember your purpose
• Keep in mind the keywords bringing people to your LP
• Always try to meet expectations

To capture the visitor’s attention quickly, you should focus on creative headlines focused on the topic and reason they have come to your landing page.

Trust and Value

Landing page conversions are increased when you provide trust and value to your readers. There are a few ways you can achieve this and I’d like to discuss the two most valuable:

First, trust and value is achieved when you are sending loyal readers to your LP and these people are already familiar with your brand. This means they trust your content and are more likely to opt-in to your form. You’ll have different offers throughout your blog so sending a quick follow-up or popup to existing visitors is a great way to produce conversions. Secondly, testimonials and reviews have worked well for huge brands and they continue to utilize this strategy going forward. For example, if you are selling a product, then think about how easy it is to convert visitors when they know others have had a great experience on your blog. Consider how easy it is to convert visitors when they see others have found your products and services useful.

Converting is Easy

An optimal way to increase conversions is by ONLY asking for the information you need when they arrive on your page. For example, if you are offering a FREE eBook, there is NO reason to ask for phone number and address. This just complicates the opt-in process and forces people to move away. I like to keep my forms simple and don’t even ask for a name on my forms. However, the form you choose should, and will, depend on your niche and what type of subscriber the visitors are becoming. If they are signing up for a FREE trial, then you might need to ask for more information than the normal opt-in form does.

Here are a few more tips you should consider going forward:

• Keep your focus in mind when designing your landing page
• Only ask for minimum name and email (depends on type of opt-in obviously).
• Don’t be shy to split test different types of forms.
• Never forget to provide trust and value
• Keep statistics and optimize along the way

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How I Got Back On Google After Being Slapped

Yesterday, I told you the story of how Google nuked me from their search engine and how I was able to survive it. In this blog post I want to share with you how I got back into Google’s good graces and the lessons learned from it.

Since the challenge of building a blog without Google was pretty much done and proven, the new challenge was trying to get back into Google. Would Google even talk to me after I’ve made them look bad for three years?

The normal way for getting a banned/slapped site back into Google is to correct whatever got you banned in the first place and then send a reconsideration request using Google Webmaster Tools.

There is no assurance or guarantee that Google will reconsider you and let you back in. You just basically have to hope and pray.

This was something I didn’t want to do.

Instead, I talked to my friend Neil Patel. Neil told me the best way to get back into Google was just to talk to Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam team at that time. Neil told me that Matt is an extremely fair guy and would be open to the idea of letting me back in even after all those violations I pulled.

Neil facilitated an introduction and Matt and I exchanged several emails. I got the feeling that Matt must work 24 hours a day because every time he emailed me, it was after 10PM.

Neil was correct in saying that Matt was extremely fair and after correcting one misunderstanding, Matt informed me that a member of his team had submitted a reconsideration request on my behalf. The next day, I was back in Google!

There are two take-away lessons you can learn from this.

The first one is… It’s not what you know, it’s who you know!

Without Neil Patel, I would have never got an audience with Matt Cutts. Instead, I’ll be hoping and praying like every webmaster who submitted a reconsideration request. Neil allowed me to go straight to The Man and get my blog back in Google almost instantly.

This is why networking is so important to me, and why I attend a lot of industry events. Your network is your net worth!

The second take away is… Have an email list!

If I didn’t have an email list when Google slapped hit, I wouldn’t be around today. The list allowed me to survived three years with no Google traffic.

My email list is the foundation of my entire online business. Without it, I would be just another broke blogger making peanuts, instead of of a millionaire blogger living the Dot Com Lifestyle.

If you truly want to make money online and live the Dot Com Lifestyle, you MUST have a list. And you MUST start it from day 1 (that’s today).

My friends over at Constant Contact would like to offer you a free 60 day trial to test out their world class list building service.

The free trial will allow you to explore all the campaign types and features that Constant Contact has to offer. You can create as many campaigns as you want, and try out all the different campaign types available.

And, unlike other trials, you don’t need a credit card to sign up. Test it out for a full 60 days and then decide if you want to be a customer. I’m sure you will once you see how powerful the service is.

