The Impact of A/B Testing on Your Conversion Rates

A/B testing (which is also known as split testing) is usually recommended for anyone trying to decide on the elements to be included when designing web content. When running this test, two or more pages are created with some variants and shown to different website visitors at random, using different elements that could prompt your website visitor to click on your call-to-action.

Running an A/B testing before launching a web page can make a big impact on your conversion rate. It helps to know (with proof) what page designs and call-to-actions will grab the attention of your visitors, and push them in the right direction. It may seem easy to guess that your preferred design will resonate better with your visitors, but A/B testing has proven that the only way to determine how well anything will be accepted by your visitors, is by putting it to test.

The reason for A/B testing is to determine what will promote as much conversion as possible. You want that landing page you spent hours designing, to convert your visitors to customers. You want your call-to-actions to get clicked.

If you sell goods or services, you want your visitors to place orders. If you run an application, you want your visitors to sign up for trials and eventually pay to use your app. If you sell subscription-based services, you want long-term subscribers who will remain loyal to your service. To make sure that they don’t get lost in your funnel, it is important that every element included on your website has been proven to be the best option.

“You’re getting tested, I’m getting tested... We’re all getting tested!”

The first thing you should do is decide on what will be tested, and in what order. Do not turn your entire website into a data collecting, testing machine. It is important that you test your website’s features one-by-one as opposed to running simultaneous tests all over. This will help in getting more accurate results.

If you’re trying to decide on what elements need to be tested and optimized, here is a list:

·        Headlines

·        Images

·        Layouts

·        Call to actions; use an A/B test to decide which works better with your visitors, between “Sign up now!” and “See our pricing plan”.

·        Offers; find out how your visitors react to your offers, for example, using $30 or $29.97.

·        Text layout and design

·        Offer layout e.g. “AAA on Sale!” or “Discount Prices for AAA”.

Whether your visitors are aware or not, these seemingly little details affect what their next action would be, regarding your website. In email campaigns, the subject line in your email determines if it gets opened or sent straight to trash.

To start your testing, choose the feature that you consider most important. It could be the page most of your buyers come through or the one feature that isn’t getting any attention. Either way, it is up to you to run your testing using your perceived order of importance.

Google’s stance on A/B Testing

Google has made public its support for A/B testing as long as it is done in the right way. To make sure that your search engine optimization is not affected, do these three things:

·        Avoid cloaking, which basically means showing one set of information to your website visitors and another set to Googlebot. Doing this is against their guidelines and can reduce your ranking or even remove your website from Google results if you are caught.

·        If you are redirecting users from the original URL, use 302 which is a temporary redirect, not 301 which is permanent. This makes it clear that the redirection is only temporary and your original URL stays indexed for when your testing is over.

·        Don’t start a test and forget about it. Run your test and update your website as soon as you have collected your results.

Pro tip: Acknowledge the Uniqueness of your Audience

One thing every marketer needs to remember is that no two audiences react the same way. A landing page design which brought in $25,000 in sales for another website might not resonate with your audience. The last thing you should do is copy and ‘slap’ another website’s design on your own because it proves to be successful at boosting conversion for them. Stay original, speak with your brand’s voice and go where the results take you, as surprising as they might get.