A/B testing tools work in a number of ways. It all depends on what you are testing.
Testing is one of the most important skills any business owner or online marketer can learn. This is because tracking your results and then testing to try to improve them can make a huge difference to your bottom line.
Increasing your conversion rate by even a percentage point or two can mean a significant increase in your sales and profits.
What to Test
The first thing is to decide what to test. There are four main areas to consider:
* Sales pages
* Email sign-up pages (squeeze pages)
* Email subject lines
* Pay-per-click ads
Testing each of these areas will mean using different tools.
Set Up the Test
First, decide what you want to test. You might wish to split-test the impact of your headline on your landing page, or the effectiveness of your email subject line.
The Goals of Your Test
Next, determine what your goals are for your test. Do you want to get more sales, clicks on your ads, or subscribers to your email marketing list?
The Right Tools for the Right Job
Once you have set up the item you want to test and what you want to test, you can use the right tools to track the A/B test.
Sales Pages
The main tool to use is Google Analytics, to track the traffic to your pages on your site. Within this program is the tool Experiments.
Email Sign-Up Pages
You can use Google Analytics and Experiments for these types of landing pages. Then, depending on which email service you use, you would track how many sign-ups resulted from the traffic from the pages you have set up.
To set up the page, you will need content and a sign-up coupon. You can test the content though the two Google programs, and the sign-up coupon through your email marketing service.
For example, an email marketing program like AWeber will allow you to create a range of sign-up coupons. You can test them to see which are the most effective. You could test coupon wording, different colors of coupon and so on. AWeber’s analytics will track the click-through rate and conversion of each coupon you create. Once you have got a winner, you would use that coupon on the site.
Email Subject Lines
Email subject lines are like headlines on a webpage. They are the first thing a consumer sees. Once they read it, they will decide whether or not they want to read more. In the case of email, the subject line will be the only thing they see. If they don’t open the email, you will lose your chance of making a sale.
You can track your subject line success with most email marketing programs by setting up a split test for your subject lines. You can test the body of the email as well if you wish, by tracking your sales from the promotional emails you are sending.
Pay-per-Click Ads
There are a number of pay-per-click ad networks, but the most popular are Google AdWords, Bing, and Facebook ads. Each of these networks has their own testing and tracking tools to help you see which ads are performing best. This means better sales for you, and often for less money because these systems reward you for high-performing ads by making the per-click fee cheaper.
Test your headline of your ad, the body of the ad, and the image in order to improve your results and sales.
Use all of the tools available to you for each type of test you want to run, and see what a difference it makes to your profits.
