Thread: Day 18: Intro to Landerlab

EXPLANATION & ACTION


***************

INTRODUCTION

If you don't have your own server, Landerlab is simply the easiest and fastest way I know of to get landers ready for action, so I want to give you this option.

But Landerlab is not a must. In the next lesson, I will show you how to store your landing page files on Amazon S3, and use Amazon Cloudfront as the CDN to speed up the loading of your landing pages to visitors all over the world. That method involves more effort, but it's practically free.

Whereas Landerlab, in exchange for providing the convenience of storing and serving your landing pages to visitors (i.e. by replacing Amazon S3 and Cloudfront), charges a monthly fee. At the time of writing, the monthly fee is $49/mo, or $499/yr if paid annually.

I'll provide you with both options in this lesson and the next, and leave you to pick one to go with. You could even try both before deciding to stick with one long-term.

If you choose to sign up for Landerlab, please continue with this lesson. If not, please skip to the next lesson:

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...osting-and-CDN



***************

PREPARATION

Before you can use Landerlab, there are a few things we need to take care of...



1)Sign up for Landerlab

-First of all, please sign up for your Landerlab subscription here: https://landerlab.io/


2)Register a Landing Page Domain at Namecheap

(Note: You don't HAVE to register this domain at namecheap - you can do so at any other domain registrar - as long as you know how to register the domain AND point that domain to nameservers, without having to rely on my step-by-step below.)

IMPORTANT: If you have a domain you've already registered from before, that you can use as a landing page domain for landerlab here, please make sure that you have NOT previously added this domain to Amazon S3. If you HAVE, please either register a new landing page domain, or change the S3 bucket name.

-Register an account on Namecheap.com if you don't yet have one.

-Sign in, click on "Domains" > "Domain Name Search".

-Think of a domain name for your landing pages. If you have a vertical you would like to focus on, you can come up with a domain name that is related to that vertical (e.g. for sweeps, something like daily-prize-rewards.com). If you haven't decided on what kind of offers to promote, then just register something generic, such as:

bestinternetoffers
specialpromostoday
extreme-deals-site

....you get the idea. And if you can come up with shorter names without spammy-looking hyphens, all the better!

I wouldn't suggest spending too much time on trying to come up with the perfect domain name, because nowadays, domains get banned by google quite frequently.

Enter your desired domain name into the search field and press ENTER. Domain names that have already been taken will say "TAKEN" and show a "make offer" icon at the end of the row. Domain names that are available will show an "add to cart" icon.



And no, it doesn't have to have a .com extension. For example, .xyz, .club, and .life domains are cheaper. However, keep in mind 2 things:

a)People tend to trust .com sites more - I haven't personally split-tested this myself though, so have no idea how much impact domain extensions can have on conversion rates.

b)Some people believe that .com domains are less likely to be flagged/banned by google, and that they may be faster: https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...ns-For-Landers

For tracker domains I'd recommend getting a .com. For lander domains, if you run high volume pop traffic, lander domains can get flagged by google quite often so .com's can get expensive.

You're encouraged to do your own experimentation. For your first domain, don't overthink - get a .com for now and switch to other extensions later.

-Once you've decided on a domain name, click on "add to cart" as shown in the screenshot above, then click on the shopping cart icon at the top, then "View Cart" where you'll need to complete the purchase.

No need to buy their additional services such as Web Hosting, SSL, VPN, etc.

Purchasing for 1 year would be enough - you can always pay for another year if the domain isn't flagged by google by then. "AUTO-RENEW" I would suggest to leave at OFF for the same reason (although you could leave it on, and come back to turn it off if the domain gets flagged by google - your choice).

Get WhoisGuard (now "free forever" on Namecheap), as many pop landers are at least somewhat scammy in nature, so it would be best to not have your name associated with those landers.

No need to get Premium DNS - we'll be using Amazon Route 53, as you'll see later.

I purchased a new domain for use with this tutorial as an example - the domain name is winbignow.xyz. I'll be using this domain for the remainder of this lesson and the next.


3)Add Cloudflare Account to Landerlab

-If you don't yet have a Cloudflare account, please register one for free here: https://dash.cloudflare.com/sign-up

In a separate browser tab, verify your email to complete account registration.

-After signing up, Cloudflare will ask you to enter your site. Ignore that for now. Click on the profile icon at the top and then click on "My Profile".



-Click on the "API Tokens" tab, then find "Global API Key" and click on "View".



-You'll be asked to enter your Cloudflare account password again - do so.

-You'll then be shown an API key - click on "Click to copy" to copy to clipboard.



-Back in Landerlab, click on the "Cloudflare Accounts" icon in the left menu, then click on "+ Add Cloudflare Account".



-Type in your Cloudflare email, paste the API you copied, and click "Add".




4)Add Landing Page Domain to Landerlab

-In Landerlab, click on the "Domains" icon in the left menu, then click on "+ Add Domain":



-Paste the landing page domain you've just registered into the "Domain" field, then choose the Cloudflare account you've just added to Landerlab, and click "Add":



-Next you'll be given some name servers to plug into namecheap for your landing page domain. Save them somewhere safe for use in the next step!




5)Update Nameservers for Landing Page Domain

-Back in Namecheap, click "Domain List" in the left menu, find your landing page domain and click on "Manage".



-On the "Domain" tab > "NAMESERVERS" section > click to change from "Namecheap BasicDNS" to "Custom DNS".



-Copy and paste those 2 nameservers you got from Clouflare. Don't forget to click on the little green checkmark to save.



-Back in Landerlab: Your lander status will say "Pending" while the nameservers get updated. This can take anywhere from minutes to 72 hours. You'll need to wait until the "Pending" turns into "Active" before you can use that landing page domain for your Landerlab landers.







