The Structure of a Winning Landing Page

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All good landing pages follow a certain structure. These aren’t laws of the universe, but it’s what typically works the best. No point in re-inventing the wheel.

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A benefit oriented headline. The headline is the most important part. If the visitors came by clicking on an ad, it must correspond to the ad text that triggered the page. If your banner or PPC ad said „Breakthrough meditation system“, then this phrase should also be included in the headline of your landing page.

Relevant and short copy. Make it clear, relevant, concise. Don’t put too much text on the page, as the visitor has to be able to read it quickly. Use bullet points to drive the main points home. Make sure the language in the ad is also present in the copy of the landing page (otherwise visitors will doubt whether they’re in the right place)

The focus is on getting visitors to take one specific action. There should be only ONE possible action for the visitor to take – be it subscribing to something, making a purchase or something else. Don’t offer options or the conversions will suffer.

There are no distracting navigational links. Remove all extra clutter – links, menus, buttons – that have nothing to do with the particular ad/campaign. The point is that the visitor cannot ignore your message by navigating away, and therefore focuses on only that page.

There is a prominent subscription form. The one action you want the visitor to take has to be big and obvious. Put a large sign-up form on the landing page, and make it stand out. If the landing page is long enough for scrolling, duplicate the form or button at the very bottom of the page.

Maintain your brand. Don’t make your landing page look different from your overall website and brand. Keep the same colors, fonts – the overall look and feel of your main site. This helps to enforce the brand awareness.

Here are some examples to look at:

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What You Need to Include:

a headline that speaks to the target audienceyour company logoa quick explanation of your offer above the fold (the fold is the portion of the screen that can be seen without theaverage user having to scroll down)a longer explanation of the offer below the fold if needed (depends on the complexity of your offer and product)an image of the product being offereda simple form, with ideally just 1 to 3 fields (usually just name and e-mail). Remember, the more fields you ask the visitor to fill in, the more friction you create and therefore the less people will fill out the form.a signup button on your pre-defined most wanted response

What You Should Leave Out:

a navigation menu – remember to focus only on your offerlinks to other parts of your sites such as “about”any pictures or images that don’t relate to the offer; these will only serve as distractionshard to read text, anything less than 12 px is bad (use 14 or even 16px for body copy)any links along the lines of “click here to read more.” If you can’t cram all your content into the upper fold of your landing page, just let the user scroll down. Scrolling is almost always better than clicking to the next page.scary forms with unnecessary fields such as “title” or “fax”“clear fields” button

There are always exceptions and you usually can’t copy best practices to use on your site, but this advice given here should be your starting point. Get the essentials in place first, and tweak from there.

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Long or short? There are 3 factors affecting the efficacy of body copy length on a landing page:

Nature of visitor motivationInitial level of Anxiety about product/companyLevel of cost/commitment associated with conversion.

So in a nutshell short copy performs better when the offer is free, very cheap or in some other way not intimidating. Also, when it’s an impulse buy or gives an emotional satisfaction (concert tickets, candy, something beautiful). Long copy is more suitable for expensive or complex product.

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Leading behavioral design researcher BJ Fogg has created a model that explains that three elements must come together at the same time for a behavior to occur: motivation, ability and trigger. When a behavior does not occur, at least one of those three elements is missing.

Bottom line is this: Behavior = motivation x ability x trigger.  Before I’ll go into how to apply it  for boosting conversions, you need to understand the model itself. (All credit goes to BJ Fogg.)

Here’s the model:

You want to aim top right (high motivation, easy to do, a trigger in place). If you have high motivation and low ability (difficult to do), what you’ll get is frustration. If it’s low motivation, but easy to do (e.g. take out the trash), you get annoyance.

How to use it:

1. Everything starts with defining the specific desired behavior - in our case it’d be getting visitors to subscribe.

2. Make sure the headlines and the copy create enough understanding and motivation before asking visitors to take action

3. Ensure that your form is not overly long or complicated – only keep the essential fields to make it easy to opt-in.

4. Your form and call to action is your trigger here. Make sure it gets noticed!

Now you can create a landing page that follows this structure with the new GetResponse Landing Page Creator.

