Landing Page Reviews

Harvard has opted not to use a traditional landing page to sell the Harvard Health Letter.

Instead, the main sales page for the Harvard Health Letter is a minimal transaction page with the barest of copy and graphics, and is devoid of the selling effort one would normally expect when promoting a paid subscription publication online.

Knowing the smart marketers at Harvard, we have to believe that this is a deliberate choice. As we recall, they don’t use this “bare minimum” approach in print promotions: their paper direct mail that we’ve seen consists of strong, long-copy sales letters that sell the publication and its benefits, and sell it hard. Why then would they opt for this “bare bones” approach online? This review really addresses a broader, more important question: are online and offline copy fundamentally the same or fundamentally different? … Continue Reading »

In Psychology 101 we all learned the basic principles of attraction and avoidance. Pleasure and pain. Reward and punishment.Boiled down, I think of it this way: You either want something you don’t have, or you have something you don’t want.If you suffer with back pain, you have something you really don’t want, and you’re not alone. … Continue Reading »

The Mequoda Library recently did an Internet Hub Case Study on America’s Test Kitchen. A brief recap: the company takes the 2.9 million viewers from their TV show, America’s Test Kitchen, and pushes them to www.AmericasTestKitchen.com, a Mequoda Internet Hub, where viewers can get recipes featured on the show for free. … Continue Reading »

We were first introduced to InvestmentU.com when we interviewed John Phillips, who heads up search marketing for the website. He and his team have done a very impressive job of bringing visitors to the InvestmentU.com site with a combination of organic and paid search. In this review, we look at the landing page that InvestmentU.com uses to convert these visitors to customers for its lead product, The Investment U Course. … Continue Reading »

The biggest flaws are the lack of a unique selling proposition in the headline and lead and failure to establish the qualifications and credentials of the course creator or publisher.

My advice to the Rocket French company… I also think there might be a missed opportunity in not starting with where the reader already might be in her search for French mastery: frustrated by failure in high school, college, and other programs. … Continue Reading »

Landing Page Scorecard: Rose-Growing-Secrets.com

Internet Explorer, the pundits tell us, accounts for up to 95 percent of all Web browser traffic. So why should we care about that small minority of surfers who prefer alternative browsers such as Netscape Communicator, Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Safari?

And why waste time with those non-conformist non-Windows users who are stuck with the Mac version of IE? … Continue Reading »

Clayton Makepeace is a legend in the direct response advertising business. He has the respect of both his clients and peers—the hallmark of a real professional.

He has a huge portfolio of winning direct mail packages, commands top dollar for his work and in April of 2006 conducted a $5,000-per-seat, how-to seminar for aspiring copywriters. I can’t imagine anyone not putting his name on their top-10 list.

At MakepeaceTotalPackage.com Mr. Makepeace displays his considerable skill with one objective: to get other copywriters to sign up for his free email newsletter. … Continue Reading »

In our NicheADay.com Landing Page Review we examined an information product designed for opportunity-seekers. That’s a large and ever-changing market niche comprised of would-be business owners.

These are people who are dissatisfied with their jobs, or have recently become unemployed, and suddenly decide to go into business for themselves. They may suddenly embrace the “American Dream” of being self-employed and start what they hope will become a profitable business. They even call themselves entrepreneurs. One of my mentors, Michael Gerber, calls that “having an entrepreneurial seizure.” … Continue Reading »

If You Want a Landing Page that Excites the Senses and Hits all the Hot Buttons with Ample Proof, Then This is the One to Mirror.

We are back now with another offer from her highness, Alexandria Brown, “The Ezine Queen.” After seeing this site I have decided that I might want to be a loyal subject. “The Queen” has brought you into her kingdom by earlier selling you her ezine course. This is good. This is how you get folks into your funnel. NOW, Ali is joining other Internet Marketers (with one main difference that I shall discuss later) and upselling them to a hands-on business marketing seminar. … Continue Reading »

With a few judicious tweaks to this sales letter landing page, he might sell even more.

Perry Marshall is something of a Renaissance man—engineer, advertising copywriter, technical writer, marketer and philosopher.

Among Internet marketers, he has ascended to the rank of high priest of Google AdWords. As one of the world’s leading specialists on buying search engine traffic, he has published a very popular how-to book, conducted high-ticket seminars and is a much-sought-after personal coach.. … Continue Reading »

Ali K. Brown’s Landing Page Shows You How To Boost Business with Your Own Ezine—and More

In business it’s location, location, location. And of course online, it’s your list, list, list. Back in the covered-wagon days of marketing when there was no Internet, the only way to communicate with your prospects or loyal customers was to contact them through mail, fax, phone or carrier pigeon.