In upcoming post seris, I will show you how to take full advantage of all the unique features Constant Contact has to offer. Go set up your free trial now so you learn can along with the training. Remember, it’s free and no credit card is required.

Start Your Free Constant Contact Trial. No Risk. No Credit Card Required.

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Tomorrow’s Big Win Starts Yesterday

One of these days, you’re going to be the head of one of those newsworthy Internet startups that eventually goes IPO or gets bought up by Facebook, Apple or Google. One of these days, you’re going to be one of those big, successful online influencers who rakes in thousands of dollars for a single tweet or Instagram post. One of these days, you’ll be sipping on umbrella drinks on some tropical beach somewhere, as your autopilot online business generates consistent passive income to sustain your elaborate lifestyle.

One of these days. But you can’t today, because you’ve got to go and pick up the kids from band practice or you need to go to the grocery store to pick up some oranges or you need to catch up on the latest season of Black Mirror on Netflix. Seriously, Black Mirror is such a great show.

And then the next day rolls around and you discover another YouTube series you want to watch, another game you want to play, another cafe you want to relax at for hours at a time. Or maybe you have a goal of saving up to buy your first home or you want to launch that big blog or any number of other objectives. And yet, you never get around to getting started, because it seems like such a daunting task.

That’s the problem. And it’s a big problem, because it’s so easy to fall into the trap of putting off to tomorrow what you can do today. You put it off because it seems to scary and intimidating, so you decide that you’ll want for a better opportunity. You’ll wait until the circumstances are better. You wait until you have all your ducks in a row, so to speak.

But that will never happen. You will never encounter a situation wherein all the circumstances are perfectly aligned in your favor. There will never be a time when everything will be coming up Milhouse, as it were.

If you decide that you’ll get around to tackling these bold ambitions and these big dreams some day, then you will have to face the harsh reality that someday never comes. Put another way, there are seven days in the week and none of them are called someday. This is true regardless of the goal that you have in mind.

You might look upon people who have achieved great things, both online and off, and you might look upon them with a tremendous sense of envy. The thing is that this great success you see is only the tip of the iceberg. You see the big win, but you don’t see everything hidden beneath the surface. You don’t see the years of sacrifice and hard work that let to that “breakthrough moment.”

Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos was recently named as the richest man on the planet with an estimated net worth of $106 billion. The company has seen a lot of huge successes over the years, growing to become the biggest name in online commerce. But it also has not been without its share of failures and shortcomings.

Remember the Fire Phone? That was a pretty big flop. And while Amazon Prime Music and Amazon Prime Video have made positive strides, they’re still easily overshadowed by competitors like Spotify and Netflix. What we need to realize, on a more humble scale, is that the big wins are not things that will happen overnight.

It’s only when you chip away at these big goals over an extended period of time with a number of different tactics. It’s only when you endure a number of false starts, stumbly steps, innumerable setbacks, and tiny pick-me-ups that you move toward the grander vision. And at the end of the day, “lucky breaks” much more readily come to those who are prepared to meet such opportunities halfway.

Are you ready to win tomorrow?

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MOST Important Questions to Ask Before Starting a Blog – Part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of my series, where I’m exploring the important questions to ask before starting a blog. These questions will help you get a better idea of what you are trying to achieve with your business and audience. By creating an outline of your objective, you will have clear focus and this will help guide your content writing. I believe a successful business has everything to do with the ability for you to resonate with your readers. If this is clear, then you will have no problems achieving your bottom line. In part 1, we discussed the following:

• Importance of audience
• The purpose
• Why You’re Unique
• Different Content Types

Let’s jump into Part 2 and look at some other important questions to ask before getting started.

What are My Deadlines?

Blogging is very time consuming and requires enormous dedication. That’s why, before you start, it’s important to find out the type of deadlines you are working with so you can organize accordingly. From my experience, here are a few things to consider:

• How often you have to write content
• How often you should be publishing content
• How often you should research

Having a solid posting schedule and focused deadlines will ensure you keep a consistent flow of content, which is important to build momentum and brand awareness.

