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A/B Testing Your Landing Pages - [Marketo Success] Guide Sneak Peek

Katie_Pedroza2
Marketo Employee
Marketo Employee

This week, we prepared another excerpt from our brand new Marketo Champion-authored ebook, titled [Marketo Success] Guide. The [Marketo Success] Guide will give marketers detailed insights to navigate Marketo like our most successful customers and help you prove your Marketing team’s impact to your organization. Check out an excerpt from the ebook below written by Alex Greger, Marketing Automation Manager at Hitachi Vantara & Lauren Aquilino, Senior Consultant at Revenue Pulse to learn how they A/B test their landing pages in Marketo.

A/B Testing

What is it

Only 52% of those that use landing pages also test them to improve conversions. (1) Testing allows you to optimize conversion rates. This is a native, and frankly underused, feature. In Marketo, A/B test groups allow you to compare conversion rates of specific landing pages and optimize for the best results.

Why use it

The real question is - why not use it? A/B testing allows you to quickly gain insight into what’s working and what’s not. You’ll be able to gain valuable insights on the UX preferences of your audience.

How to use it

Landing pages are tested using a feature in Marketo called Landing Page Test Groups. First, you’ll create the landing pages you would like to test against each other - two or more. Ideally they would have forms. While still unapproved, right click one and select convert to test group.

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Add the landing pages that you would like to test, and approve your test group. Once your landing pages are approved and live, you’ll be able to compare stats of the landing pages in your test group.

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When testing, every component is up for adjusting. However, there are some factors that may affect conversion more than others. Some examples include:

  • Form placement and length
  • Social proof
  • Headline
  • Copy
  • Images
  • CTA
  • Button Color

4 Keys to testing include:

  1. Define goals and baseline metrics
  2. Keep it simple and choose one variable at a time
  3. Test often
  4. Maintain a log of results

We hope you enjoyed reading this excerpt from the upcoming [Marketo Success] Guide: Best Practices from Marketo Champions. Keep an eye out for more tidbits from the new ebook that is launching in early 2019. Have questions about the content? Let us know in the comments!

Resources:

(1) http://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2017/08/02/conversion-rate-statistics

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5 Comments
Jasmine_Chin
Level 1

Really helpful! Thanks for breaking it down step-by-step Katie - we can't wait to test our LPs now  

JLM
Level 2
Level 2

Within the Landing Page Test Group  - In order to roll out the winning Landing Page - do you just Unapprove one of the Landing Pages and leave in the Winning Landing Page? 

Dylan_Rodgers
Level 2

Yeah, my question exactly @JLM . What do you do once a winner is chosen? Unapproving the loser(s) seems like a messy way to handle it, though I could see it being useful to have it remain a test so it's a running log.

Malik_Zafar2
Level 4

Any insight on what happens to the loser?

Scout4U
Level 2

Wouldn't you just redirect the loser to the winner's URL?