HiPPO's are big and powerful, and hard to argue with. Use the diplomacy of an A/B test to solve the corporate version of a family argument
The HiPPO I’m referring to is the Highest Paid Person’s Opinion. Typically the voice of an uncreative senior management type that likes to ask if you can “make the logo bigger”.
Sitting around a boardroom table with a giant projection of your latest design or web page splashed across the wall. Conjecture and opinion fly – generally in the face of conventional wisdom or plain old common sense.
You argue back and forth using your most experienced and educated insights to nullify the stupidity – hopefully mixed in with some examples of previous campaigns where a certain idea didn’t work.
3 simple design techniques to reduce your landing page testing costs
How you design your landing pages determines how easy they are to test – which can have a direct impact on the bottom line of your marketing campaigns.
By using some simpler design strategies, you can free up the marketing team to produce multiple test variants more quickly, with less reliance on design or development.
It’s easy, and in this post I’ll show you how to do it along with examples of some landing pages that do a good or bad job.
Which test tube has the magic elixir in it? A, B or C?
Whoa there, easy Tiger! Why would you say such a thing? Well, first of all let me qualify that statement.
Both forms of testing have their individual merits and can be used for different situations. A/B is quick and simple and can tell you which page works better for your target audience. Multivariate can test a multitude of options and variants to come up with the absolute peak performer out of hundreds of potential landing page element combination’s. (However, there are certain restrictions that mean that Multivariate (MVT) isn’t even statistically viable until you have masses of traffic).
Note: if you’re unsure of the differences between A/B Testing & Multivariate Testing you should read this post on the differences for clarity.
And the truth shall set your landing pages free! (photo credit - The Truth Group)
Simply put, A|B split testing isn’t a silver bullet or a panacea for improved conversion rate on your landing pages.
What it is, is an opportunity. A mechanism by which you can begin to understand the behavior of your customers and start to build upon that knowledge over time by testing and tweaking your campaign’s effectiveness.
Testing is exciting. It allows you to see which copy, imagery and page layouts create the desired emotional response in your target demographic.
These micro brand hints can be fed back into how you speak to customers on the phone, they can allow informed design decisions to be enacted on your website, and they can put more money in your pocket.
Download our free white papers and reports for some bedtime conversion optimization reading.
Read our opinionated guide to landing page conversion.
Using Twitter to enhance, promote and measure your landing page campaigns.
A collection of articles about landing page fundamentals.
