Test Your High Value Pages

Wednesday, April 30, 2008 4/30/2008 09:45:00 AM

Posted by Jon Stona, Website Optimizer Team and Laura Melahn, Google Analytics Team

Trying to optimize a large website for conversion can be a daunting task if you don't have a plan. The most important pages to test are those that have the biggest impact on your site's success. By using Google Analytics and Google Website Optimizer together, you can identify these high value pages and set up experiments that will eliminate the guesswork from their design.

Your high value landing pages

In his talk on the Web Analytics panel at SES, Avinash Kaushik recounted his experience searching for a new faucet. The top paid ad took him to a page focused on sinks rather than faucets; he was immediately turned off and bounced from the site.

What's the lesson here? Landing pages are key pages to optimize because they are your visitors' first (and often last) impression of your website. If a visitor lands on a page that doesn't provide the information she's looking for, she'll probably leave without clicking any further. For high-traffic landing pages, this can add up to a lot of lost visitors.

That's why it's so important to find, and fix, high-traffic landing pages that lose a high percentage of visitors. Look at the "Top Landing Pages" report within the Content section of Google Analytics. Pages that have both a high Bounce Rate (the percentage of visits that resulted in the visitor immediately leaving the site) and large number of Entrances need to be redesigned.

The Google Analytics Landing Pages report (Content Section) shows a list of top landing pages ordered by the number of entrances on the left. On the right, the Bounce Rate compared to site average is graphically displayed. Pages with a high number of Entrances and a high Bounce Rate (red bar), are good candidates for optimization.

Don't forget about funnel pages

Other high value pages are those that lead visitors to your goal pages. Visitors reach a goal page once they have have made a purchase or completed another desired action, such as a registration or download. In Google Analytics, you can specify up to ten pages in a defined funnel representing the path that you expect visitors to take on their way to the goal page (conversion!). A page that is part of a goal funnel is another great place to focus website optimization efforts.

The "Funnel Visualization" report within the Goals section of Google Analytics shows you how many visitors exit the funnel at each step in the path towards the goal page. In the funnel visualization below, you can see that most visitors in this funnel are lost in the transition from the "View Shopping Cart" step to the "Login" step. Only 7% of visitors move past this step, but of those who do, many go on to make a complete an order! Limiting steps in paths to a goal, like the "View Shopping Cart" step below, is another great place to begin your website optimization experiments.

The Google Analytics Funnel Visualization report (Goals Section) shows the pages where visitors abandon a goal path. Pages that lose a high percentage of traffic on the path towards a website goal are good candidates for optimization.

You know which pages to test...

A little competition can get your team excited about content experimentation. Try asking a couple of your co-workers and perhaps your boss for suggestions on alternate variations of a high value page. Label each of the suggested variations in Website Optimizer with the contributor's name. Then, ask another set of co-workers to predict which variation will emerge victorious. You can monitor the progress each day to see how everyone's suggestions and predictions are stacking up. Keep in mind that it usually takes at least one or two weeks for the definitive winner to emerge. Once Website Optimizer has determined the winning page, you'll not only have a better performing page, but if you're lucky, you'll have bragging rights in your office.

Is a Picture Really Worth a Thousand Words?

Friday, April 25, 2008 4/25/2008 08:30:00 AM

Posted by Tom, Website Optimizer Blog Team

People say pictures are worth a thousand words, and some industry experts even argue that you should always have them — the bigger, the more friendly, the better. But whenever you hear someone say "always," that's your first clue to test that claim (if for no other reason than to become a website-design myth-buster). We came across an interesting case study from WiderFunnel Marketing, one of our Website Optimizer Authorized Consultants, that illustrates this very point.

WiderFunnel's client, Safe Software, wanted to maximize the number of people downloading a trial version of their software application. They sought to make the Trial Version Download Page more effective by getting more visitors to click on the download button. Here was the original version of the page:


The website owner had meant to update this page for some time. Working with Safe Software, WiderFunnel developed two alternate versions of the page which they envisioned to be more modern and visually appealing. One version had a big picture of a smiling model, a number of points outlining the benefits of the software, and a clear call to action. The other version maintained the distinct call to action, but removed the picture and benefits points.

Alternate version 1:


Alternate version 2:


The team at Safe Software wasn't sure which of these versions (original, version 1, or version 2) would lead to the most conversions. If you're an avid reader of online marketing best-practices literature, you might predict that the version with the picture and benefits would outperform the others. After all, aren't pictures and useful information always good things to show to visitors? What's noteworthy is that the winning page was actually version 1: no picture and not as many supporting arguments. Even more surprising is that the original page outperformed version 2!


After the fact, we might hypothesize that the preceding pages did all the selling and that at that point, visitors just wanted to get their hands on the application. Perhaps the image distracted visitors, or perhaps some of the supporting arguments raised more questions than answers.

What's certain, though, is that the winning version led to a 15% increase in conversions. These results go to show you that what you (or 'the industry') think works best often doesn't, and you never know until you test it.

Testing is not just about Technology

Monday, April 21, 2008 4/21/2008 11:46:00 AM

Posted by Tom, Website Optimizer Blog Team

One of the things we've learned is that to be a successful experimenter, you need to master a few key concepts. These concepts include diagnosing problematic pages (Google Analytics is a good tool for this), coming up with ideas on how to improve these pages, and understanding how to use Website Optimizer to instrument tests. Last but not least, you need to have the discipline to wait for your tests to gather enough data before drawing the right conclusions. Let's break down each one.