How to Use Color Psychology in Email Newsletters

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So you’ve done the hard work, you’ve got your killer subject line. It’s short, it’s sweet, and it’s very clickable. You’re confident that people are going to open the email and see your newsletter, but now you have to make sure they read it. Yes, a lot of that’s down to having interesting content (and you’ve got that too) but you want to have that cutting edge that makes sure your readers want to examine every inch of the newsletter.

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Color theory has been around for a long time, but its application in marketing circles is pretty new. Regardless of it’s age, there’s no denying its effectiveness.

We as human beings naturally associate different colours with different emotions and ideals. Savvy businesses can harness these associations to create desire, trust, and pleasure in the mind of their customer, and in doing so make their services more attractive.

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If you look at some examples of popular newsletters, you’ll notice that most of them put a big block of color at the very top of the newsletter. This serves as a hook for the reader’s eye, and naturally draws them into reading the content itself.

After that, color is applied much more sparingly, you’re not looking to overload your reader with color, rather your objective is to use color to guide their attention and influence their impressions of the piece. For example, article headings are often coloured differently than the article text to encourage people to read them first – meaning they often take in the whole newsletter before going back to read the articles that most interest them.

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While human experience means that we all have different reactions to different colors, there are some colors, which it’s broadly agreed, have specific effects on a person’s emotions. Depending on the topic of your newsletter, it may pay dividends to pick out a few colors that match your tone (and brand). For example, if you want your newsletter to appear optimistic, bold and confident, then you should use reds, yellows, and oranges.

If you’re a creative company, or are promoting something creative, it pays to make use of some purple in your newsletter. Purple also works well when you’re trying to imply decadence and wealth.

Any newsletter that wants to appear more dependable and trustworthy should make good use of blues throughout. Green also carries positive associations, and can often be associated with wealth and growth.

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The success of color in your newsletter hinges on the perceived appropriateness of the color within the context of the newsletter. So choose your colors based on the tone of your website and the mood that you hope to portray. It’s also worth assessing similar newsletters to your own and their use of color, though not necessarily with the aim of imitating them (more on this later).

The content of your newsletter is going to have quite an impact on the kinds of colors that are available to you. For example, if you were writing a newsletter about developments in your community then lots of bright vibrant colours would be welcome in the eyes of the reader. However, If your newsletter is addressing more serious topics, then you would be better off using more subdued tones with a splash of color to grab attention. Always consider how the reader is going to react to your use of a color; what looks good in a vacuum, may send a completely wrong message in context.

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A recent A/B test showed that a red button was clicked much more frequently than its green alternative. While this follows on in some ways from the idea of red being a bold and exciting color, it’s also important to consider the other colors on a website. Green is a much more neutral color and is much more likely to be present throughout the website. Red on the other hand, doesn’t lend itself to extensive use, and therefore stands out when it appears.

Keep this in mind when laying out your newsletter – if you want a piece of your newsletter to be the focal point or for an area of the newsletter to draw attention to itself, then fill it with a vibrant color that isn’t present anywhere else on the newsletter. For example, if your newsletter is largely white, bursts of red, yellow, and orange in important text boxes or titles will draw the reader’s eye down the page and encourage click-throughs.

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Studies have shown that humans prefer brands which they have no trouble recognizing. The same should go for your newsletter. Once you’ve picked a color scheme and decided how you want to utilise different colors in your newsletter, stick with those colors. Readers are much more likely to engage with a format they recognize and follow it through to the end.

When picking your colors, be sure to choose ones that make you stand out from other newsletters. If most newsletters in your field are using reds and yellows, consider using a lot of blue instead. This is immediately notable and also has the added bonus of many competing newsletters merging together in the reader’s mind.

