Advertorial landing page: how to build the pre-sell page between your ad and your product
How to build an advertorial landing page that converts and passes ad review: the blocks in order, how to match it to the ad, how long and how plain to write it, and the rules from Google, TikTok and the FTC.
Marián Cabadaj
9 min read
An advertorial landing page is the article-style page a reader lands on after clicking your ad, before they see the product page. Its job is to do what the ad had no room for: name the problem, explain why the usual fixes fail, show proof, and only then make the offer.
Most of these pages fail in one of two ways. Some are a product page with a newspaper font, so the reader feels tricked and leaves. Others copy the worst of the format (a fake reporter, an invented "doctor", a countdown timer) and get the ad account flagged.
This guide covers the build: the blocks in the order a reader needs them, how to match the page to the ad, how long and how plain to write it, and the rules from Google, TikTok, the FTC and the UK ASA that the page must pass. If you want to see real advertorials first, with their labels and what they sold, start with our advertorial examples.
What is an advertorial landing page, and when do you need one?
An advertorial landing page, also called a pre-sell page, is a page you host that reads like an article and sits between a paid ad and the product page. You need one when a cold reader has to understand a problem or a method before the product makes sense. For an impulse product with a clear photo, the product page alone usually converts better.
Where it sits in the funnel
| Step | What the reader knows | The job of the copy |
|---|---|---|
| The ad | Nothing about you | Stop the scroll with one problem or one question |
| The advertorial landing page | The problem, not yet the fix | Explain the cause, show proof, answer the doubt |
| The product page | Why this product fits | Remove the last friction: price, size, delivery, returns |
The advertorial is the middle step. It is wasted on warm audiences who already know the brand, and it earns its place with cold ones. This is the same logic as writing for problem-aware and solution-aware readers: a problem-aware reader needs the explanation before the offer.
Our articles are still written by HUMANS! Get human written articles in your Google feed.
Add as preferred sourceWhat goes on an advertorial landing page, block by block?
An advertorial landing page has nine blocks, in this order. Each block answers the question the reader has at that point, so moving a block usually breaks the page.
| Block | What it does | Common mistake |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Ad label | Says "Advertisement" above the headline | Hidden in grey at the bottom |
| 2. Headline | Repeats the promise or question from the ad | A new promise the ad never made |
| 3. Opening | Names the reader's situation in two or three sentences | Starts with the brand's founding story |
| 4. The problem | Explains why it happens | Skips to the product |
| 5. Why usual fixes fail | Shows the reader why what they tried did not work | Attacks named competitors |
| 6. The mechanism | Explains why your approach works, in plain words | Jargon and invented ingredients |
| 7. Proof | Reviews, numbers, a photo of the real result | Results that are not typical, with no context |
| 8. Objections | Price, effort, "will it work for me" | Ignored, so the reader leaves to check |
| 9. Offer and one button | One product, one call to action | Five links to five products |
Why the label goes on the page as well as the ad
The FTC's 2015 guide on native advertising says that when a native ad leads to a page where the full ad appears, disclosures are needed both on the publisher's site and the click- or tap-into page on which the complete ad appears, unless that page is obviously an ad (Federal Trade Commission, 2015). In the UK, CAP Code rule 2.1 says marketing communications must be obviously identifiable as such (CAP Code).
What this means for a DTC brand: the "Sponsored" tag Meta or TikTok puts on your ad does not cover the page. Put "Advertisement" at the top of the advertorial itself, above the headline.
Write the proof block with typical results
The FTC's Endorsement Guides say that when a testimonial shows a result the advertiser cannot show to be typical, the ad must make clear what the generally expected results are (Federal Trade Commission). A pre-sell page full of before-and-after stories is exactly where this rule bites.
What this means for a DTC brand: next to your best review, say what most customers can expect, and when. "Most customers see a change by week 6" is honest and still sells.
How do you match the ad to the advertorial landing page?
The headline of the page should repeat the promise, the question or the image of the ad that sent the reader there. A reader who clicked on one promise and lands on another feels lost and leaves.
TikTok makes this a rule. Its landing page policy gives as an example of what is not allowed: "The ad features product A, but the landing page shows product B", and the same for brand A and brand B (TikTok Ads policy).
A question-led ad needs a question-led page
The ad below opens with a question a buyer would ask. If an ad like this sent traffic to an advertorial, the page headline would ask the same question and the opening would answer it in the first paragraph.
| The ad says | The page headline says | The page opens with |
|---|---|---|
| A question: "Why do I wake at 3am?" | The same question | The two most common causes, in plain words |
| A number: "4.7 stars from 2,140 reviews" | Why 2,140 people switched | One reviewer's situation before and after |
| An image of a result | The story behind that result | Who it was, what they tried first, what changed |
The rows above are illustrative, written to show the match, not taken from a live campaign. Every number on your own page has to be true before it ships.
How long and how plain should the copy be?
As long as the reader's questions need, and written in short, everyday words. The length can vary. The reading level should not.
Plain words convert better
Unbounce's 2024 Conversion Benchmark Report puts the median landing page conversion rate across all industries at 6.6%. It also found that pages written at a 5th to 7th grade reading level converted at 11.1%, against 5.3% for pages written at a professional level (Unbounce, 2024).
What this means for a DTC brand: an advertorial can be long and still convert, if every sentence is easy. Cut the long words before you cut the paragraphs.
Readers scan, so the first lines carry the page
Nielsen Norman Group's eye-tracking work on the F-pattern found that the first lines of text on a page receive more gazes than later lines, and recommends putting the most important points in the first two paragraphs (Nielsen Norman Group, 2017).
