Marketing Your Business is both art and science. The art comes from listening and understanding the needs of users in order to customize your message and increase conversion rates.
The science comes from using analytics data to test which marketing actions provide the greatest return and why.
Yet many business owners struggle with testing and can’t figure how to use it as part of their marketing strategies.
Using the Right Tools
The biggest obstacle for first-time testing is deciding what analytics tools you need to use. The good news is there are many options that meet a variety of business needs and budgets.
The bad news is that they can be difficult to learn and often require a large time investment to learn how to use them for the best results.
Here are just two of the most popular analytics and testing tools available:
- Google Analytics
This is the most commonly used testing tool and is a free option that makes it easy to set up a variety of tests.
Google Analytics lets you take advantage of the immense user data that the leading search engine has accumulated.
It requires some familiarity to use it effectively. Consulting with an experienced marketing professional can shorten the learning curve and get you faster results.
- Visual Website Optimizer
Visual Website Optimizer provides a more user-friendly experience while still providing the tools you need for successful testing.
With Visual Website Optimizer, you can perform a variety of tests including A/B, multivariate, and usability testing.
What to Test
Deciding what factors to test is the second challenge businesses face. The following are just some of the elements of your business that can be optimized through testing:
- Domain name
- Headlines
- Tagline
- Call-to-action
- Copy length
- Images
- Color
- Site layout
- Pricing
Headlines, for example, are the most critical factors in generating attention and interest from users.
You can measure which headlines perform best by using A/B testing among a small portion of your audience and then rolling out the most successful ones to a larger audience.
By determining the best headlines for your website, advertisements, or email campaigns, you increase the number of users who move further along your sales funnel and eliminate wasted marketing costs.
Testing Validates Your Offer
Testing does more than increase your bottom line. It helps you validate your products and services. This is especially important in the early development stages of a new offer.
Using and testing a simple landing page, you can measure the results of an offer to determine if customers are interested and willing to buy.
This establishes the proof of concept that lays the foundation for further development.
Over time, proper testing gives you the feedback to make improvements that increase usability and growth.
Testing also shows you what isn’t working. This helps eliminate the factors that may be causing friction in the sales process while improving your offer.
For the best results, testing must be performed properly. Having more data isn’t enough. You must be able to interpret the data and ask the right questions that translate into an effective marketing strategy.
If you’ve struggled with implementing the right tests for your marketing your business, let us know in the comments below.
We’d love to help you determine the best place to start so that you can optimize your strategy for marketing your business and measure your online success.