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With the popularity of e-newsletters on the rise, it’s important that your content is as compelling as possible. While harnessing color theory will not guarantee you a better read or click-through rate than other newsletters, it should guide your target audience to the articles they want to read; and encourage them to start thinking of you newsletter as a brand to which they return regularly.

LinkedIn: How to Promote Your Business Internationally

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Recently, we’ve discussed 5 effective ways of promoting your business through LinkedIn. Today, we’ll dig a bit deeper and learn about other methods that will help you increase your brand awareness on an international level. If you want to know how to create targeted ads and advertise your products in different languages via LinkedIn, then this article is for you.

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LinkedIn is a social media platform that puts professionals and businesses together. It allows for an easy and open discussion, sharing of knowledge, exchanging of ideas, and promoting own products and services. Unlike other social media networks, LinkedIn has a more formal tone to it, which results in the type of users that it attracts. The majority of LinkedIn users are over 25 years old and have graduated from college.

Moreover, LinkedIn is one of the most frequently visited websites on the Internet. This means that any information you may put about your business on your LinkedIn profile, has a high chance of reaching a high rank in search engine results. Through this, you get a chance to showcase your products and services, and generate valuable traffic on your own website.

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Thanks to sponsored ads and updates you can easily reach out to wider audiences with your own products and services. This feature allows you to get in touch with people who have not yet had the chance to get to know your brand, and will in turn raise your brand awareness. On top of that, it’s great for maintaining relationships with your current clients, business partners, and people who may generally be interested in what you have to say. Also, through these tools, you can attract new leads regardless of which language they use or what location they are in.

To create a sponsored ad or update you have to log in to your LinkedIn account and go to the following page:

https://www.linkedin.com/ads/

After clicking ‘Get Started’, you’ll get to choose whether you wish to create an entirely new ad (consisting of text, images, or video) or if you want to promote one of your previously posted updates.

Once you get to choose which method of promotion you prefer to use, you’re also able to adjust the following settings:

Ad formatTextVideo or imageAd orientation and designURL of your landing pageLanguage

For each of your sponsored ads you can run an A/B Test and create up to 15 different versions of your ads. Through this you can compare the different formats and content and see what works best for your target audience. With this information, you’ll be get the chance to optimize your future campaigns to achieve even better results.

Once you’ve personalized your ad or update, you can choose to whom it will be presented. Your message will be targeted specifically to the people you choose, based on the following data:

CountryIndustryCompanySchoolJob positionSkillsGroupGenderAge

In other words, you have full control over what type of message you will present and exactly who will it be presented to.

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Through creating your company profile on LinkedIn you can present your brand, post job offers, or even introduce the team of people who stands behind your business. What you have to do is to simply fill in the necessary fields with text, images, and hyperlinks.

What’s more, every LinkedIn user can select a default language for their profile and add secondary languages that will be presented to people who have it as their first language. Should a visitor of your page use a completely different language to the ones you offer they will be simply presented with the default one.

Thanks to this feature, you can adjust the name and the description of your business based on who and where gets to see it.

In order to create different language versions of your company page, log in to your account, go to page settings, and select to optimize the page for different languages.

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Let’s assume that you are a producer of different kinds of rubber seals and wish to promote your products to companies that manufacture cars and agricultural machinery in Europe.

From your research you’ve found that the target audience you’re after is in Germany, France, and Italy.

What should you do?

Step 1

You know all about how important it is to adapt your offer to your customers and and that you should treat clients individually. In order to do so, you should start off by making sure that both your website, promotional materials, and sales team are ready to take good care of international clients whose first language isn’t English.

Once that is secured, you can go on to the next step, which is to start your promotional campaign using one of the many available channels, e.g. LinkedIn.

Step 2

When starting with LinkedIn you should begin by creating a company page for your brand and preparing different language versions for the countries that you wish to do business in. This way

you’ll make sure that individual customers’ needs are taken into consideration and a language barrier is no obstacle for them or you.

Having filled in the necessary fields in English, German, French, and Italian you can proceed to the most important element of this process i.e. creating ads.