Today, anyone with an online presence that has an in-demand product or service, (and if they know how to position themselves) can set up an ezine list of thirsty customers. Another way to grab market share is to grow rich within your niche. … Continue Reading »

Dan Kennedy’s Free Gift Landing Page is a Great Site to Model

Even before the Internet took over our lives (and I mean that in a good and bad way) there were marketers who made a great living offline promoting their products and consulting services.

One man, speaker/copywriter/bigtimemarketing consultant Dan Kennedy, was someone who took this “old school” knowledge and parlayed it into a strong cyberspace presence. I’ve studied Dan Kennedy’s work and he has greatly influenced a plethora of online marketers as well as many brick-and-mortar businesses who have produced a strong ROI for themselves. … Continue Reading »

The fundamental mistake made by many entrepreneurs is the classic chicken-and-egg scenario in which the inventor first creates a new product and then seeks a market for it.

Experienced product developers do the opposite. They anticipate the changes in society. They assess the evolving problems, requirements and desires of consumers, and look for opportunities that have not yet been addressed by the market. Then they forecast demand and create new products that fill the gap. … Continue Reading »

With gardening season upon us, it seemed like a good idea to check out the landing page forGardening Secrets and Tips.

There are few hobbies or avocations that rival gardening when it comes to the need for secret methods and helpful tips. And there are few activities that attract more avid practitioners. So, with that in mind, I took a long, Mequoda Landing Page Scorecard look at GardeningSecretsandTips.com. … Continue Reading »

Landing Page Conversions Gets Personal

For decades, direct marketers have been using personalization to increase direct mail response rates. When you send out a laser-printed sales letter with the prospect’s name in it, you gain his or her attention.

Personalization works equally well online, yet your name doesn’t appear within the copy of most of the landing pages you click on. Glen Hopkins wants to change all that with Page Personalizer. … Continue Reading »

It wasn’t long ago that I was reviewing the landing page for the Internet Marketing Center, the very long and very well done Internet sales letter developed by late Web marketing guru Corey Rudl. When I heard of his tragic death in an automobile racing accident, I figured we’d probably seen the last of IMC. … Continue Reading »

The South Beach Diet Newsletter Could be the Best Thing Ever Printed… but we’d Never Know it from this Landing Page

Are there any subjects more mulled over and carefully considered than our health and appearance? If you can do something to make the population more slender and likely to live longer, you should be able to make a fortune—shouldn’t you?

Maybe not… at least if you make all the mistakes and miss all the opportunities that The South Beach Diet Newsletter does on its landing page. This is a sales page that offers pretty pictures instead of compelling reasons to buy and a glorified order form instead of a sales pitch. But to be fair, let’s take a moment and see how it stacks up to the Mequoda Landing Page Scorecard. … Continue Reading »

OK, folks. Bring your seat and tray to the upright position. We’re ready for take off with an incredibly convincing and compelling landing page that shows you the mesmerizing influence of “good old fashioned-take-no-prisoners-suck-out-the-money-from the wallet” copy and graphics.

The secret of creating streams of revenue in a niche business is to identify a problem that keeps your prospect up at night and then give them a real, viable, solution. Now everywhere you go on the Internet there’s always some marketer who says they’ve invented a better “widget” (I’ve never seen a widget, but apparently there are a lot of them out there) to improve every website owner’s quagmire: search engine ranking with the 800 pound gorilla Google as well as with Yahoo, and MSN. … Continue Reading »

A friend of mine sent me a printout of the landing page promoting a copywriting course from American Writer’s & Artist Inc. He wanted to know if it would be worth it to him to enroll in the AWAI course. I was impressed that my friend, a skilled writer who has done national infomercials and other projects, was interested in this letter. It takes a lot of sales skills to tempt a semi-cynical infomercial writer.

