A/B testing is one of your most valuable tools when it comes to digital marketing for business and figuring out how visitors respond to your website. In an A/B test, you simply run two different versions of a web page simultaneously. Each visitor to the site is randomly assigned one of the versions, and then you gather analytics to determine which variant was best at meeting your performance goals. The difference between the two versions can be as large or small as you require. Anything from a simple font or color change to a completely new layout is fair game for A/B testing.
Can you improve your site with A/B testing? Definitely!! Here’s how to do it.
How Can A/B Testing Help Your Site?
The first step for A/B testing is deciding which performance indicator you want to improve. For many websites, that means testing to improve sales conversions, but it can also be newsletter sign-ups, user engagement or even simple click-through page views.
Whatever your chosen indicator, the primary goal is always to figure out how to improve your website’s ability to do these three things:
- Grab a visitor’s attention
- Draw their eye to important page elements
- Drive them to complete the desired action
Humans are highly visual creatures who often operate on auto-pilot when surfing the web, so even the smallest details in color, form and text can make or break your site’s success in those three areas.
Five Basic A/B Tests Every Website Should Perform
To figure out which components are influencing your visitors correctly (or failing to), start with these basic types of A/B tests.
1. Typeface
Font size, color, and layout are all crucial factors for influencing user reactions.
2. Color
White backgrounds with black text are the standard for professional web pages, but other action elements need to be colored and attention-grabbing. Test buttons, links, and any component tied to your performance indicator with different color schemes.
3. CTAs
Your call to actions drive performance indicators, so they need to grab attention and then drive the action. Test layout, wording, color, and positioning to find the best combination.
4. Images
Images have the most immediate visual impact, so test different versions to find out which best meet your goals.
5. Headlines
The large-font blurb at the top of your page serves as an instant sales pitch, so experiment with wording, size, and color to find out which combination encourages visitors to further explore your site.
By slowly collecting a database of A/B testing results, you can determine a combination of all the best elements to create your final optimized web page. Use this tool to easily set up A/B testing on your WordPress site today!