Step 3

By going to this page you can create a sponsored ad or an update. Simply select the appropriate method and fill out the text, images, possibly video ,and select the language your current ad will be running in. This will have an impact on how many people from your chosen audience will get to see your ad.

Step 4

Here you can choose the right target audience for your ad. You can select people e.g. from a particular company, industry or a specific job position. In our example we’ve selected people from Germany who work in agriculture, engineering, and automotive manufacturing, and have specific roles in their companies. Based on the selected conditions, the total number of people who we can presented the ad to is 22,493.

Step 5

The last step that you’ll need to take is to set your budget, advertising model, and how long your campaign will be running for.

The available payment models are:

CPM – for every 1000 views of your adPPC – for every click on your ad

You can also add an additional feature offered by LinkedIn, which is to place a lead bar on top of your website through which your visitors will be able to send you a request for contact.

Step 6

Once you have gone through all these steps all you’ll have to do is to fill in the billing information and observe how your ad is performing.

You’ll have to repeat Steps 3-6 for every different language that you wish to use in your campaign. Simply change the ad language, use the right copy, URLs, images, and select the right target audience.

LinkedIn sponsored ads and updates will allow you to increase your brand awareness and reach out to audiences regardless of their location or the language that they use. Of course, there are other tactics and methods that you can use aside from adjusting your profile and running sponsored ads. Some of them have already been covered in our previous post. As for others, we will be discussing them shortly on our blog so stay tuned and don’t miss any updates!

Would a Caveman Click? Avoiding Call-to-action Malfunction

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Your subscriber is drawn in by a juicy subject line and just opened your email with high hopes. The offer is perfect, precisely what he is looking for. He even scanned through the email and now.. and now … [Delete]. Hey! What just happened there? Most likely a Caveman Call-to-Action malfunction.

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Our brain consists of different parts, including the cerebral cortex where all the planning and reasoning takes place. But under that thick layer of thinking, there is a much stronger caveman brain. The caveman brain is where instincts and gut feelings originate. Primal and subconscious thoughts and involuntary processes. It evolved in years and years of the human race trying not to die and is super powerful.

We still use the caveman brain all of the time. In the seconds people spend on your email newsletter, a big part of the processing is done by the caveman brain. As you can understand, your email needs both to be very obvious what you want them to do and attractively presented. Ignoring to cater your emails to the caveman is a very easy way to ruin your email marketing campaign.

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Have a look at this example from the sports clothing brand Champion. Right under the navigation bar of the mail is the main offer “Select tees tanks and shorts 2 for $30”. So where is the CTA? Dr Caveman say: “Me want clear CTA”. This banner definitely calls out for some testing.

The Call to Action “shop” in the example isn’t a strong one because…

Take a minute and see if you can come up with some ideas to improve on the CTA. You can look at the bottom of this article for some hints.

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Let’s dig a bit deeper. You can improve upon your CTA and creative design by asking yourself these questions:

Which elements can I remove that don’t add to clarity?How can I make it more visual?What elements might be distracting?Does it seem hard to get this offer?Is the wording right?Is there enough contrast?How can I make it easier to understand?Is this offer 100% clear?

All of the above lead to the ultimate question: Would a Caveman Click? Go back to the example and see if with these questions you get some more ideas to improve upon it.

Testing your way up the mountain
For each of the ideas you have for improvement, there might be a lot of counter-ideas. Maybe you are not sure if some of your ideas will work (and you should!) I am definitely for testing your way up the mountain, through AB split testing your newsletter you can learn if your improvement ideas also result in more conversions. The starting point should always be the most obvious and clear “best practice” version you can make.

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The CTA in the Champion example: The offer is pretty darn hard to read on the left, being spread over three lines. The CTA could have been clearer by changing size and positioning it in line-of-sight. Also the banner is completely in blue and white, even blending in with the logo and navigation bar. Adding more contrast through colour and design would bring out the CTA more.

