Experiment with conversion rate optimisation

CRO vs. AB Testing vs. Experimentation

To delve into the above a little deeper, we can look at where these terms come from. A/B testing is an approach used to understand the effectiveness of one treatment versus another – and can first be traced back to the mid-1700s and the treatment of scurvy (arrrr me hearties – sorry, couldn’t resist). Conversion Rate Optimisation was a term coined and trademarked by an agency looking to brand their services in the mid-noughties. 

Experimentation equals understanding

Instead we need to go back to that third term, “experimentation”. This more accurately describes what we’re doing:

"the action or process of trying out new ideas, methods, or activities"

And you could extend the definition further – the reason we’re trying out these new ideas is to understand whether one is better at driving the action we want, than the others.

This is where the concept of your experimentation program should be more exciting than what you perceive CRO to be. A good experimentation program should help you to understand:

• Which of your USPs or product details matter most to your users – something which you then use in harder-to-test channels like out of home or print media
• Whether there’s sufficient appetite to develop or sell new products, something which you can then feed into the relevant product and buying teams
• Which products are most appropriate to cross-sell with others – something which should inform your CRM activity and how you speak to existing customers
• What persuasive techniques work best for your brand and can be adapted for other mediums – for example if scarcity is more effective than social proof or urgency, then you can use that information to improve your paid media ads

And yes, by understanding all of the above, and crucially what wouldn’t work and would actually decrease your conversion rate, you’ll identify what to implement to help you to drive overall conversions.

Don’t underestimate the power of experimentation in risk mitigation. By identifying those changes would actually harm your business, you’ll be saving money both in terms of unnecessary development to build that out fully AND in avoiding missed revenue by implementing a duff feature.

But the critical part is that the increase in conversions is the by-product of learning, they go hand-in-hand. Without learning and just focusing on conversion, you’re going to dramatically reduce the power of the work you’re doing.

It’s why you’ll see us refer to our services in this space as experimentation, rather than CRO or AB Testing. We’ll probably be pushing water up hill for a bit, but as they say, no-one ever got anywhere without getting a..bit…damp. Is that the phrase?

Anyway, if you need help pivoting your program to focus on learnings, putting a rocket under it by better use of data, or just need to scale your testing velocity, give us a shout.