In this post we are going to cover what is an AB test and how to AB test landing pages or also known as split test landing pages. Also we will show the 5 key areas why and where you should be doing it.
So this post is for you if you want to save money on your marketing costs and increase your cutstomer coonversions without spending any more money and make your business more profitable.
Table of Contents
What is AB Testing or Split testing?
AB testing or split testing is the process of testing two versions to find the best option for your customers. Similar to market testing which a brand will undertake when they launch a new product.
AB testing is the digital method for us to test what your customers or prospects prefer when they visit your pages and view your online content.
By AB testing landing pages we can easily and quickly understand what our customers prefer by measuring their actions.
The first step in creating an AB split test is deciding what item you are going to test in your AB test of your sales and funnels pages. The principle of AB testing is to test small changes each time until you achieve your winning or final version.
You can test a number of different areas in your AB test landing pages depending on what sort of content you are actually testing. The important point of the tetsing to note is that you shoudl only test one item at a time in order to understand which item was the winning item. Many people make the mistake of testing to many items at the same time and then they are unsure which item was the important item which had the most benefit. This process is called single variable testing.
The 5 Key Areas to AB Test Landing Pages
The most common areas to run split test optimisations on your content are as follows:
- Headlines
- Page Content
- Videos or Images
- Calls to Action
- Forms
Within these areas you can test a whole range of different combinations. These could include variations of message on the page content, bullet lists, long form content etc.
Page Heading Split Testing
Different lengths of page titles and wording used within page titles. Different lengths of page content, short form cotent or long form content. As Headlines are a key focus area of your pages these are generally the most frequently tested items and the ones most easy to see big results in terms of variance.
Page Content & Colour Testing
Different colours should be tested for your landing pages and sales pages. Where colour is used as a page backround or block areas or highlight areas should be tested. Certain colours are proven to convert better for different consumer types and there is a whole marketing industry on colour theory. Where buttons are used these should be tested for the best colour to convert within your split testing of your landing pages.
Video & Image Split Testing
You should test the benefit of using images and videos in your landing pages split test, a mixture of these or even not using these at all. Also the video itself should be tested and which video works best on the page.
Images should also be tested as although images are recommended for website content they may not be the best thing for a sales page and may actually be a distraction. Whenever an item is used on the page it should be tested to see if it adds benefit or reduces benefit.
Call to Action Testing
As certain colours are known to convert better for different consumer types where buttons are used on the page, these should be tested for the best colour to convert. The words used on your buttons should also be tested for conversions.
How to Run an AB Test on Your Content
To run an AB split test you need to send traffic to the two variations. This can be organic search traffic that you are already getting or it can be paid traffic from Facebook or Google.
The benefit of using paid traffic is that you can see the results more quickly. If you are running paid traffic it would be best to test the landing pages with a smaller traffic volume while running your split test. And then increasing your traffic after you have improved your landing pages.
How to Analyse Your Split Test Results
If you are using paid advertising such as with Ad-words you can see your AB-testing statistics by creating a new ad experiment. You will then be able to view your conversion tracking when you view your ads analytics within the Experiments area of your analytics.
If you are using organic traffic to your website and using WordPress there is an advanced or Pro version of the Pretty Link plugin. With this plugin you can rotate your links to your offer or sales page. There is a tutorial within it but it is really easy to use and there is basic reporting and analytics within it
They have a Conversion Reporting feature to show how well different landing pages or sales funnels are working with their conversion reports. As they advise they are great for A/B testing or split testing.
Email sign ups is another good conversion statistic which can easily be measured. Email auto-responder providers such as Aweber or GetResponse have analytics built into their services.
Creating AB Test Landing Pages Or Split Test Landing Pages Quickly & Easily With Grooovepages
My preference is to create custom landing pages which you can quickly and easily create with GroovePages by cloning a site or cloning a page within a site and then making a variation change to create your AB testing landing pages. These pages from Groovepages can be used as AB landing pages for squeeze pages for email signups or offer pages as part of a sales funnel. The other benefit of using Groovepages for split testing landing pages is that they are a very quick to load and they can also be hosted online by Groovepages so you can get them online in just minutes.