Remember: It is not that your subscribers are lazy (although some might be), but the default is for them to stay in their cave and do nothing. They don’t have a lot of time and will scan your email quickly.  It’s your job, through the CTA, to motivate them to take action.

Which changes would make the example so strong even a Caveman would click?

Gamification in a Small Business: Does it Really Work?

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"Gamification" es una palabra caliente en la industria del marketing – aunque suena marca nueva, ha sido atractivo desde los años 70, cuando esos grandes jugadores como Mc Donalds o Procter Gamble & comenzó la implementación de sus estrategias. Usted puede encontrar un montón de ejemplos y casos prácticos sobre él, pero ¿te has preguntado cómo podría funcionar para una pequeña industria?

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Como una de las definiciones, "Gamification" significa utilizando la mecánica del ordenador o juegos sociales para aumentar la motivación de los empleados y participación en situaciones que no están comúnmente asociados con juegos de azar. Puede utilizarla para por ejemplo asignaciones de estudio, trabajo en equipo o promociones.

Para simplificarlo – "Gamification" aporta elementos de juegos de azar en sus situaciones de la vida cotidiana. Suena interesante, ¿verdad?

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En el creciente tráfico de marcas competidoras, comunicaciones de marketing, la publicidad luchando por los intereses de su cliente potencial se convierte en algo muy difícil de hacer. Un anuncio simple producto o promoción que has hecho antes no sería suficiente para captar la atención del cliente. Lo que tienes que hacer es dedicarse al cliente y dejarlo interactuar directamente con su marca. Esto es cómo "Gamification" puede ayudarle a construir una buena relación con los clientes reales y potenciales.

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Una de las ideas más populares y ampliamente discutido "Gamification" se llevó a cabo por compañías de automóviles que alentaron a los usuarios para recoger puntos de eco conducción. La mayor tasa de millas por galón que alcanzado, más alto anotó – aunque no había ninguna clasificación para compararte con otros conductores, la idea de aplicar prácticas eco-amigables como un juego que han demostrado que vive su vida con el entorno natural en mente puede ser divertido y emocionante.

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Otro proyecto de la famosa "Gamification" también participa la industria automotriz: "Mini en Estocolmo". El objetivo del juego era encontrar un coche Mini virtual en las calles de Estocolmo, que necesario, usando una aplicación móvil especial. El primer usuario que encontró Mini dentro de una distancia de 50m "tomó", ganando un coche Mini Countryman real! Pero la tarea no era fácil – que evitar que otros usuarios dentro de la misma distancia cercana, como podían tomar el Mini lejos de ti. Eso es lo que se llama una búsqueda auto – redefinida.

Aparte de aplicaciones móviles, redes sociales a menudo se utilizan como el medio ambiente para activitiy "Gamification". El objetivo es principalmente la misma: animar a los usuarios a competir entre sí y crear tablas de clasificación basado en varios criterios.

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¿Te has preguntado si podría ejecutar la cocina de un hotel por ti mismo? Ahora, Marriott Hotels darte la oportunidad de probarlo en un hotel virtual – y tal vez incluso de verdad! El juego fue lanzado para reclutar a empleados para nuevos hoteles Marriott ubicados fuera de los Estados Unidos y probar sus habilidades de gestión. La aplicación está dedicada principalmente a jóvenes candidatos (18-27 años) y pruebas de actitud del solicitante, habilidades de gestión y resolución de problemas. La Corporación hotel desea reclutar a incluso 50 mil empleados usando el juego.

Hotel Marriott, imagen vía http://www.bvkmeka.com/

En 2011, antes del 2011 MTV Europe Music Awards, MTV decidió participar aficionados antes del evento y aumentar la expectativa. Lo que hicieron fue crear un juego de ventilador de múltiples capas llamado "MegaFan concurso".

Las maneras de acumular puntos eran numerosos para cada participantes – podían votar en las categorías de elección de audiencia, ver videos de rendimiento, vista flip libros y más. ¿Cómo hacer todo el proceso sea más competitiva? La respuesta es Teambuilding – cada usuario podría unirse a diferentes equipos y compiten entre ellas, que por supuesto significa ganar más puntos para el equipo ganador.