I couldn’t really tell him definitively how he would benefit from the course if he took it, but I did decide to put the landing page through the Mequoda Scorecard and see how it fared. The site is a classic in the long-copy tradition. The landing page sales letter printed out to 18 pages. I love long copy, but let’s see what the scorecard has to say. … Continue Reading »

One of the most fun—and frustrating—things about Internet marketing is that the rules and best practices are constantly changing, based on innovation and discovery of new methods that work better than the old. I say “fun” because there are few thrills in direct marketing as big as creating a new promotion that significantly outperforms the old one. I say “frustrating” because implementing these new strategies can involve a lot of time and work—often forcing us to redo old online promotions that we thought were all set. … Continue Reading »

Paul McManus, operator of PrayerPower.com, has an edge over other Internet marketers: he can pray for success, and if his product, “Prayer Power,” does what he promises in his copy, his prayers will be answered. Prayer Power is a $19.95 book. It comes with two free bonus CDs valued at $31.90, and shows you the right way to pray. How McManus has knowledge of the type of praying God responds to best is beyond me. … Continue Reading »

The Internet is a competitive marketplace, and the late Corey Rudl, founder of the Internet Marketing Center, once told me the most important strategy for Internet marketing success is to find a niche market that you are passionate about. Since people love their dogs, I would assume the founders of SitStayFetch.net have done just that. … Continue Reading »

Some wag once said “the perfect is the enemy of the good.” In other words, the goal of achieving perfection in a new venture often gets in the way of accomplishing an outcome that is “good enough” to succeed. Often an idea for a big, bold new product is one that never gets completed. Meanwhile, simple products quickly get created, marketed and sold, often bringing significant financial success to their developers. … Continue Reading »

This landing page works mainly because it engages the reader, teasing you with their wonderful fascinations, while not overwhelming you with clutter. The copy does a strong job of building your trust and presenting its credibility on its main portal homepage (and subsequent landing pages). If this was a free standing micro site, you’d need more information. Bottom Line presents an overall strong communal feel to its readers on their overall site (not necessarily on this Store page). … Continue Reading »

Like just about everyone else, I’d like to make more money, work less, and enjoy a higher level of financial security. That’s what Dave Lindahl, the Apartment King, is offering the public on his landing page. There’s a fine line that must be walked when offering get-rich products on the Internet. Offer too much and you lose credibility. Offer too little and you lose the sale. … Continue Reading »

My friend Fred Gleeck, the Internet marketing guru, says that if all you do to get people to sign up for your free e-zine is have a tiny box on your main website in which they enter their email address, you are probably failing to build your e-list as rapidly and cost-effectively as you could. … Continue Reading »

If you want a good example of a soft offer in direct response advertising, all you have to do is pick up a copy of the National Enquirer at your local supermarket. (Yes, yes, I know you scan “only” the cover and the headlines, but wouldn’t dare buy one.) But if you did—and you actually read some of the advertisements inside, you’d come across a strong two-step method of getting a targeted prospect to raise his/her hand. … Continue Reading »

Reviewing a website published by Jakob Nielsen is a little like giving driving lessons to your father. It feels as though the roles ought to be reversed. Nielsen has a Ph.D. and holds 78 U.S. patents, most of them on ways for making the Internet easier to use. I, ahem, do not.The New York Times calls Nielsen “the guru of webpage usability.” U.S. News & World Report calls him the world’s leading expert on web usability.” A popular German publication calls him “the world’s leading expert on user-friendly design.” … Continue Reading »

Doctor Douglass’ Real Health Breakthroughs Landing Page by Agora Demonstrates How Traditional Long Copy, Captivating Headlines and Effective Story Telling Convince Readers to Buy … Continue Reading »

This week we’re looking at the landing page for Jose Silva and his Jose Silva UltraMind System. Here we face a particular challenge that pops up frequently in information marketing: how to best sell an author, expert or system that has been around a long time. On the plus side, Silva’s longevity means his methods have been extensively tested, read and used by thousands of people, and featured in major media for decades. These credentials make it easier to promote Silva as a credible expert vs. someone who is just trying to break into this market… as new people are doing all the time. … Continue Reading »

Naturally, investors of all shapes and sizes want a great ROI, which is why they spend a lot of money on investment newsletters. And as you’re well aware there’s no shortage of it online and off. The majority of investment newsletters we know and love primarily use long-copy landing pages to sell their products. This review is of an excellent company that’s been giving a plethora of information since 1997: 21st Century Investor. … Continue Reading »

Mequoda guidelines outline the 12 characteristics a landing page needs to successfully close sales online. And to incorporate all 12 characteristics typically, at least for a consumer product, requires medium-to-long copy on that landing page. But should you send your traffic directly to that long-copy landing page? Or will visitors be put off by its length? … Continue Reading »

Few occupations are as romanticized and misunderstood as the field of professional writing. The term “freelance writer” often conjures up images of tweed jackets with arm patches, briar pipes, cozy garrets and a rural mailbox stuffed with royalty checks. The fact is, though, that writing for a living requires a certain amount of preparation and training. … Continue Reading »