***************

IMPORTING LANDERS INTO LANDERLAB


Option 1: Import Landing Page Directly From Adplexity into Landerlab

-Log into LanderLab.io.

-In a separate browser tab, log into Adplexity, find a lander you wish to "fix up", click on the lander to go into the data screen, click the first "Show More" at the top to open the "Landing Page Details" screen, and click on "IMPORT TO LANDERLAB".



-Fill in all applicable info - there are no definite rules but if here's what I do:

For "Name" I'd put in the lander "style" and a number. For example for the first spinning wheel sweeps lander I'm adding for the particular prize (in this case it's $5500 in cash), I could name it "spinwheel-1".

For "Language" choose the lander language.

For "Domain" choose the landing page domain you added. I usually don't use subdomains so I'd leave "Subdomain" empty. If you wish to use subdomains you'd have to add them first - following the instructions here.

For "Path" I'd put the vertical, followed by the sweepstakes "prize", followed by the 2-letter language code (which you can find here) representing the lander language. In this particular case I'm adding an English sweeps lander that's giving away $5500 in cash, so I set the path to "/sweeps/5500cash/en/spinwheel-1". It doesn't really matter how you organize your landers with this path / folders - go with whatever arrangement will help you stay organized.

When you're done filling in the info above, click "Next".



-For "Add to Tracker" just scroll to the bottom and click on "Skip this step".

-If all goes well you should see the "Success" message.



-To find this lander, click on the "Landing Pages" icon in the left menu. Click on the "PUBLISHED URL" to make sure the lander loads.





-Clicking the "Edit" icon > "Open in editor" will allow you to edit the landing page.





-You should see a popup with a reminder for you to replace outgoing links. I will talk more about this in a future lesson on landing page tracking and we can replace the links then. For now, simply leave it at "Don't replace links" and just close the window.



-From here, you can proceed to edit your landing page - more on that later.



Option 2: Upload Landing Page Files From Your Computer into Landerlab

Use this method if you have a zipped file of the landing page (e.g. downloaded from Adplexity or another landing page service; if your landing page files are not zipped, zip them first before proceeding).

-Click on "Landing Pages" icon in left menu > "+ Add Landing Page".



-Click "Upload from Zip". Assign a name to the page (e.g. "giftbox-1"), specify the landing page language, choose your landing page domain, specify the path (e.g. /sweeps/iphone12/en/giftbox-1; again, whatever naming system will help you stay organized) then upload the landing page zip file (don't drag the file - that function isn't working for some reason - click the upload area to upload). Click "Next".



-For the next step, "Add to Tracker", just scroll to the bottom and click on "Skip this step". You should then see a "Success" screen. Click on "Go To Landing Pages" (or just click on the "Landing Pages" icon in the left menu).

-Click on the "PUBLISHED URL" to make sure the lander loads.

-Clicking the "Edit" icon > "Open in editor" will allow you to edit the landing page.

-You should see a popup with a reminder for you to replace outgoing links. Again, I will talk more about this in a future lesson on landing page tracking and we can replace the links then. For now, simply leave it at "Don't replace links" and just close the window.



-From here, you can proceed to edit your landing page - more on that later.



Option 3: Use a Landerlab Template to Create Your Landing Page

Landerlab comes with its own set of landers that are already "fixed up" and fully functional - all you need to do is replace the outgoing links. Landerlab calls them "templates".

Again, we'll cover how to replace outgoing links on landers in a later lesson. For now, just know that the templates are available.

To access these templates, simply click on the "templates" icon in the left menu, find one you want to use, and click "Use Template", and add lander details as was covered above (more than once - so won't repeat again here).



They have templates available for various verticals. You can also request for landerlab support to "fix up" a landing page for you (that you've downloaded through manual spying, or from a service like Adplexity for example).

(You can submit a support ticket from this page: https://support.landerlab.io/)



***************

EDITING LANDERS IN LANDERLAB

Here are guides on how to edit landers in Landerlab:

https://support.landerlab.io/087337-...-Landing-Pages

https://support.landerlab.io/024726-...-Visual-Editor

Feel free to proceed to the lesson on how to fix landers, and follow that while tinkering with your landers in Landerlab. Basically you want to make changes until the following objectives are achieved (again - we'll talk more about this in the later lesson on how to fix up landers):

1)The landing page displays and functions as intended. Displays well in the most popular browsers on the most popular devices - nothing cut off, major landing page components above the fold etc. Survey questions roll over to the next question when answered, gift boxes open, spinning wheels spin, etc.

2)The outgoing links that are meant to lead the visitors to the offer, are replaced with the proper tracking link (i.e. the "Click URL").

3)Lander loads FAST! Very important for pop traffic - otherwise visitors will click back or close the window in droves.

4)OPTIONALLY: Customize to make the lander different from the original. For example change the look-and-feel, rewrite the text, customize the landing page for another sweepstakes prize or another vertical altogether. Innovate to end up with a different landing page you can split-test with other landing pages.

So you can make edits in Landerlab, refresh the "PUBLISH URL" in the browser to see how the changes are reflected, and repeat - until the objectives above are achieved.



OPTIONAL: Integrating Your Tracker with Landerlab

In this intro lesson, I skipped this step to avoid confusing you, because we haven't covered how to add landers to your tracking, and how landing page url parameters work. After you finish the lesson on that topic, you can come back to integrate your tracker with landerlab, so that all future landers you add to landerlab, will also be added to your tracker - if you so choose.



***************

So that was Landerlab! Again, if you're not sure you want to pay the monthly fee, please feel free to try the next lesson first, where we'll be using practically free services to host and serve your landing pages.




Amy