What this means for a DTC brand: the label, the headline and the first two paragraphs decide whether the rest is read. Write subheadings that tell the story on their own, so a skimmer still gets the argument.
Length wins when it answers real objections
When Conversion Rate Experts rebuilt the Moz landing page, the winning page was six times longer than the control and produced a 52% improvement in sales in the first split test (Conversion Rate Experts). The extra length came from objections the team collected from real customers, not from filler.
What this means for a DTC brand: collect the questions from your reviews, support inbox and comments first. Each one that stops a sale earns a paragraph. The rest does not.
Why does the phone version decide the result?
A click on an Instagram or TikTok ad opens inside the phone app, so for paid social the mobile page is the page most readers see. Two numbers show why it needs its own check.
Google's AdSense help says its research shows 53% of visits are likely to be abandoned if pages take longer than 3 seconds to load (Google). Nielsen Norman Group found that comprehension on mobile and desktop was about the same, but that hard passages took longer to read on mobile than on a computer (Nielsen Norman Group, 2016).
What this means for a DTC brand: compress the photos, drop the scripts you do not need, and read the page on your own phone before it goes live. A heavy page loses readers before the headline loads.
What do ad platforms and regulators not allow on an advertorial landing page?
The rules across platforms and regulators point the same way: the page must be honest about being an ad, honest about results, and useful on its own.
| Rule | Source | What it means for the page |
|---|---|---|
| No claims that "entice the user with an improbable result" | Google Ads Misrepresentation policy | No miracle results, even if one customer got them |
| No clickbait or "sensationalist text or imagery" | Google Ads Misrepresentation policy | No shock headlines or fear-based images |
| No destinations "solely designed to send users elsewhere" | Google Ads Destination requirements | The advertorial must say something useful itself, not only link on |
| Landing pages must be mobile-friendly | TikTok Ads policy | Test on a phone before launch |
| Same product and brand as the ad | TikTok Ads policy | The page shows the product the ad showed |
| A label on the click-into page | FTC native advertising guide, 2015 | "Advertisement" above the headline |
| Typical results next to testimonials | FTC Endorsement Guides | Say what most customers can expect |
The page you must never build
In 2011 the FTC moved to stop 10 operators of fake news sites selling acai berry weight loss products. The FTC alleged that the reporters on the pages were fictional and the comments were "simply additional advertising content" (Federal Trade Commission, 2011).
What this means for a DTC brand: a fake news masthead, an invented journalist or a made-up comments section is the example regulators use for an illegal advertorial. Write as the brand, under your own name.
How do you test an advertorial landing page?
Test the whole route, not the page alone. Send half of one cold audience from the same ad to the advertorial and half straight to the product page, and compare the cost per purchase. Then test inside the page: the headline first, then the proof block, then the offer.
Read conversion rate at each step
Put the visitors and the purchases of each route into the calculator below. An advertorial lowers the click-through from the ad to the product page, because some readers stop reading. It earns its place only if the purchase rate of the people who do click through is high enough to make up for them.
Your numbers
Purchases, signups or leads. Whichever action you are optimising, keep it the same one on both lines.
Your conversion rate
Market average 2.22%
Conversion rate
—
Visitors per conversion
—
Scale: 0% to 5%
Conversion Rate Calculator: the full tool, with the benchmarks and the FAQ
For the ad side of the test, our guide to direct response advertising covers which metric to read first when a funnel underperforms.
How Selzee feeds your advertorial landing page with ads
Selzee does not build or host landing pages. It makes the ads that send people to them. Selzee researches your market, your customers and the ads that are running longest for other brands, then recreates the winning ads for your brand with your products, logo, fonts and colors. Every ad comes with the angle and the insight behind it, which gives you the promise your advertorial headline has to repeat. You can change a headline in seconds, approve the ads you like, and ship them.
If you already have the page copy and need ad lines that match it, the free ad copy generator works from text you paste. Paste the advertorial's opening and its best review, and it ranks those sentences and frames them as hooks, headlines and primary text, without adding a claim the page does not make. For the line-level craft, see our copywriting examples.
Advertorial landing page: FAQ
What is an advertorial landing page?
An advertorial landing page is an article-style page, hosted by the brand and labeled as an ad, that a reader reaches after clicking a paid ad. It explains a problem and a solution before sending the reader to the product page or checkout.
Is an advertorial landing page the same as a pre-sell page?
Yes, in most usage the two terms mean the same page: content that warms up a cold reader between the ad and the sale. "Advertorial" stresses the editorial look. "Pre-sell" stresses the job the page does in the funnel.
Do I need to label an advertorial landing page as an ad?
Yes. The FTC's 2015 native advertising guide says disclosures are needed on the page a native ad leads to, unless that page is obviously an ad, and the UK CAP Code requires marketing to be obviously identifiable. Put "Advertisement" above the headline.
How long should an advertorial landing page be?
Long enough to answer the questions that stop a sale, written in plain words. Unbounce found that pages at a 5th to 7th grade reading level converted at 11.1% against 5.3% at a professional level, so plain words count for more than a short page.
Will Meta or Google reject an advertorial landing page?
Not for being an advertorial. Pages get rejected for what is on them. Google's policies disallow improbable results, sensationalist clickbait and pages that only send users elsewhere, and TikTok requires the page to match the ad's product and work on mobile. Check Meta's Advertising Standards for your category before launch.
The short version
An advertorial landing page is the middle step for cold traffic. Label it, repeat the ad's promise in the headline, follow the nine blocks in order, write in plain words, show typical results, and make it fast on a phone. Then test the whole route against your product page on cost per purchase.
If you want the ads that feed that page found and made for your brand, see how Selzee works on your own brand.