Diagnose and Develop Ideas:
Look at a page that gets a lot of users. Does it have a high bounce rate? What's wrong with it? What's stopping people from continuing to dig further into your site? What are they expecting to see? Is it there? What's there that isn't important? If you asked visitors what they expect to see before the page loads, is their answer even close to what you're showing them? Figuring out what's best to test can be as much an art as it is a science, but it may be the difference between a 30% improvement in your page performance versus a test which concludes that the various versions of your page performed about the same.

Instrument the Test:
All the ideas in the world won't help you if you don't know how to set up the test. We have a bunch of demos and help articles to show you how to do it, but the best way to learn is simply to start using the tool to set up lots of tests. Before you know it, you'll be trying all kinds of advanced experiments. If it's your first one, we'd recommend a simple A/B test where you give Website Optimizer two or more URLs and we split the traffic among them.

Wait:
Sometimes the hardest part of running a test is not jumping to conclusions. Let the horses run a few laps around the track before declaring a winner. Website Optimizer will tell you the chance to beat your original for each variation. The lower that number is, the more likely the pages are simply not that different. We like to wait a minimum of two weeks and for a 95% 'Chance to beat original' before declaring a solid winner, but it depends on how sure you want to be.

Keep in mind that it's possible your test may never determine a winner or that the winner may even be your original page. This could happen if all your pages perform about the same or your original page is really better than the other ideas you tested. Sometimes those tests are the most valuable since you learn what not to show your visitors.

For ideas on a few top elements to test on any site, check out our recent webinar, 'Website Optimizer, What Should I Test?'.

Content Testing Goes Mainstream

Wednesday, April 16, 2008 4/16/2008 10:00:00 AM

Posted by Jon, Website Optimizer Blog Team

It's been about a year since we made Website Optimizer available to all Google AdWords users. Since then, we've seen great enthusiasm for the tool; now it's hard to find a serious advertiser who doesn't at least plan to do content testing this year. One thing we've learned is that lots of people who don't work on advertising still want to perform content experiments. These folks are often web designers, web developers, and marketers who may not be directly responsible for advertising.

So this morning, at the ad:tech conference in San Francisco, we announced that we're also making Website Optimizer available outside of AdWords. You can now sign up for and access the tool with any Google Account, such as the one you may use for Google Analytics or Gmail.

For those who use Website Optimizer from AdWords, have no fear: you can still access the tool within your AdWords account as you have in the past, and we'll continue to add features regardless of how you access Website Optimizer. For those who have been putting off testing because you didn't want to set up an AdWords account, the standalone version of Website Optimizer awaits you.

The AdWords and standalone version of Website Optimizer are virtually the same. Both are free, work with all traffic (pay-per-click, organic, and direct navigation) and support an unlimited number of experiments. No matter which version of the tool you access, you'll also see an improved setup flow for multivariate experiments, with more straightforward instructions we've adapted from user feedback.

If you're about to set up your first test, we recommend visiting our new Testing 101 section for detailed tips on how to get started and step-by-step video demos. Next, pick a page that gets lots of traffic. Create a version of that page that looks really different (don't be shy: big changes generally yield big differences in performance). Then run an A/B test to see which one does a better job of getting people to another desired page on your site, such as a Contact Us, Product Detail, or Thank You page.

Once you launch your experiment, just sit back and let your website's visitors tell you what works on your site and what doesn't. We recommend letting your experiments run for at least two weeks, no matter how much traffic you get and how strong the results initially appear, just so the data has enough time to normalize. Feel free to share your experiences and learnings with other users on the Google Website Optimizer user forum.

Welcome to the Website Optimizer Blog

Tuesday, April 15, 2008 4/15/2008 12:40:00 AM

Posted by Tom, Website Optimizer Blog Team


Welcome to the Website Optimizer Blog
Are you optimized?

Wouldn't it be nice to test which of these two headlines might encourage you to learn more about Website Optimizer? Well, that's exactly what Website Optimizer does in a nutshell: you can test different variations of your site content to determine what is most effective at getting your visitors to take the action you want them to take. That desired action could be anything from a visitor making a purchase or signing-up for your newsletter, to spending a set amount of time on your page - the possibilities are endless.

Now that Website Optimizer has been around for a year, we thought it was high time to remove our beta label and start our own blog. The purpose of this blog will be threefold:

• Keep you up-to-date on the latest developments that relate to Website Optimizer, such as new features or service updates.
  
  
• Share industry best practices, tips, and tricks about testing, so that novice and experienced testers alike can get the inspiration and knowledge to help them successfully launch that next cool test

• Highlight case studies from folks like you, so that the interesting work you're doing can get the attention it deserves in the testing community

We'd love to hear about your most innovative experiences using Website Optimizer, as well as any other feedback you might have. To send it in, just click the feedback link on the right-hand side of this page.

We hope you'll consider subscribing to the blog to receive posts in your Inbox, or just stopping by every now and then for a dose of testing talk. We also hope everyone who has a website will use controlled experiments to make sound decisions about their content and design. In the long run, we see that practice as being good for Internet users, since they get well-designed web pages, and good for website owners, since their website performs better for them.

Thanks for checking out the blog, and don't forget to also stop by our Google Group if you're feeling chatty - another great area to discuss testing strategies, technical questions, and industry insights.

Happy testing!