Revisiting the Landing Page Wonder Wheel

Landing pages are like online closers: the number of online visitors who convert into leads depends on your landing pages' ability to both inform and persuade your audience toward action. That's why it's so important to build landing pages that are optimized for high conversion ' but what exactly does a top-performing landing page look like?

Some time ago, @chiefmarctec provided his unique perspective in a post on Search Engine Land: the Landing Page Wonder Wheel. The Wonder Wheel is a visual map of the perfect landing page based on 8 pre-determined dimensions. How closely your landing page exhibits each of these properties (on a scale of 1-10) determines the overall 'shape' of your landing page. The more perfect your 'wheel', the more potential for your landing page to generate a response.

Three years later, the Wonder Wheel still applies in many respects: design, boldness, depth, and freshness still contribute to the all-important user experience, and launch speed, non-conversion value, message match, and interactivity all together lend towards a higher potential for conversion.

I've included a few updates to the Wonder Wheel below, in order to help you evaluate your landing pages in 2012.

Revisiting Four Dimensions of the Wonder Wheel

• Message match ' Message match is usually defined by how closely your landing page resembles or speaks to your ad text. This could mean repeating your offer in the headline, using supporting imagery, or reiterating the ad text in your body copy. One advantage we have in 2012 is using dynamic content insertion and replacement to support the ad copy and lend to landing page relevancy that can boost your quality score and create better message match.
• Landing page design' Effective landing pages are a mix of great design, compelling copy, and conversion optimization strategies. Much like in 2009, landing pages are truly in a competitive beauty contest ' except in 2012, the interplay between design and interactivity has blurred the lines between these two dimensions. As new devices like tablets and smartphones necessitate new design strategies, marketers need to consider what their landing pages.
• Freshness ' Fresh content is essential to gleaning responses from visitors. As the role of content marketing in conversion optimization continues to rise, visitors are arriving to your landing page seeking both novelty and value. In 2012, landing page software has evolved to make A/B and multivariate testing even easier to use, allowing you to test and deploy new landing pages rapidly, which keeps content and experiences fresh for your visitors.
• Launch time ' From concept to launch, landing pages need a fast and efficient process. Some organizations could require multiple departments or additional resources, all adding to the time to launch.

Are you finding that your landing pages are taking too long to launch, or requiring too many resources? A landing page software can help you by removing many of the barriers that previously prevented a speedy launch. Check out our landing page software buyer's guide to see how.

Do you have any additions or updates for the Landing Page Wonder Wheel? What would you improve? Leave us a comment below to tell us more!