Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions Reviews

• One of the most important web marketing and sales books you'll own

  
  By A2QEZU2SHYBHM5 on 2008-04-03
  This is a very important book. It helps you understand why the landing page is so impacting on the final actions of your visitors and what a landing page is for that matter. The book provides you with excellent guidance for analyzing your current website and determining how to make it easier for the visitor to use and, more importantly, easier for the user to do what you need them to do.
  
  I loved the section titled, "Why your site is not perfect". It provides excellent information on how to uncover hidden problems in your site that your users are experiencing even though you may not have noticed them. Let's just say that it goes way beyond dead links.
  
  Finally, "the math of tuning" shows you how to make logical decisions for next steps and make sure you're not wasting time fixing things that aren't broken or don't matter. Overall... a great book.
  
  

• A great source yet very uneven book

  
  By A2HXFXA89TW0MV on 2008-05-07
  This book may be the best thing since sliced bread for you, or can be practically useless. It has an extensive focus on Joe web surfer's persona, on why and how he behaves on the web. It also explains basic concepts such as A-B split testing, ROI, and gives a few examples from author's consulting background. There's a few mathematical formulas, which I am sure are excellent for marketing folks.
  
  But what completely lacks from this book is THE WHAT and THE HOW. The "Uncovering Problems" section is surprisingly small and has no real value. It is explainable - the later part of the book is nothing but a marketing promo of author's consulting business. This costs author 1 star in my review.
  
  The second star I remove because this book is completely useless for small to medium business. If you are a company with under $20 million in revenue - which is where 99% of websites belong - this book is not going to help you much.
  
  

• Praxis Oriented and Hands-On, No Blah Blah

  
  By A2P0KCC7P6ABF0 on 2008-05-15
  The book was written by Tim Ash of SiteTuners.com, a web analytics and site optimization service who does landing page optimization among other things for his living.
  
  It is a real-world and practical guide to landing page testing and optimization without any fluff. It is really for the folks who do the testing and the ones who have to sell it to their boss and need to know about the details of the process of landing page testing, what is involved, what are the risks and how it should be approached and why.
  
  It is very useful and complimentary to the "Landing Page Handbook" by MarketingSherpa, the $500 "bible" for folks who do serious landing page optimization for their business.
  
  They also overlap in a few areas. This means that it is also a good buy for people who are not doing enough business that involves using landing pages to justify and recoup the $500 investment in the MarketingSherpa book. It's not exactly an alternative, but it is a start that cost a lot less.
  
  If you are doing serious business with landing pages, I recommend getting both books. The return (increase in conversion = increase in business and profits) you will get out from it will pay for the initial investment quickly and then over and over again for the time to come.
  
  

• Way beyond a-b split testing

  
  By AB1RUTRLCO0K7 on 2008-02-06
  I believe Landing Page Optimization will become the bible for Internet marketers who wish to dramatically improve their online sales. As a frequent internet shopper, I am constantly frustrated by confusing, difficult-to-use and uninformative sites even though I want to buy a product.
  
  Here is a clear, logical and often humorous tutorial on how to assess, test, improve and verify your site's ability to generate sales. Mr. Ash gives examples of actual sites with poor landing pages and contrasts those with sites with effective pages. He also fills in important background about the psychology and math of testing that most people are not even aware of.
  
  This book illustrates just how sophisticated landing page optimization has become and is a must-read for everyone in the online marketing business.
  
  

• Finally - a real guide to landing page TESTING

  
  By AWUXAFZO1JWS0 on 2008-02-08
  Website conversion rates are the key to my job. In the past, the only landing page guidance I could get was from books that talked about web design or usability, or specific case studies that were not helpful for my field. Many of them were fluff or too generic.
  
  This is the first comprehensive book about TESTING landing pages. This is a very different beast than just DESIGNING them. Ash is right when he says that your audience should "vote" for the best design - it does not matter what you like best as the site creator.
  
  The book covers a lot of material in depth. I was a bit in over my head in the chapters about statistics in math. But at least I understand the limitations of different testing methods now, and won't buy into the hype anymore. This was the densest part of the book, but absolutely essential to anyone who is actually setting up and running multivariate tests.
  
  This book is not a quick read. You will have to spend some time to get the most use out of it. You will probably come back to it again and again because there is so much good material in there.
  
  I wish the screenshots were bigger and in color, but that is only a small formatting gripe. Overall this book is very solid - there is no other one out there that even comes close in terms of the ambition and scope.
  
