This article discusses the way I am integrating landing pages into the Silent Earning website and how I plan to end up with just blog posts on WordPress, with other pages created in Leadpages.
The reason: I find Leadpages much easier to work with than WordPress, for creating pages that both look good and that can channel my readership to the content that will be most relevant to them.
I still plan to leave the Silent Earning blog on WordPress, so I can use the blogging tools, like Blogo and Yoast. I will probably also keep a home page, but it will not be the primary way people will find and access my material.
I am happy writing and formatting my blog articles using Blogo. I find it quick, easy to use and I can use it on any device. However, it is designed to upload to WordPress, Blogger or Medium. WordPress is also still the best pure blogging platform so it makes sense to keep it on my blog.
I use Yoast SEO to advise me on whether my articles are written well for SEO. Their WordPress plugin allows me to optimize my article with meta tags, foundation keywords, and other Google friendly stuff.
How WordPress Themes Work
When I first set up Silent Earning.com, I worked exclusively with WordPress. I followed the recommended route: set up my hosting through Bluehost, added the Genesis Framework from Studiopress along with the SPI child theme, also from Studiopress.
For more on this, visit my article – Start an Online Marketing Business in 2018 – What You Need to Do First
For any of you that don’t know how WordPress themes work. WordPress is the platform on which you build your blog or Web site. To get it looking like it should, you need to add a theme.
Studiopress uses a theme made up of two components:
- The Genesis Framework, which handles all the optimization and back-end structure,
- A range of “child themes”, which govern the design and how the site or blog actually looks.
Your first purchase and install the Genesis Framework, then select and purchase a child theme. (There are also some free child themes that may work for you). You can see how the theme will look by clicking the demo button. I recommend two themes:
- Smart Passive Income Theme
- Aspire Pro Theme
If you like what you see, you can purchase and upload the theme to your WordPress console and activate it. I would recommend starting with the demo and customize it to what you want it to look like.
The SPI child theme was released last year by Pat Flynn. (If you don’t know who Pat Flynn is, Google it!). I chose it because it gave me the look and, more importantly, the page layout I was looking for.
I have since also tried the Aspire Pro theme, which gives the option for many more fields on the home page, a bit like a sales page.
However, WordPress has a fairly steep learning curve. You can get your site looking like the demo pretty easily, but if you want to change anything, you need to understand how the menus and widgets work and it isn’t always easy.
I found Leadpages much easier to work with than WordPress, for creating pages that both look good and that can channel my readership to the content that will be most relevant to them.
Challenges with Blogs and Web Sites
When I speak with people who are just starting out in blogging, one of the things they often cite as a barrier, is getting their WordPress blog up and running and looking professional. Most of the difficulty is in the design of the homepage.
I have also been involved in the design of a number of corporate websites for small businesses. The web design process has got easier over the years with the advent of tools such as Wix and Squarespace, but it is still a big undertaking.
There is always the option to bring in outside expertise, but this can be expensive and you also lose a degree of control. I remember my CEO getting seriously frustrated when he wanted to add a new product to our website. Our web designer was on vacation, so he had to wait 3 weeks for it to happen. Sales were lost and we all suffered!
Leadpages
Soon after I got my blog site looking largely as I wanted it to, I started learning how to use Leadpages. Leadpages is a piece of software that allows you to build landing pages. You use a landing page as a purpose-built web page that you can direct traffic to. This is typically from online ads and email offers. You build the landing page so you can present the visitor with information directly related to the ad or offer.
Leadpages is much easier to use than WordPress. It has a series of “drag-and-drop” templates that allow you to easily create a whole range of different page types and designs.
After a bit of experimentation with different templates, I chose the ones I wanted to use for different applications.
Here are links to some examples of pages I have created for different applications.
- Landing Page for people who are looking to build an email list
- Event invitation landing page
- Landing Page for Google ad campaign.
Combining WordPress and Leadpages – Best of Both Worlds
I started thinking about using Leadpages instead of having pages on my WordPress blog. This is something that was originally tested by Bryan Harris of Videofruit.com, but I wanted to test it out for myself and see how far I could take it.
I started with using landing pages to help people navigate to content that was relevant to them.
People looking to Start A Blog would be directed to this page:
Starting Your_Blog Landing Page
Whereas people looking to build an email list would be directed to this page
Building an Email List landing page
If you notice, I give visitors the opportunity to sign up as a subscriber to my email list and also provide them with links to resources they may find useful. For people that have come straight to this page, there is a bit of information about SilentEarning. There are also navigation links to other pages and my blog.
There are simpler landing page templates available, but this has a good balance of opportunities to convert and information.
Next, I designed a Welcome page. www.silentearning.com/welcome
This is designed to look like a home page, but it is actually a landing page designed using Leadpages. Again it offers visitors an opportunity to subscribe to an email list, in exchange for access to a course or ebook. This is referred to as a Leadmagnet.
What’s Next
Now it’s on to using Leadpages to do what it is designed to do – convert visitors into subscribers and customers. More about this soon.
Here are some links to the tools and products mentioned on the blog. These are affiliate links so I get a commission if you click them and then purchase any of the products. It doesn’t cost you anymore, but helps me to pay the bills. Thanks
StudioPress, Genesis Framework and SPI Theme