Los premios para los puntos de recogida fueron la pena luchar por – el precio superior implicó que el evento EMA y unirse a la audiencia de entusiastas de la música.

Si estás preguntando acerca de los resultados, usted se sorprenderá – relacionados con EMA páginas vistas en el sitio web de MTV Reino Unido crecieron un 530% comparado con el año anterior.

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¿Cómo personas que no leen libros para ganar interés en una autobiografía recién liberada? Jay-Z sabe la respuesta – lo gamificar. Para el lanzamiento de sus memorias Decoded, RHPG lanzó un juego social único. Se imprimen 300 páginas previas a la publicación de las memorias en diversas superficies, tales como contenedores de madera o incluso un forro de seda de una chaqueta de Gucci y escondió en 600 colocaciones dentro de 15 localidades alrededor del mundo. El objetivo era encontrar, montar y decodificar el libro juntos en línea antes de la fecha de lanzamiento real.

Campaña de descifrado de Jay-Z, imagen vía clickz.com

Los jugadores de las grandes empresas utilizan "Gamification" absolutamente con frecuencia y nombras docenas de ejemplos de diversas industrias. Pero ejecutando un juego social que requiere un presupuesto enorme es una cosa completamente diferente de la implementación de elementos de la "Gamification" en un pequeño negocio. ¿Como puedes usarlo con eficacia para tu marca?

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Describiendo la "Gamification" ideas sobre querían mostrar que prácticamente no existen límites en la aplicación mecánica de juego para la comercialización. Pueden ser utilizados igualmente bien para entornos on-line y reales.

Todo depende de tus metas. Cuando ligeramente modificado todos estos escenarios pueden utilizarse para las industrias y diversos propósitos.

Enfoque no estándar para involucrar a los participantes de la feria, conferencia, eventos de la industria, entrenamientos, talleres o incluso dentro de la empresa eventos. Esto es cómo darle una actividad típica en algo que dejará sus empleados emocionado durante semanas.Unirse a una comunidad para lograr un objetivo común. Si haces correr a 5km, está bien, pero si 15, 20 o 30 hacerlo contigo – que significa realmente algo grande. Usando el mismo patrón, puede recoger materiales para reciclar, renovar un parque demolido o participar en una contienda para hornear – todo por una buena causa. Este escenario funciona perfecto para las empresas locales y, si se organiza bien, puede aumentar significativamente su reputación.¿Tienes la impresión de que su industria es, digamos, no tan atractivas para el mercado de trabajo y es difícil para usted reclutar a nuevos empleados? Intenta bajar la pista mordida y ver tu idea zumbando alrededor de los medios de comunicación, llamando la atención de aquellos que podrían estar interesados en unirse a su compañía. A veces un acertijo bien compuesto es todo tarda – Asegúrese de que sólo especialistas en su sector son capaces de resolver adecuadamente.

¿Así, están entusiasmados por "Gamification"? O tal vez asustado que nunca lo harás con el presupuesto vigente. No te preocupes – y dejar de pensar en el dinero. Pensar fuera de la caja y se atreven a hacer algo diferente.

¿Has probado usando "Gamification" en su negocio? ¿O estás pensando en hacerlo en el futuro? Somos curiosos ver tus comentarios!

5 reglas de responder a los comentarios negativos en los medios sociales

Se ha terminado la conexión: Una conexión que se esperaba que se mantuviera activa fue cerrada por el servidor.

I’m sure you’re doing all it takes to bring a smile on your customer’s face. But each and everyone of us has to deal with negative feedback from time to time. When it happens in social media, the situation goes a little tense – all your words are scrutinised by the Internet community and you never know how fast the issue will spread. I want to give you a few useful steps to guide you through any social media communication trouble.

