Crossroads by Captain DJ.
Getting targeted traffic for a website is just the first step in a thorough SEO process. What comes next? Landing page optimization or conversion (rate) optimization/CRO follows. After all you want the visitors you get to stay on your site and perform the desired action (like ordering or subscribing).
One of the foremost ways to optimize landing pages for more conversions is A/B split testing
sometimes also referred to as simply AB testing. The concept is pretty simple. In the most basic set up you show version A of a page to half of your visitors while in the other half will see version B.
Of course in reality it’s a bit more complex.
You will have more than two versions in many cases and you won’t split 50/50 but will choose a smaller portion of your overall traffic to test. Also you will probably only subject new visitors to your tests in some cases in order not to scare away your repeat visitors by frequent changes.
When you prepare more than two versions of your content (as in A, B, C etc.) it’s not necessarily called multivariate testing then. Multivariate testing rather refers to tests with multiple variables you check.
The most known tool for A/B split testing is Google Website Optimizer. Like with many free tools and similarly to Google Analytics it’s not the easiest to use tool though.
There are more user friendly tools out there by now. Over the course of the last year A/B split & multivariate testing has been booming. I discover new tools, tutorials and other resources every other day. Nonetheless it’s by now a best practice that has been around for years. So this is not about early adopting a methodology. AB testing is common sense by now on the Web.
Introductions to A/B Split Testing
Examples and Case Studies
Resources
Tools
Guides & Tutorials
The biggest problem with A/B and multivariate testing is the time and resources needed. Even a simple test for small website entails three different departments be it, SEO, analytics, web design.
How do you perform your A/B tests? I am still undecided which tools best suit my requirements.
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