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The days where you could simply set up a simple Adwords campaign are over. There have been a couple of Google slaps happening in these past couple of years. And recently, Google changed their rule again, and a couple of affiliate review sites have been victims of it. Those sites have their quality score reduced from 10 to 1 in one night. As depressing as that is, Google only have one thing on their mind, keeping  the price low for those affiliates who follow the rule and provide good contents for their users. So, to avoid Google Slap, you need to follow what those affiliates are doing. These are 11 ways you could do to optimize your pay per click web site, extracted from many power affiliate marketers, to convert better and avoid Google Slap.

1. Stay away from Scam-my offers

You know those fake products that offer easy ways to make money online for only $1, but they actually charge another $25-90/month after that?! Yeah, those make money from Google, etc offers. Avoid them, simply because Google despise them. And, I believe you don’t want to trick other people’s money, do you?

2. Keyword focused

Let the landing pages in your pay per click web site  optimized for your chosen keywords. You should have already researched these keywords, just like when you’re doing SEO. This would allow you to get better quality score, as you are providing an extremely related pages to your ads, which in the end would decrease your CPC (cost per click) significantly.

3. Provide value to users, not direct linking to merchant sites

As I said previously, the days of direct linking are offer. So, if you don’t want to get left out alone, getting slap by Google, while others are making money, start creating your own websites.

4. Provide testimonial(s)

You would usually find lots of testimonials in the sales page of good affiliate offers. So, why do you need to provide one in your landing page as well? That’s because the testimonials you provided in your review or pre-sell page would be considered slightly more trustworthy than the one on the sales page. The more customers read would increase the chance for the customers to buy the product. How do you get one? Simple on would be by asking your friend to try the product for you and give his or her testimonials.

5. Offer related products

Have more than one product on your review or pre-sell page. Someone might have purchased a weight loss product, from you or someone else, before. But, because the previous product is not working or other reasons, he/she needs another similar product. If you only have one product on review, then you’ll definitely lose a sale (if the product they purchased before is the one you’re reviewing). By providing more than one product in you review or pre-sell pages, you provide choices and thus increase the likelihood of them buying anyone of them.

6. Borrow authorities

Ever seen websites that put As Seen on CNN, Oprah, Facebook, Google, etc on their sales of pre-sales pages? This is what I called borrowing authorities to build your credibility. The people who search online don’t know you and they definitely won’t trust you. So you need to borrow the brands (or the authority that those brands have) so that they would place their confidence in you. Use “As seen on…” or some authority brands’ logos in your pay per click web site.

7. Personalize

You could do this by providing your name and photos in your landing page. You don’t have to provide your real name, pen name is fine, as suggested by Frank Kern. And the photo could be someone else’s photo as well. The photo just needs to provide the picture of success that you wrote in your review. So, if you’re selling a weight loss product, that photo could be someone who is slim and happy.

8. What’s in it for me?

Give them a reason to buy the affiliate products by telling them the benefits and results of the products, not the features. So, rather than telling them this acne cream contained anti oxidant and aloe vera, tell them, this acne cream would make their face as smooth as a baby’s skin.

9. Gigantic affiliate link

Make your affiliate link huge and put it at the top part of your page so that your visitors could see them without having to scroll down the page. Never left your visitors searching for the links, or you’ll lose sales.

10. Necessary links

Provide Privacy Policy, About, and Contact us pages on your pay per click web site and provide links to those pages at the bottom of your landing page. These links are not meant to draw attention. The sole purpose is to increase your site’s credibility in Google’s eyes.

11. Do split-test

Even if you follow all of these rules, you still might not have an effective and highly converting landing pages. So the final advice that I could give you is to do split-testing to see which of your landing pages convert the best. Use tools like Google Website Optimizer and Crazy Egg (show you where your users are clicking) to help you.

I guess that’s all for optimizing your pay per click web site and landing pages.  Remember to do these steps to obtain better quality scores and to avoid the dreadful Google slaps. Please feel free to leave comments and tweet this if you like it.

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