Do I Need to Hire Anyone?

Depending on the type of niche you are involved with, it’s important to explore your options. For example, you might be in a niche that you’re passionate about, but need to explore topics that require professional feedback. If you are writing about nutrition and dieting, then you might need to hire someone with a Ph.D. in nutrition to write content. I usually recommend people get involved in a niche they have experience, but it’s not uncommon for you to hire someone to write based on previous case studies, etc.

Whatever avenue you take, it’s important you do two things:

First, budget yourself so you’ll know exactly how much you’ll be spending on hiring people. By doing this, you are making sure you have a dedicated budget for your writing. Secondly, you can do research, making sure you hire the right people for the job. The most important thing is to find people who are experienced and actually provide value so your readers can pull substance out of your content. Once you have a handful of people right for the job, then you can continue to pay them to write content, but the hardest part is pretty much out of the way.

How Will I Market My Blog?

Before you start blogging, it’s important to explore ways to market your blog going forward. These days, you have so many options available to you so you need to find what works the best and will drive relevant traffic to your blog. For example, here are some options you might want to consider going forward:

• Social media
• PPC
• Forums
• Relevant blogs
• Banner ads
• Email marketing

Some methods will work better than others so it’s important to split test until you find the ones that work best. The methods you choose will also depend on your budget but the good news is you have free methods available like social media, forums, and blogs. Here’s the point I’m trying to make:

Before you start your blog, become familiar with as many marketing strategies so you can start implementing them right away. The more you know about them and their interface, the better you can apply them to your blog. Don’t forget to have a system in place to track results so you can optimize at a later time going forward.

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How to Think About Productivity as a Dot Com Pro

The basic concept of productivity likely rose to prominence some time during the Industrial Revolution. Sure, people who worked on farms up until that point were probably interested in how much their fields could yield each season or how many eggs they could get their chickens to lay, but the rise of manufacturing really got the bosses interested in how much they could produce each day.

Remember that the root of the word “productivity” is “product.”

In the context of manufacturing, the number of units a factory worker can output in any given shift is instrumental to how much money that company can make. If every widget you sell brings in five bucks, you’d certainly be making more money if the factory worker manufactured 100 widgets in a shift as opposed to 10 widgets. Let’s just set the complications of supply and demand aside for the sake of simplicity.

Today, this manner of conceptualizing productivity still rings through how most people approach the world of work. If you are in the business of making physical things, maybe it’s still relevant, but so many of us work in industries that deliver far more intangible value. Just getting things done isn’t enough and this is especially true if you want to make money online.

The way that we think about productivity has to change, because it’s not just about how many hours you put in each day or how many “units” you’re able to produce. It’s far more complicated than that.

One guy might be able to bust out ten different logo designs in one day, because they’re all from templates that he only alters slightly for each client. He delivers these logos to his customers on Fiverr for five bucks a piece, putting $50 in his pocket (before fees and such). That’s ten logos.

Meanwhile, someone else came up with a new logo for the City of Vancouver in 2017 and got paid $8,000 for it. Some people might think that rate is atrocious, given the similarity to the logo it replaces, but at the end of the day, that’s how much was paid.

Let’s assume the new Vancouver logo took more than a day. Let’s say it took 20 business days (one month). Even at that pace, the rate works out to $400 a day, eight times what the Fiverr logo designer is making. The Fiverr guy may be more productive in the traditional sense, coming up with 200 logos a month (if he keeps up the 10/day pace) for $1,000, but just a single City of Vancouver logo netted $8,000. Who’s more productive?

There is a reason why John focuses most of his energy on higher ticket value items for affiliate marketing. Convincing one person to spend a few thousand dollars on a training program is arguably just as much work as convincing someone to spend $5 on a widget, but the former results in a much heftier commission. If you’re going to put in the same amount of work, you want to maximize your earnings from that work.

That’s one point.

The second point that you need to understand as a self-employed online professional is that you cannot assign a dollar value to everything that you do. This is not an hourly job where you get paid simply for showing up to work (and that is arguably the greatest advantage to the dot com lifestyle, as your earning potential is literally limitless even if your time isn’t).