The Hume Group has been in the self-help education arena since 1974. Like Nightingale Conant, they’re one of the granddaddies of that genre. They specialize in providing financial security education with real estate and stay-at-home, do-it-yourself investment programs. To quote the company’s mission statement: Our goal is to help you achieve personal financial security with investments that are most suitable to your life… (works for me). … Continue Reading »

There are a few glaring problems with the Cleveland Clinic Heart Advisor landing page. Mostly, they are not using effective copywriting techniques to sell this newsletter. Instead of promising readers a longer and healthier life, the Cleveland Clinic Heart Advisor landing page only manages to promise 2 free issues – something someone with a shelf already full of health information would not get overly excited about. Let’s see how else they do when run through the Mequoda Landing Page Scorecard. … Continue Reading »

You might know, and subscribe, to one or more products from information marketing juggernauts like Bottom Line Publications, Agora, Healthy Directions or Philips Investment Resources. More importantly, you may study their strategies and creations like an aspiring artist studies the work of the great masters. … Continue Reading »

It’s really quite difficult to find fault with an organization that devotes its time and resources to helping people train and care for their dogs using natural techniques and products. Dogs are our best friends, right? And who isn’t in favor of natural techniques and products under just about any circumstances?

So it is with the utmost respect for dogs, dog trainers and dog people in general that I unleash the Mequoda Landing Page Scorecard on the gentle folks who wrote and designed the landing page for The Whole Dog Journal. … Continue Reading »

Andrew Harper’s Hideaway Report® is a privately published newsletter dedicated to the discovery of peaceful vacation retreats for the sophisticated traveler. The publication claims 85 percent of its executive subscribers hold the title of CEO/President/Owner/Partner. … Continue Reading »

Cooking Club of America is an efficient, user friendly membership site. We found this site by typing “Cooking Club of America” into Google, and this is the first page that showed up in the organic listings.

While this page serves as the home page of this membership website, it also serves as a rapid conversion landing page, as it immediately offers a free issue of Cooking Pleasures magazine in exchange for a free trial membership to Cooking Club of America. … Continue Reading »

At first blush, you would probably expect that a world class publication, with all its resources and media knowledge, would have a truly inspiring landing page. They are, after all, The Wall Street Journal. … Continue Reading »

If you divide products into two categories—must-have and nice-to-have—newsletters fall decisively in the latter. No one needs newsletters. As Bill Bonner, founder of Agora Publishing, a large consumer newsletter publisher likes to point out, “Nobody wakes up, taps their significant other on the shoulder, and says, ‘Honey, we need to get some more newsletters today.” … Continue Reading »

“We don’t turn back our odometers.”

When I first logged on to the sales letter at SuperAffilateHandbook.com, I liked the clean design and the bright colors. However, I can’t say I feel the same about the brief, but very negative, intro copy the author offers at the top of the lette … Continue Reading »

It’s no secret that we at the Mequoda Group are big fans of the Motley Fools. In our Motley Fool Media Network Case Study, we chronicled the company’s admirable history from its humble beginnings as an America Online discussion forum in 1994. … Continue Reading »

If the advent of the World Wide Web and the superabundance of information it puts within easy reach has done anything for me, it’s made me a much better consumer of medical services and a greater participant in my own healthcare. … Continue Reading »

Depending on who’s counting, there are at least 160 paid-subscription financial newsletters published in North America. The most popular focus on stock recommendations, but there are others covering everything from options and futures to precious metals and mutual funds. … Continue Reading »

The global consumer electronics company Samsung currently has a campaign running on Forbes.com which caught our eye at Mequoda. The animated rectangle advertisement on the top of the magazine’s homepage rotates through several products, each with its own landing page. We’ve selected the SyncMaster 710mp LCD product landing page for scrutiny. This review reveals how lack of marketing focus can hinder campaign goals. … Continue Reading »

The Morningstar® FundInvestor™ landing page, when measured against our Landing Page best practices model, is ineffective and dysfunctional. This review is of one page on the MorningStar.com website, a link from the site’s homepage to the landing page for one of its many print newsletters. … Continue Reading »

The Richebächer Letter, published by Agora Financial, uses one of the more bare-knuckled attempts at turning fear into threat that we’ve seen to date. The copy on their sales letter landing page effectively takes the threat of losing one’s money and turns it into print subscription sales. … Continue Reading »