  
• Broad and deep - no fluff here
  By A1OYIS9CPO5TZW on 2008-02-06
  Most books on improving landing page conversion rates are very tactical. They give you specific prescriptions for how to change your site, without providing a comprehensive framework first.
  
  This book is very broad and deep at the same time. It covers human psychology and decision making, identifying problems with your website, usability and writing style for the web, the math behind landing page testing, as well as extensive chapters on how to assemble the right team and create a whole landing page testing program within your company.
  
  If you are looking for a quick fix, this book is not for you. But if you want a deep understanding of all issues that are critical for landing page testing success, then you should definitely read this.
  
  
• Great for non-commercial webs as well!
  By A3960359GLANQV on 2008-04-03
  Could a book that would obviously be about grabbing a web surfer's attention for commercial purposes be helpful to someone who wasn't particularly concerned about `conversions'? In this case, absolutely yes. If you can allow your mind to think outside the box just a bit, this book can really provide some helpful advice which can be easily translated to your particular goal.
  
  Mr. Ash assumes you know what you want to do but nevertheless gently nudges you with reminders of the many things which you should be considering. Complex - but necessary - concepts are explained in context and without boring definitions so that you can smile smugly with the sure and steadfast knowledge that you've always understood things like Full Factorial Non-Parametric Testing. After a few pages, you'll be eager to make meaningful changes to your own website!
  
  
• Author's self review
  By A3LASWRP5QPV37 on 2008-02-07
  I was asked to write this book by John Wiley & Sons Press because there was a gap in the available knowledge on the topic of landing page optimization and testing. Sure there are lots of books on web design, web usability, and persuasive web copy-writing. But these topics are just a small subset of the knowledge that is required to have a successful landing page testing program.
  
  Many books by so-called online marketing "experts" will purport to know the "right answer", and tell you what you should do in a particular situation. This is valuable as far as it goes. But in my own extensive experience with TESTING landing pages, my opinions and ideas are very often wrong. No single expert or company can be right all of the time, and understand exactly what your particular website visitor audience will respond to. That is the whole point of testing (as opposed to conjectures or guessing).
  
  My book tries to fill in the holes around testing in particular: how to identify problems with your site, how to decide what page elements to test, how to understand the math and statistical assumptions behind testing, and how to select the right testing method and understand its limitations. In addition, I cover real-word considerations such as the company politics of tuning, how to create an action plan for your testing program, and how to avoid common testing pitfalls and problems.
  
  So if you are looking for good books on website design or usability in general, you should get them as well. In fact I list several additional recommended titles on this book's website (LandingPageOptimizationBook dt com). But this book should be useful to you if you are interested in learning the additional topics that you will need to understand in order to be successful with landing page optimization and testing.
  
  Here's to higher landing page conversion rates, and your continued online marketing success!
  
  
• Must read
  By AIRBOPEPR9X94 on 2008-02-11
  If you're serious about the strategy of war, you must study Clausewitz and Musashi. If you're serious about LPO, Tim's book is on the must read list.
  
  
• Learn Landing Page Optimization from an Jedi
  By A1A63IPAA7676P on 2008-06-10
  Landing page optimization (LPO) is NOT as simple as changing a web page's images, text, or font color and font size to create what you THINK others will like. There are many more pieces to the puzzle, which Tim Ash covers very well.
  
  I firmly believe that this book is a great read for anybody who plays a part in the design and layout of any web page that asks a visitor to do something (i.e. buy, sign up, download, etc.). You'll definitely learn how you can make your mission critical landing pages convert better.
  
  Even the old salty pros out there can learn a thing or two from LPO Jedi, Tim Ash.
  
  Eric Itzkowitz
  [...] Phone Cards
  
  p.s. We've already put into place some of the learnings derived from this book. We can't wait to see the results!
  
  
• A Page Turner
  By A3NSRBTXE8YB29 on 2008-07-17
  As a project lead for a Microsoft team that works with adCenter clients, I read a lot of technical books about online advertising. A lot. I've never referred to any of those books as a page turner. Never. "Landing Page Optimization" is a book with weight and substance without being dead weight. When I finished the book I had a working knowledge of the rationale and testing methodology for landing pages including a better understanding of the math than I had expected. I have a background in search engine advertising and web analytics but lacked a clear understanding of multivariate testing. With this book I could step into a search engine advertising production environment and feel comfortable with the learning curve.
  