A great example of this might be if you are writing an ebook or developing a membership site.

A great example of this might be if you are writing a book or developing a membership site. You could spend days, weeks or even months (or years!) toiling away at this project without bringing in a single penny for your efforts. You may have written 200 pages, but can you really measure your productivity based on raw word count?

It won’t be until you actually publish the book or launch the membership site that you will have any idea how “productive” you really were. And even then, there are so many side benefits that extend far beyond the number of copies you sell or the number of paid memberships you’re able to get. Putting your name on the cover of a book adds credibility and developing that membership site adds to your skill set.

When you take on a longer term perspective, you may reconsider just how “productive” you were for those days, weeks or months you were working on the book or membership site. If the project is a total bust, maybe you weren’t being especially productive and your time could have been better spent. If the project is a huge hit, then maybe you were being way more productive than you could have imagined. You just never know.

Don’t worry too much about how “productive” you are each day. Don’t dwell on your daily earnings too much. Instead, look further down the horizon and think about how you can do better rather than simply doing more. Being busy is not the same as being productive.

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MOST Important Questions to Ask Before Starting a Blog – Part 1

Blogging is a tough business and it becomes tougher if you don’t know your objective and mission. However, over the years, I’ve found there are certain questions I can ask that will help me outline my purpose so I’m better in charge of the questions I’d like to answer through my blog. I’ve been a true believer that if you want to succeed, then you should have a clear purpose that solves a common problem within your niche. Only then will you be able to attract the right type of audience and keep pushing forward. If you can attract traffic and build loyalty, then it just makes it easier for you to prosper in the world of blogging. If you don’t believe me, then simply ask some of the MOST success bloggers within the industry. With this said,

I’d like to start this “2” part series, where I go over some of the MOST common questions to ask before you sit down and outline your blog’s purpose. These are very simple questions, but they will have a huge affect on your success.

Let’s get started…

The Audience

Once you’ve established your audience, you’ll have a better idea of your purpose, which we’ll discuss in the next section. However, you need a great outline of your audience so you know which way to aim your focus. By doing some research beforehand, you’ll be able to find out who your audience is and then create content to stir their interest, which is very important for your success. Keep in mind, blogging is very competitive and the ones that survive are those that attract a wide enough audience. Here are a few things you can do to research your audience…

• Research “target” keywords
• Visit competitors and see what they are doing
• Use Alexa.com because they provide a good breakdown.
• Test of Facebook ads because they have a great filter system.

The Purpose

It’s one thing to know your audience, but a completely different thing to have a clear idea of what you are trying to do. For example,

• Are you trying to solve a problem?
• Are you creating a debate?
• Are you trying to make money?
• Are you selling products and/or services?

All these questions will allow you to guide your content writing and create something engaging. This is important if you want to build momentum and have a successful blog. However, purpose comes after knowing your audience because it’s only when you know who you are writing for that you can create what they are looking for.

Why am I Unique?

It’s no secret you’re going to have competition so you have to ask yourself: Why am I Unique? This will make you think long and hard about the things you can do to stand out compared to others within your niche. Some blogs will focus on “expert interviews” while others will focus on “infographics” so think of ways you can stand out. I know many bloggers who have done very well by doing live case studies.

If you can find ways to stand out then you’ll have a way to build momentum against your competition and this will help spurt your growth quickly. It’s a simple question to ask yourself and something you should think about before you start blogging so you don’t hit a roadblock afterward.

The Content Types

If you decided you’re going to be unique because you’ll be a tutorial blog, then you have to figure out the ways you will present your content. For example, you will solve common problems within your niche so now write down ways you’ll achieve this. At this point, you have many content types available, all proven to be very effective, like:

• Video posts
• Infographics
• Images
• Text content

These are all great ways to present content and some will work better than others. I encourage all of you to try different things and find out how your audience engages with each. By doing this simple trial and error, you’ll be able to find what works well and increase engagement on your blog. With higher engagement comes a better chance of building more social shares and conversions. Here’s a quick tip:

It doesn’t matter what you’re doing online because you have to split test to find out what works compared to others. After, it’s time to simply optimize and push forward.

