These 20 A/B Testing Variables Measure Successful Marketing Campaigns
By pvaughan@hubspot.com (Pamela Vaughan)
Contrary to widespread practice, marketing analytics expands beyond email marketing and can be applied to practically every other inbound marketing tactic — social media, blogging, landing pages, lead generation, and lead nurturing. The possibilities for testing your marketing campaigns are virtually endless.
While we believe marketers should constantly be testing their marketing efforts, the first step is identifying the different marketing variables you can test. And because so many of these variables are applicable across channels, you’ll likely never run out of tests to run or experiments to try.
The following testing variables can reveal valuable opportunities to optimize and improve the performance of your marketing initiatives.
20 Marketing Variables to A/B Test
1. Layout
Test the layout within individual content items like blog posts, email marketing messages, lead nurturing emails, and website pages like landing pages, your main website homepage, your blog homepage, etc. Move elements of your pages around, and test the performance of one layout vs. another.
An example of a layout done right is on Asana’s website. With this type of layout, you can adjust which side of the screen the image is placed on, where the header appears, and the order of the CTAs.
2. Calls-to-Action (CTAs)
CTAs offer several testing opportunities. For example, you can test the performance of different CTAs based on their placement on various pages of your website and within certain pieces of content like blog posts, ebooks, and webinars.
Hubspot offers tools that allow you to run an A/B test with multiple variants of your CTA. You can change the size, color, and text for the CTAs to narrow down exactly what works for your visitors.
3. Content Offers
Calls-to-actions are made up of different offers, such as an ebook, a webinar, a free trial, etc. Test calls-to-action in terms of varying content offer topics in your industry and various formats (video vs. webinar vs. ebook vs. free trial, etc.).
Do certain offers focused on a particular topic or in a specific format tend to resonate better with your audience? These types of tests can help you identify the wants and needs of your prospects and customers and help you create content your audience cares about.
Nethunt’s homepage is an excellent example of different content offers in action. The page features “Log In,” “Start here,” and “Watch Video,” CTAs. Ideally, you’d want your visitor to focus on one or two tasks when they reach your homepage. By running an A/B test on various content types, you can figure out which one converts best.
4. Color
Test the color of the elements on your website. You can even test the overall color …read more
Source:: HubSpot Blog
