Marketer, writer and Squidoo founder Seth Godin was interviewed by Chris Sherman over at Search Engine Land today, and it’s worth a read. Seth, whose knowledge and expertise transcend all facets of marketing, speaks primarily of the challenges we all face as search marketers and the direction to go if we are looking for long-term success.

Here is a sample from the interview on the topic of landing pages:

Q. You've said that many search advertisers miss the boat by sending searchers to landing pages that try to get them to buy or convert immediately. Instead, savvy advertisers develop an "offer culture" where they experiment with landing pages and create a step-by-step process that encourages participation rather than a single event. While this sounds great, what about searchers who want to make an immediate purchase?

A. I think what I meant is that many advertisers make one of two common mistakes: a) they get lazy and send everyone to a generic page or worse, to a home page, instead of customizing an offer to match the ad itself, or b) they get impatient and try to turn that first click into a sale right now. While that works sometimes, we all know that real sales take time, and the beauty of permission is that you can educate and follow up later.

Interesting stuff…not sure if I totally agree about the click into sales part (at least in the lead generation world), but interesting none the less.

Read the full interview here.