  
• comprehensive and very readable
  By A2NEKQ34HRRLVV on 2008-02-07
  This book is "meaty". Although it has many screenshot examples of landing pages issues, the book also has a lot of comprehensive and detailed discussion of important and diverse background materials. At times it reads like a graduate business school textbook on the subject, but a very readable one.
  
  It is not about specific "one size fits all" landing pages. It shatters a lot of common assumptions about how to approach landing page design. Instead, it delves into the fundamental principles that allow you to design and test the best landing pages for your specific situation.
  
  This book gives you new eyes with which to see opportunities for increased landing page efficiency and conversions. As a search engine marketer, this book is critical to my job success.
  
  Highly recommended!
  
  
• the quickest way to increase conversion rates
  By AA5OOJIDL2UQL on 2008-02-08
  Tim uses his own experience and real-life examples to illustrate the necessity of a good landing page. Each chapter details steps you can follow to fine-tune your own website and get results.
  
  If you're serious about increasing your conversion rates, here's a comprehensive guide, as well as a good read.
  
  
• Loaded with great ideas
  By A2A64V2C0URGPS on 2008-03-02
  Creating a website, even with a great looking initial landing page, is not nearly enough in today's increasingly competitive marketplace. Tim Ash's book is a simple, practical step-by-step guide to effectively win your target customers' attention, their purchases and, ultimately, their loyalty. A "must read" for anyone with an Internet presence.
  
  
• The Most Comprehensive, Actionable Book On Landing Page Optimization
  By A1LIZ2YQJDWU2S on 2008-06-15
  I just finished reading Tim's book and want to let you all know that this is by far the best book I have ever read on landing page optimization. I now have 18 pages of notes and ideas to apply to my work as a result. No combination of blog posts, speakers or articles can provide this kind of comprehensive, actionable knowledge.
  
  I work in the search marketing / analytics field in a digital-centric agency setting and will be recommending this book to everyone I work with. This is a must read for any person or company involved in digital media, analytics, usability, web design or any other online field.
  
  
• Great Book
  By A5HLV1KZBKQSR on 2008-08-02
  It is a great book, with lots of important information.
  It may helps the web guys to improve their business perception and may help the business people to develop their web technology perception.
  A very good mix of information very oriented to customer aquisition and retention.
  
  
  
• A good look at a under estimated subject
  By AKN36GLJ2TZOV on 2008-08-05
  As a small business owner reading a book about Landing Page Optimization I thought it would be more than I could handle. After just a few chapters I got the hang of what he was talking about. Its a tough subject that would over shadow many web designers, but I think it is a valuable subject once you have a website operational. Thanks Tim for you research and hard work.
  
  [...]
  
  
• If this book was avaialbe ten years ago, I would be retired by now
  By ATNT3G8PI905D on 2008-08-06
  
  
  
  I am owner of unoptimized website and I found this book to be invaluable. My website was not performing as it should, but I didn't know how to correct the problems. Landing Page Optimization showed me why my website sucked and what to do about it.
  
  If you own a website and you are paying for clicks, you had better read this book, because if your site is not optimized, you are losing money and lots of it.
  
  
• A warning message here though
  By A1JG2SSZ0HP0XT on 2008-05-03
  Though I had given this book 5 stars, I really mean it - this book is everything you need about the topic.
  But.
  A warning here. Author goes on for a lot of math, theory and things, what can scare you away, in case your mind is prepared to see a lot of pictures & comics style reading like you probably saw in this book:
  
  Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition
  
  I would say - if you want easy book to read on a topic - take a Steve's book, but of you are ready to serious brain wash with a topics starting from Myer/Briggs personas (same topic is covered by another great book - Waiting for your cat to bark, from Eisenberg brothers), probability theory, quantitative approaches, and other similar issues - then this book is for you.
  
  Just do not expect the easy go read. This is what I wanted to say
  
  
  
  
• An excellent read, valuable no matter your role in your web presence
  By A28QWQNQEW0BE5 on 2008-04-24
  Certain types of advice go without saying; eat your vegetables, listen to your mother, look both ways before crossing the street. In his new book Landing Page Optimization, Tim Ash reminds us of fundamental landing page design concepts that seem simple. But we all (at least occasionally) fall into the trap of forgetting them when designing a page.
  
