Utilize A/B Testing To Optimize Your Design Projects

When developing your brand identity, you have to consider colors, fonts, logos and packaging – all of those visual things that help prospective customers associate your brand with things that will encourage them to do business with your company.

The look of everything that you use to represent your brand affects the decision to buy on the part of the consumer.

Taylor & Francis Online found that “visual appeal can be assessed within 50 ms”. You have .05 seconds to impress prospective customers and encourage them to follow through and answer your call to action or log off of your website. Each visitor that enters your website is another opportunity to gain a new customer and build a lasting relationship.

This data makes it evident that using Hatchwise to design your websites is beneficial for the sheer number of designs available to choose from that will represent your company differently. Of course, the number can be overwhelming, but you get the chance to weed through what doesn’t speak to you and narrow it down to the few that do. Choose alternatives that offer different colors, layout, fonts, and images.

Those few remaining designs can be used to perform A/B testing to try out different designs with visitors to ensure you choose the right design that delivers the right message. If you are in the planning and launching stages of your business, this is the perfect time to utilize A/B testing.

What is A/B Testing

A/B testing uses two versions of a webpage or application to determine which performs better for your business.

Why Use A/B Testing

Sometimes individuals are partial to certain designs, even if they don’t elicit favorable responses from the audience. A/B testing gives the opportunity to present different designs to customers and use the response to make a final decision. It is easy to employ, just try it out in your marketing.

How to Use A/B Testing

You simply take your multiple Hatchwise designs and narrow down the choices you want to present to your customers, before you select your contest winner.

There are two types of projects that lend themselves to A/B testing: Email Templates and Landing Pages.

Both are easy to assess through clicks and conversions. Well-designed marketing emails are extremely effective, more than social media. Emails with the right images and typography can encourage a click-through and engagement. With email marketing software you can run A/B tests with different messages in the subject line. Don’t worry about these options, just worry about the main message or content. Send out one tester email template to half of your list and another for the other half.

Compare your click-through rate and conversions after 24 hours to see which performed better. A/B testing on your landing page is executed differently than with the email templates. Your landing page will randomly present different options to customers.

Cookies ensure that visitors see the same landing pages when they return to your site. Wait until you have over 10 visits before attempting to determine which option performed better. Using click-through rate, conversions and bounce rate you can decide which the best design for your company.

Making that Final Decision

Remember not to rush the testing period. Until you have enough data you cannot make the right decision. Be patient with the process. Using analytics you can determine the performance of both options and gain confidence to make that final decision. There was a reason you opted to use A/B testing, so go with the numbers and rest assured that numbers don’t lie.

Once your design has been set, test other parts of your emails and landing pages to ensure they are helping you to reach your goals.

Start with small tests, focusing on one element at a time until you are a pro at determining statistical importance of patterns that you are seeing.

As you grow and evolve you can return to Hatchwise to obtain new designs to test for your brand.