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Before you start reading, should remember just one thing (seen from two angles): you are just a human and your customers are just humans. They don’t expect you to be perfect as a robot and you shouldn’t expect them to be silent like robots. When you take these factors into account, the rest seems pretty logical. Also the fact that if you deal with the problem wisely, you can only earn a reputation of a business that really cares for its customers – if this sounds good enough to you, check out the tips below.

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I can imagine how tempted you feel to click Delete or Hide when you see some typical Internet hate on your brand’s Facebook timeline or Twitter profile. Answering these comments may seem a total nonsense to you and you wish it all disappeared, which is actually just a click away. But I’ve got to warn you – some tried before you and failed. Even the famous ones – do you wonder why Streisand effect carries this particular name?

Of course, it’s perfectly justifiable if you wish to delete comments including explicit lyrics or spam. This is your right as a profile admin – nobody wants trash in their own area.

Idea to try out: Draw up a short set of rules for your fanpage or profile and place them in a clearly visible place, e.g. in a separate Facebook tab/album or available in the About section. Such a document could include following provisions:

no spam,no explicit lyrics,no hate speech,compliance with the portal’s terms and conditions.

As simple as that – now everybody has a clear idea of what can or can’t be posted on your profiles.

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The key factor to success in terms of social media is response time. Believe me, you can’t afford answering your clients when you find suitable – the only suitable time is when they want answers.

Even if it’s not possible for you to deliver a direct answer to someone’s post immediately, make sure they get your attention on the spot, even if it’s just a peaceful “We’ll get back to you in an hour/15 minutes/(select the time you need to find the answer and post a reply)”. Thanks to this, your customers can be sure that you’re taking care of them. But remember to type the realistic time needed to solve the customer’s problem – you don’t want anybody to be disappointed with delays!

Idea to try out: After the problem is solved, you can follow up with the posting customer and check back if the customer is happy with the solution and the performance of your product/service. It surely works well for your reputation!

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There are two main reasons why solving a client’s issue in a private channel is better than doing it directly on your timeline: when your communication conditions are far from convenient or the negative feedback sounds very strong.

By inconvenient conditions I mean e.g. character count limits, just like on Twitter – 140 characters may not be enough to post a proper reply. Or, when a request on your wall is posted in a long, long line of comments – moving your dialogue to private messages makes it easier to follow both for you and the customer.

Seriously negative comments are a completely different thing. Dealing with an angry user disappointed with your brand is like dancing with fire – you never know when it will spread and burn everything around to ashes. What makes the dialogue so flammable is the audience watching every new post. After you eliminate this factor, the user is more likely to cooperate with you on solving the problem and appreciate your help afterwards.

Important: Make sure your customer is aware of the fact that you’re trying to contact him privately. For example: “I sent a private message to you, please check your Others folder” (for Facebook). It happens very often that users don’t look into their inboxes carefully and miss incoming messages from fanpages. When the user’s settings don’t let you send a message as a fanpage, introduce yourself as the brand representative – talking to strangers sounds exciting only to a really small bunch of people.

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You left this negative comment on your timeline – check.

You responded promptly – check.

You chose the right communication path – check.

Now, don’t spoil it all with getting defensive!

I know it may be hard to talk to an unhappy, disappointed or simply furious person, but… that’s why I started this post with a statement: your customers are just humans. They have emotions and flaws, and your sarcastic, rude or too official comments definitely won’t make anyone calm down. Imagine you are a therapist listening to a patient – stay calm and understanding. Maybe your angry patient will provide you with valuable feedback if you let him/her speak?

Above all this, apologising never hurt anyone. There’s nothing wrong with admitting that your business is also run by humans that make mistakes. The only wrong thing is not trying to fix them.

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I left this point for the end of the post, because people often don’t see the point in preparing a communication plan without knowing the other four. You can avoid so much stress, pressure and unexpected events by outlining a schedule of best communication practices in the case of customer complaints in social media.

Think of possible scenarios and sample answers to most frequently posted requests. These should work together with your customer service communication strategy, so that the customer doesn’t get confused contacting you both on social media and e.g. via email.