  Landing Page Optimization starts and ends with a very simple premise: you are not the expert in designing an effective landing page -- your customers are. You may feel that you have pegged the perfect message, the right layout and the simplest form. You reason you derived all of these elements from an exact understanding of who is visiting the website and why. Truth is, you haven't. Your design most likely rests on how you see your product or service, how you structure your company, what your CEO likes, or any number of other things that have little or nothing to do with the customer's needs. Swallow your pride, trust your customers to tell you what they want through their actions, and give it to them.
  
  Tim asserts the basic principle that your page must appeal to the emotional responses of the visitor. Make them feel welcome, safe and connected to your site. Unfortunately, you don't have the time to explain to them why they should trust and commit. Visitors devote only a few seconds to your landing page, and you must make the most of these seconds. Assume no one wants to read your lengthy descriptions. Communicate quickly with images and bulleted lists, with your overall goal of maximizing conversions constantly in mind.
  
  Tim has delivered a must-read book for every level of an organization that wants to make its website and online marketing efforts successful. Far from being a book for any one job title, Landing Page Optimization gives everyone in an organization a solid foundation for how to think about customers, how that relates to design, and how to test sites with maximizing conversions in mind. Each person involved in landing page design must think about how each element on the landing page helps or hinders a visitor's ability to understand immediately who the site owner is, conclude there's a solid benefit for them, and trust the site owner with their information.
  
  In all, Landing Page Optimization provides a valuable look at the factors we should consider when evaluating the effectiveness of any landing page. This excellent read will leave you saying, "I knew that! Why haven't I been doing this all along?!?"
  
  
  
  
• Not enough unique content...
  By AO8PAYAIKA5H4 on 2008-07-29
  I write a lot of landing pages for my clients, so I was excited to see this book. However, much of it is standard marketing advice you could find in many sources. The author loosely defines "landing page" as the page where the visitor enters your site (as opposed to a page that's specifically designed to transition from a promotional offer to the main site) so it really is a book about web marketing in general.
  
  A lot of space is devoted to short summaries of related subjects (the Meyer-Briggs personality types, various statistical analysis techniques etc) which the reader is either going to be familiar with or, if not, would do well to learn about in more complete discussions elsewhere. An important subject to me (actually, the reason I bought the book) is personalization on landing pages but that gets just ½ a page. There are good case histories but the book needs far, far more of them.
  
  If you're just starting out in web marketing this book might be a good primer (hence the 3 stars). Otherwise you'd be better off to read the MarketingSherpa case studies along with Jakob Nielsen's writings on web usability.
  
  
• Comprehensive and full of information
  By A4HMPDNZYCCX on 2008-07-31
  I have to say when I ordered this book I expected it to talk mostly about short-term campaign related landing pages. In fact it's a lot more than that. It talks about a landing page as any page on a site where a given visitor could start interaction with a website.
  
  The first few chapters might need to be skipped if you know the basic of marketing and don't need to be reminded of the all important customer acquisition, conversion and retention concepts.
  
  This is a comprehensive book that details the theory and practice of improving a website to convert more visitors into actors, no matter what the size of your site is.
  
  Optimising landing pages involves as much trial and error as it does using proven methods as the ones in this book. This book will be a great starting point for a lot of people, but it is very hard for a single book to teach you everything you can do to optimise your unique website. It is your deep knowledge of your product and your customers that will help you the most.
  
  I highly recommend this book for web marketing novices, somewhat experts AND for experts. Everyone will get something out of it.
  
  
• Broad but extremely thin -- beginners only
  By A37MKMU8XN52CN on 2008-10-18
  If you know absolutely nothing about marketing or web commerce, this may be the book for you. It touches on a great many important subjects, and provides a useful -- if brief -- introduction to each.
  
  If, on the other hand, you have ANY experience at all with basic marketing principles and the concepts and techniques behind optimizing your web site to maximize customer response, you will find this book quite tedious.
  
  Simply put, nothing in this book gets more than surface treatment. Hundreds of very valuable concepts are introduced but none is ever fleshed out in a useful fashion. Practical examples are almost non-existent. Case studies are not used. Techniques are described in the broadest terms so that they may apply to any of a million different contexts or scenarios. This approach renders the book nearly useless to anyone who has even a little bit of knowledge in this area.
  
  After reading a few chapters, I was simply bored out of my mind. I switched to scanning sections and dropping in periodically to see if the level of detail increased, but it did not. I do not consider myself an expert by any means, but there was nothing here that I found enlightening or even useful. It's all too bland and general.
  
