A/B Testing Fundamentals in B2B Marketing

A/B testing is a great, economical way to learn more about what motivates your target audience’’s buying behavior. Hopefully everyone is already utilizing A/B testing as a part of their B2B marketing strategy, but if not then this blog is intended to demonstrate how easy it can be.

What It Is:

• An A/B test is when you compare two (or more) things based upon one key difference. So you may compare one web page to another web page, with a key difference being an image, a headline, form questions, etc.
• Each web page visitor will see one of the versions (either the control or the variation/variations) and you will determine which page is best based upon the conversion rate. In other words, the conversion is what you are testing.

Getting Started:

• Try doing qualitative research first in order to discover which options to test. Don’’t just assume that a headline or image may resonate with your target audience,– get out there and talk to them. Find out what they say would motivate them to buy, and test it out on the rest of your target audience.

Analyzing the Results:

• Ideally you’’d like to have at least 1,000 visitors before analyzing your results, but you don’’t always have that amount of time (or traffic). In my view, work within your parameters. I would argue that any insight you may be able to glean will be helpful, even if it isn’’t scientifically valid.