A search-optimized, content-heavy rapid conversion landing page is the perfect place to build email circulation
I once did an interview with a publisher who, when asked about his success, gave all the credit to his team. In fact, he asked that I use their names in place of his whenever credit was due.
Just like a star football running back who, when asked about his success, gives credit to the linemen.
“They open up a hole, and I simply run through it,” he explains modestly. “Without the other members of the team, running backs alone are not very effective.”
Like those modest individuals, a Rapid Conversion Landing Page (aka “name squeeze” page) is essential to building a database of free email newsletter subscribers. It, along with other landing pages on a website, act as the team that builds an email list. However, the RCLP is extra special in that its main purpose in life is to drive a ton of traffic from search in order to build your email list.
The premise is simple. Create a freemium – a valuable free report, white paper, or downloadable software application – and offer it free-of-charge with a simple sales letter. We call it a Rapid Conversion Landing Page because it’s designed to rapidly convert the reader to a free email newsletter subscriber.
After all, the RCLP offers a low-risk, low-friction proposition: It essentially says, “I’ve got a nice gift for you. It’s easy and free. Simply give me your email address, and in return, I’ll give you a valuable piece of downloadable information. And if you want to get off my email subscriber list at any time, I’ll make that easy, too.”
The offer is certainly attractive – “free” is a price that meets with very little resistance. The challenge, as with marketing any product, is getting the word out to your intended audience.
A few examples of rapid conversion landing pages:
- Here’s a perfect example from Yankee, promoting their Best of New England in the Fall: Fall Foliage, Great Hikes, Apple Picking and More free ebook.
- Or how about Countryside’s free guide titled, Sheep Farming for Beginners and Beyond: Everything You Need to Know, from How to Raise Sheep and What to Feed Sheep to How to Shear a Sheep and Lamb Diseases.
- Even Harvard’s Program on Negotiation has RCLPs set up for their free special reports, like ones on Team-Building Strategies: Building a Winning Team for Your Organization.
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Write a well-crafted Rapid Conversion Landing Page, pepper it liberally with keyword phrases you know are popular search terms with your target market, add an email capture box, turn the whole message into HTML, and upload it to your website.
Presto! You’ve got a Rapid Conversion Landing Page that should be easy for Google to find, and irresistible to your target audience. Collecting hundreds of email addresses should be automatic now, right?
Well, not so fast.
Because eventually the Google crawlers are going to find your nifty little RCLP, read it, and ignore it.
Ignore it? Why?
Because without a supporting cast of incoming hyperlinks, Google doesn’t consider your RCLP to be of much importance.
A Rapid Conversion Landing Page without article pages is virtually worthless. It requires dozens of portal posts, all pointing to it using hyperlinks that include the name of the free report or download. Each RCLP requires a press release, a few email newsletters to spread the news, and a ton of social media posts about it.
That’s because Google inherently does not value a single page, no matter how well it’s optimized for search. This is particularly true when the purpose of the page is to extract someone’s email address.
Google wants the RCLP to have supporting pages, like the linemen on the football team. Important internal links from Portal posts should contain well-written content on a topic similar to the Rapid Conversion Landing Page, that reference your free download.
Google is effectively saying, “If you don’t think this offer of a free download is important enough to link to, then we don’t think it’s important enough to rank highly.”
As a free Portal publisher, you can publish innumerable article pages. Legacy publishers have a wealth of content that can be repurposed as article pages that point to an RCLP.
The final piece in this marketing effort is getting other publishers to link to your RCLP. This is why we distribute a press release for each new freemium released. When Google determines that your offer of a free download is recommended by lots of website colleagues and friendly competitors – as demonstrated by incoming hypertext links from these external websites – your Google rank is virtually certain to soar.
Offering free premium downloadable content on a Rapid Conversion Landing Page – one element of a properly architected website – is a win/win for all concerned: Google, the user, your publishing colleagues, and you.
It’s also the best circ-building strategy ever devised.
If you liked this article, you may want to read our 35-step list for building and promoting a new freemium and then how to refresh a freemium.
