A landing page, sometimes known as a compression page, is a quick and easy way to build your subscriber list.

The main goal of the page is to get your potential customer to allow you to have his email address and give him permission to send you emails relevant to him.

The rules changed recently, so your landing page should have a few more elements than it used to. Back in the “old days” of 2005, you could get away with a headline, a few “reasons why” panels, and a subscribe button.

Today, you need more items. Search engines want to think of your landing page as a valuable page in its own right. You can use any HTML editor to create a landing page, including free NVU software if you’re on a tight budget.

Then you will need to include:

Links to other pages on your site. At a minimum, you should include a link to your privacy policy and a contact page. If you can add links to some relevant articles, so much the better.

A free gift to incentivize people to sign up for your email list. Gone are the days when you could just say “sign up for my newsletter” and get subscribers. Give new subscribers a valuable free report that is hard to get elsewhere; get one written on Rentacoder or Elance if you don’t want to do it yourself.

Make noise! Most tests show that an audio message that starts immediately when the page loads will increase your response. Use Audacity to record the message and one of the free or cheap software programs out there to add it to your page.

Add a picture of someone pointing to the sign up button. Or at least, a big arrow to aim. Testing has shown that this can help increase the number of people signing up from your landing page.