  I started the web site for my small business about five years ago, and constantly seek out new sources of insight into how I can improve it. The information in this book was just too generalized to be of any use.
  
  If you are new to web marketing, use this as a primer, but you will soon be itching for a more practical resource. A shorter but infinitely more helpful (and entertaining) primer might be something like Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability, 2nd Edition. From there, you will need individual books on things like analytics, keywords, SEO, pricing, copywriting, etc.
  
  In that vein, I thought I was buying a book about optimizing my landing pages (a very big and complex subject all its own). This book touches on that, but not in a way that I found particularly detailed or useful. A better title for this book might be, "Introduction to Marketing (Web Edition)".
  
  
• It's no longer just about clicks...
  By A3FIR2JEXK4VXN on 2008-05-30
  I often find that mastering the art and science of conversion optimization is one of the key areas that separates outstanding marketers from the also-rans. Tim's book is an essential resource to help people start to develop that mastery.
  
  I particularly enjoyed Chapter 10 since it helps you think about the entire testing process from end to end. There tend to be three kinds of testers. (1) Those who don't know about testing yet. (2) Those who get good but not extraordinary benefits from testing since they don't think through their tests. (3) Those who do think through their testing and UX strategy and get such great results that it becomes huge competitive advantage.
  
  Folks who can take the insights from this book and get a few big tests under their belt will not only deliver big gains to their employer but will also be the cream of the crop in the digital marketing professionals marketplace.
  
  
• Comprehensive, Practical, and Actionable Website Optimization Guide
  By A2024MXRGHHFQ4 on 2008-08-14
  Amazingly enough, virtually everything you need to know about optimizing the commercial efficiency of a website (not just a "landing page") is included, concisely, in Landing Page Optimization. In addition to the motivation for doing optimization, how to select what to optimize, and, in detail, how to measure and analyze your optimizations, Tim Ash includes helpful summaries of the psychology of users and even of how to navigate corporate politics to get buy-in for your optimization project. There is very little about creating a successful commercial website that I did not feel more knowledgeable after reading this book.
  
  
• A good book to get you going successfully with your landing pages
  By ADVLRJS633OTD on 2008-08-09
  The author no doubt knows his subject and I suspect he's good at what he
  
  His discussion on testing is good and important. And he does answer some important questions. For example, should a landing page have lots of navigation or just enough? This book will help you in increasing your conversions. There's no doubt about that. But most of the information is available on the Web at this time. And I personally felt a lot was left unwritten and unanswered.
  
  - Susanna K. Hutcheson
  
  
• Tim Ash is a World Class Professional - the book says it all
  By AKOOLFI6AFG0J on 2008-08-26
  I traveled 6000 miles from Scotland to the USA to further fulfil my passion for doing Search Engine Marketing for my Scottish client base. I got the chance to actually meet the people behind the books who in our business are seen as the mastering mentors of our profession. through me being an Optimiser in the UK. I had the opportunity to meet Tim Ash, who is a very pleasant and knowledgeable person and this inspired me to buy his book. I have since read cover to cover, and the book is like the person. Since that meeting and reading of his Book Tim even went out his way to answer an email on a burning question I had - now that's commitment! It was an honour getting the chance to meet Tim Ash, the positive reviews here sum him up, so go ahead - get the book and get your website tuned up - today.
  
  
• Landing Page Optimization: The Definitive Guide to Testing and Tuning for Conversions
  By A28R24579O241C on 2008-09-04
  This is a terrific read! If you have an online business -- this is a MUST read. -Steve
  
  
  
• Easy to digest and results oriented.
  By A1RUXLG6HURU2N on 2008-09-22
  The author has accomplished a difficult feat indeed - explaining the variety of methods and mechanisms of multivariate testing simply, plainly, and with real world application.
  
  I work in the Direct Response space, we've used multivariate testing for a number of years and actively subscribe to a number of newsletters and whitepapers on the subject. I would consider myself an expert on the process and technologies, yet still found a wealth of new and refreshing information in this book.
  
  In particular, the methodology behind calculating the real dollars and cents increases is well executed.
  
  All around easy to reccomend.
  
  
• A Must Have
  By A2NJGBDHKGAQ3Z on 2008-10-11
  I immediately digested this book as soon as I got my hands on it. It is a must have for those in the industry as a developer, consultant or merchant. This book provide critical information you shouldn't be without!
  
  

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