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Exploring ROI Beyond the Numbers

If there is at least one thing you can learn from television shows like Dragons’ Den and Shark Tank, it’s that you should always have a great handle on your numbers. Whether your business is online or offline, physical or digital, you need to know your numbers. How much revenue did you pull in last year? How many units were you able to push last quarter? What is your profit margin on a per-unit basis? Can you get a better wholesale price?

These are all important figures to keep in mind as you determine the overall profitability of your business, because you need to know where you have opportunities to grow your revenue and reduce your expenses. You need to know what ventures or projects are worth investing your time and money into, and what opportunities are better off being pushed aside. What does your year-over-year growth look like?

Now, there are all sorts of different systems, software and programs you can use to track all of this kind of data. You’ve got plenty of spreadsheets and accounting software to help you stay on top of this sort of thing. If you’re into affiliate marketing and other similar avenues, you’re likely already using a number of built-in and third-party tools for tracking such key metrics as CTR, CPC, eCPM, and so on.

These all lead back to perhaps one of the most important metrics of them all: ROI. At the end of the day, return on investment is the number that really matters the most. If you bring in $10 million in revenue, but it cost you $100 million to get it, then you’ve probably got some pretty big problems. The kind of ROI you can expect will vary wildly based on a number of factors, but it is definitely something you need to keep an keen eye on.

But here’s the thing. Not everything can be summed up using raw numbers alone and return on investment (ROI) is no exception. Allow me to illustrate with a couple of key examples.

Several years ago, I agreed to co-author a book with John called Make Money Online. The book is largely from the perspective of John and his online journey up until that point, offering insights and advice into how to make a full-time income from part-time blogging. At the time, John basically offered me two main options.

First, he could pay me a flat rate (or a per page rate) to ghostwrite the book for him. I’d do the work, he’d publish the book, and my name would have never been attached to the project in any official capacity whatsoever. You’ll find that this is oftentimes the case with a lot of celebrity memoirs and other similar kinds of autobiographies. No one really cares about the ghostwriter. They want to know about the celebrity. Fair enough.

Alternatively, he could provide me with zero up-front payment whatsoever and I’d get a cut of the resulting royalties from book sales. Now, it would be easy enough to compare how much I’ve earned from my share of the royalties against how much the up-front payment would have been in a pure ghostwriting arrangement, but that’s only part of the picture. With this second option, which I chose, I would share the byline with John.

Instead of having just “John Chow” on the cover, the cover to Make Money Online reads “John Chow with Michael Kwan.” That’s huge. I cannot say with any real certainty how much work I’ve received as a freelance writer as a result of this shared byline or how “better known” I am as a result, but there is a definite intangible value to it, just like having my own byline for this blog post. The ROI goes beyond the raw numbers.

Here’s another example. In 2017, I set out to vlog each and every week. My YouTube channel has been around for years, but this was the first time I was sticking to a set publication channel. The content of the videos range from travel to fatherhood to local events, but the goal was to have a new personal video up every Monday morning. And I accomplished that goal.

When I first set out, I had hopes that this would help to grow my YouTube channel significantly and, by extension, grow my online reach and exposure in general. It helped, to some degree, but in all honesty, I haven’t exactly been getting as many views as I had hoped. Does this mean the vlog experiment was a waste of time and energy and effort? Not at all.

The intangible ROI goes far beyond view and subscriber counts. Through the vlog, I was able to connect with some other local YouTubers in Vancouver. Through the vlog, I was able to exercise a different set of creative muscles and learn so much more about video production, as well as video editing and the whole YouTube ecosystem. I learned a lot and these lessons can be applied to other endeavors I may have in the future. The ROI goes beyond the numbers.

Many people have the misconception that success is a straight road paved only by success after success. The truth of the matter is that the road to success is littered with innumerable failures and shortcomings, and it is through these experiences that you learn how to keep moving forward, taking the lessons with you to the next project or opportunity. That’s the real ROI.

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