First, a definition: Your "Landing Page" is where the URL in your Resource Box goes to. It's either to your home page or deep within your site.
There's some expert author behavior that I just don't understand and I thought I'd take a moment to point out what they are doing to help everyone see what 'not to do'.
Example #1 I'm reading an article on Forex (currency trading) and the link in the resource box goes to a lean abs secrets product. WTH? (What The Heck!)
What they should do instead: Only include links in your Resource Box to niche-related content. Changing niche topics on your reader BREAKS TRUST instantly.
Example #2 I'm reading an article on the benefits of hot yoga and the link in the resource box goes to a deep link of the exact same article on the authors website. WTH? Why would I as a user/reader want to go to re-read the article I just read. This makes no sense and now I don't trust the writer to be an expert of any kind... especially article marketing.
What they should do instead: Never link to a copy of the article you just shared with your reader. Instead, funnel that reader into your site to find more content or products/services related to your expertise.
Example #3 I'm reading an article on DJ'ing and as I click on the resource box links -- I'm taken to a page that is in Japanese. WTH? If I'm reading an English article, I expect to find an English website when I click on any Resource Box link.
What they should do instead: The author should only send their readers to English versions of their website if they are going to write articles in English.
More things to avoid when choosing which
URL of yours to include in your Resource Box:
- Sending your article readers to a squeeze page with no other content or outbound links on the page is rude. Instead, send them to a content rich website of unique content and have a sign up form for them to join your list.
- Sending your article readers to a one page site with a few sentences of content than a big blue link saying to click me for whatever affiliate products they are pitching. No trust is built by this bummer of an approach.
- Sending your article readers to a page that has 90% ads and 10% content or any MFA (Made For AdSense) templated site. This type of site again builds no trust with the reader and wastes your hard work in writing quality original articles to attract valuable traffic.
Do you see the theme I'm trying to help you with here? Use your landing page URL to continue the trust building that you started with by offering your prospect universe your quality article content.
To comment further on today's topic:
http://blog.ezinearticles.com/2008/05/landing-page-tips.html