Also, make sure the rest of your employees know that they might be the ones to help. At GetResponse, we communicate constantly with Product Development, Customer Success, IT or Compliance teams to answer customers’ posts with accuracy and comprehension.

How do you feel about your brand’s customer service on social media? Tell us about your experiences in comments – we’re looking forward to read your stories!

Understanding Your Target Audience for Landing Pages

AppId is over the quota
AppId is over the quota

What’s more important, traffic or conversions? If you get 50,000 visitors from a random tractor repair website and 500 visitors from an industry magazine that covers the specific market you’re in, which one is going to be better for your business?

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Unless you’re in the pageview business, what you should first and foremost care about is conversions. Conversions take place when targeted traffic meets a relevant offer. It all starts with knowing who your target audience is and what they need or want. So – if you want to boost your landing page (and overall) conversions, you need to do the following.

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Conduct surveys and interviews to understand your customer’s pain points. You want them to opt-in to your email list, so what could you offer that would make them want to subscribe? Instead of making guesses, talk to people! You’ll be surprised by how much you will learn – and how useful it will be.

If you know…

who the people are, you know how to get to them (the blogs they read, the sites they visit, the stuff they search in Google etc);how they describe the type of services they offer, you can word the copy on your site to match the conversation in their heads (very important!);how they choose and compare products in your industry, you know how to structure and prioritize content on your site;what they want, your value proposition can state exactly that and the whole site can be 98% relevant to them;what they don’t care about, you can dismiss and cut it out from the site content;how their life is better thanks to your service, you know which end-benefits to communicate.

… and so on and so forth. It’s all about relevancy – if what you offer and how you present it matches their state of mind, you have gained a customer.

If your customer is “everybody”, you’re making it extremely difficult for yourself – nobody will identify with “everybody”. One of the biggest problems I see with landing pages is that the page has no understanding of who the visitor is, what they want and why.

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The best thing you can do with subscribers is to survey them. What you want is to get in the heads of your customers, learn what they need. The goal here is to learn what you should offer as a lead magnet to entice them to opt-in. Survey responses will be very insightful about this.

I recommend asking the following questions (adjust the wording as you see fit):

 What can you tell us about yourself? Get the demographical data and see if there are any trends (e.g. generational). If you’ve got a B2B business, ask about their industry and position in the company (and who makes the decision!)What’s your #1 challenge with [the problem your business helps to solve]?If you could ask just 1 question from the top [your industry] guru / researcher, what would it be?

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If you can, keep it short: the more questions, the fewer responders and poorer quality responses. Once you list your questions, then weed them out.

Make sure the information you collect is actionable – don’t ask questions just because you’re curious.  Once you have written your questions, go through them and ask yourself: “What am I going to do with this information once I have it?” Make sure each question contributes something unique and is necessary.

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If you have no paying customers yet, you’re dealing with assumptions and educated guesses based on your first-hand experience and anecdotal evidence.

Traditionally, defining a target audience involves determining their age, sex, geographic locations, and their needs. The data you need to know depends on the product and whether you have a B2B or B2C business.

This approach, however, is not very helpful. Online the location matters much less (if at all). Age is not what it used to be – fifty-year-olds get just as excited about new tech gadgets as twenty-somethings, and 30-year-olds may still be living with their parents. More than demographic data, you want to look at the lifestyle.

You want to have answers to these questions:

Who are the target customers? Describe their life (or business) situationWhich problem are they solving for themselves? What’s the pain?What are their needs that aren’t being met?

Assumptions to these questions will help you come up with a better offer – a better lead magnet.

Remember, conversions take place when targeted traffic meets a relevant offer. So your job as a marketer is to figure out how to make your landing page content relevant to your audience. Relevancy leads to sales.

Use the findings from talking to people and surveys to write the copy on your site. When your target audience arrives to your site, looks at the content and goes “Hey, this is exactly what I’m looking for”, you nailed it.