Everyone wants tons of traffic to their website. But masses don’t amount to much when you’re not converting those visitors into leads and/or sales.
If you want your website to be a conversion machine, you need to test different web page elements to drive more leads and/or sales… which is why landing page A/B testing (a.k.a. split testing) is at the helm of conversion rate optimization (CRO).
Basically, you need to test two or more different versions of a web page to see which one reels in the most conversions. The one that comes out a champ is the one you want to roll with.
But before you start your test, you need to implement a good A/B testing tool, like Google Experiments or Optimizely. Having a good A/B test tracking tool set up from the beginning is a MUST. You can’t do CRO without it.
Now, what to test is certainly custom to each site, but there are common components that are helpful to look at. Below are seven that are good indicators you may have some testing to do.
I know, I know, you’re ready to get testing so you can get those conversions and are hoping I’ll just get right to it.
But before you test anything, you must observe what people are doing on your site so you can determine what makes the most sense to test.
That way, you don’t waste your time testing a whole bunch of things that aren’t likely to help you.
There are two ways to observe, and I recommend you do both.
The first is good ol’ Google Analytics. This will allow you to see the path visitors take through your site, how long they’re on the page, and what they do once they’re there.
Another option is using a tool like Hotjar, which essentially takes video recordings of the behavior on your site.
You can see a person’s mouse moving and what they’re clicking on. Pretty cool.
You’ll want to observe the behavior of 40 – 50 visitors or more to have a good sample size to analyze.
Okay, you’ve been patient. So here are seven things to test to help your website convert like crazy:
1. Unclickable Stuff
If you observe that people are consistently trying to click on something, such as text or an image, that isn’t actually clickable, it might be good to make it clickable and have the link send them somewhere that’s applicable to what they’re trying to click on, especially if the next click could translate into a conversion for you.
2. Content
If people are pausing for a long period of time on a certain portion of a web page, or they leave your site at that point, you may need to test other headline and/or body copy variations.
The quality of the content on a page is crucial because when the content is unappealing, people will leave a site pretty quickly. So it’s definitely worth spending some time to figure out what’s resonating with visitors – or what’s not.
3. Navigation
If a lot of visitors are defaulting to the footer of your site to navigate, you probably need to test one to two tweaks to your top navigation so it’s more intuitive.
Since your navigation is at the top of your site and everyone sees it, testing different menu options or page titles can be pretty critical.
4. Web Forms
If you notice that people are coming to a web form (i.e., contact us, sign up, etc.) on your site but it seems like they’re having difficulty filling out the form or clicking the button, you know you need to fix something.
It could be technical problems. In which case, there’s nothing to test. Just fix the problem.
But if it’s not a technical problem, you may need to reorder some of the fields and do some testing, which could mean doing something like moving the position of the email address so it’s the first field at the top in version B to see if it performs better than the the name field that shows up at the top of the form in version A.
5. CTA Button
If visitors to your site are clicking through to your your landing pages, are filling out all the information on the web form pages, but then are not clicking the “submit” button, or they come to the page and leave, you may need to test the color, size, and/or wording on the “submit” or CTA (call to action) button.
For example, let’s say you are a SaaS business selling software, then you might want to test something like this on your button: “Free Trial” in version A vs. “Start Your Free Trial” in version B.
6. Landing Page Encouragement
If visitors to your site have come to your landing page but failed to turn over their contact or credit card information, there could be a number of things turning them off.
It may be they need to see customer testimonials or an image showing what they can expect to receive. Or the CTA button may need to be worded differently.
What Next?
Pathetic conversion rates are certainly a pity. But it’s my hope that some of these tips will help you tap into more of that money sitting on the table.
Commit to set up a landing page A/B test in the next week. You’ll thank me you did.
Sure, your first test might not yield any conversion improvements… but it might. That’s why every business should test, because without testing, you won’t know.
And if not the first test, you likely start seeing more conversions based on what you’ve learned along the way by your second or third A/B test.
Never stop testing!
Once you get in a groove, converting more visitors into leads or sales will start becoming a reality. Enjoy!
Now, I’d love to hear from you. What will you test first and why? Post a comment below.