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A/B Testing: What It Means For Your Online Business

You want to create an unforgettable experience for your customers and leads. Observing SEO best practices is one way to achieve this.

But how do you find out what works for your online visitors and what doesn’t? How do you know what to improve on in your marketing and advertising campaigns?  These questions are the reason for A/B testing.

What is AB testing?

A/B testing is a way to obtain data directly from your customers. It is the process of comparing two versions of an email copy, web page or other marketing assets to find out what users prefer.

It helps you make data-driven decisions and create a positive impact. You can find out which words, phrases, videos, images, headlines, testimonials, and other elements work best. Even the most basic changes can have a huge impact on your conversion rates and customer satisfaction.

As Kyle Rush, former Head of Optimization at Optimizely rightly put “if you are not testing, you will not know how effective your changes are”.  A/B testing helps you prioritise your efforts for the long term.

How does A/B testing work?

The first step to running an A/B test is to know what to test. Will it be an off-site or on-site test? In an on-site test, think about the sales-related elements of your website and decide on the ones you want to change. It could be as simple as a headline, a CTA button, or a complete redesign of your page.  

An off-site test would be when you’re testing variables in your ads or sales email, that’s anything outside your website.

Half your traffic is shown one version of the web page, or sent one version of an email, and the other half shown, or sent, a different version. The engagement of the two groups is then measured and collected in an analytics dashboard, where it is analysed with a statistical engine. You can then find out if the difference had either a negative or positive influence on user behavior, or no effect at all.

A/B testing process

Here’s what you need to know to run a successful A/B test

  1. Pick one test variable

When optimising your emails or webpages, there are a number of variables, such as wording, layout, and headline, that all contribute to user experience. To find out how effective a change is, and know the variable responsible for the change, you need to test one independent variable at a time.

2. Set clear goals

Think about what your optimisation goals are, for instance, you need a way to communicate what your business is all about, so you can encourage more visitors to your site. Identify the variables that will help you achieve the goal, and consider how the proposed changes might affect user behavior.

3. Generate hypothesis

After you have identified a goal, come up with A/B testing ideas, for instance you can test a variation of your domain name and hypothesise on the possible effects and why it may be better than the current version.

4. Create variations

For domain name A/B testing, domain name forwards are used. This will measure how much traffic each name sends so that you can select the stronger variation.  You will need a dedicated domain name and two or more domain names that are to be tested as potential alternatives.

5. Run experiment

Set up a Google Analytics account under your primary domain name. Register two or more domain names you would like to test and set them up to redirect to your primary domain.  You can get good domain names at www.freeparking.co.nz/domain-names/.

Promote the test domains using the same promotional methods for each one. Let the experiment go on for a considerable period of time so that you can collect enough data.

6. Analyse results

After the experiment, your testing software will present the data showing the performance of the test groups. You can then find out if there is any statistically significant difference.

In the A/B test example we used, it is important that the domain name variations are not radically different from the primary domain name. For example, you could use different TLDs (.org, or .com) for the same name, alternative spellings of the name, and so on.

Benefits of A/B testing

Every element of your website, email copy, or any other marketing asset can be A/B tested as long as it can influence user behavior. You can A/B test:

  • Call-to-action (CTA) text
  • CTA button
  • Headlines
  • Links
  • Images
  • Testimonials
  • Layouts
  • Fonts
  • colors
  • Paragraph text; and many more

A/B testing can improve such factors as reader engagement, and conversion rate. Some of the many benefits of running an A/B test are:

  • Solve visitor pain points: data collected from monitoring user response, with behavior analysis tools such as Google Analytics, surveys, and heat maps, will help you to effectively meet your visitors’ pain points.
  • Improved user engagement and reduce bounce rate: A/B testing is used to test multiple variations of basic elements on your site in order to find the best possible solution. This can lead to improved content quality, site load speed, and other factors which will make web users spend more time on your site.
  • Improved content: Testing your web or email copy means you have to create a list of potential improvements to display to users. This process makes your content better and improves reader engagement.
  • Increased conversion rates: with A/B testing, you can determine the best content that will motivate your visitors and make them respond to your call-to-action. Knowing what works and what doesn’t will convert leads to loyal customers.
  • Reduced risks: you can avoid committing to time-intensive, costly changes that might be ineffective to your marketing efforts. A/B testing enables you to make informed decisions and make the most of your time and resources.
  • Increased sales: improved user experience ultimately leads to brand trust, repeat purchases, and increased sales.

In Conclusion

A/B testing is a sure way to create a better experience for your consumers. It also ultimately boosts your SEO. However, keep in mind that an A/B test should be an iterative process conducted over a considerable period of time. Each test should build upon the results of the previous one in order to get the best solution.


MORE ON THIS SUBJECT –

https://replyco.com/brainery/22-ways-to-collect-customer-feedback/

Michael Hunt

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