Ideas for Google Multivariate Testing

Last month I wrote about the Google Website Optimizer. I’ve since started testing pages for one industrial client, and I’ll soon begin testing for another. While looking for the best criteria to test for, I came across a great article called “108 Google Multivariate Testing Ideas”. If you plan to do any testing, I encourage you to read it. Here are some of my favorite tips from the article:

Don’t test the small stuff. Test big bold changes. This has two advantages

• You’ll get the results quicker (it’s a statistics thing).
• You’re more likely to get big improvements.
  
  

What’s your company’s positioning? In other words, what makes you different from or better than all your competitors? Have you ever tested it against possible alternatives? Draw up a shortlist to test – then your visitors can let you know which is most important to them!

What you say is more important than how you say it . You’ll get the biggest improvements by changing the core message of your headline, rather than just tweaking the wording.

Add testimonials from happy customers. In general, a video testimonial is better than a testimonial with an image, which is better than a testimonial with just a name, which is better than an anonymous testimonial.

Test different “calls to action”. The call to action is what you want them to do next. It is often written on the ‘proceed’ button. Test direct ones such as “Buy Now And Get 10% Off” as well as indirect ones such as “Learn More”

Put all the best stuff “above the fold”. A surprising number of your visitors will not scroll at all, so it’s best to make sure that the area “above the fold” is pretty damn enticing.

Test different images. The following tend to be most effective:

• images of the product
• images of the product being used , maybe by a “role model” character
• images of the successful outcome of the product
• images of happy customers holding the product (that is, a testimonial and product shot all in one).

Attention-grabbing images are great, but only if they help to communicate your sales message (which they rarely do).

Put captions under your images and test them. For some weird reason, people almost always read the captions under images.

Make everything clickable. Visitors click on everything, pictures in particular. And if they are clicking on something, it’s because they expect something to happen.

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