Split Test Your Copy

Learning Outcomes

To learn what split-testing means.

To continually improve your results by split-testing.

Testing Is Essential

No matter what research you do by talking to your customers or looking at what they’re posting online, you won’t know if your copy works until you test it.

Split testing (also known as A/B testing) is the process of taking a piece of copy, making one small change, and trialing both versions to see which converts the strongest.

Sometimes the smallest change can improve your conversion rate drastically.

You can test out every aspect of your copy, for example:

Change Your Copy's Aspects

• Layout
• Font
• Colors
• Visuals (e.g., images, photos)
• Content (body of the text)
• Headlines/subject line
• Subheadings

For example, you could test just the text on your CTA button. To use an example from earlier, change one word and try “Start my free 30-day trial” instead of “Start your free 30-day trial.” In this way, you can see if using the first-person "my" leads to more conversions than the third-person "you".

You could also test the color or the size or the shape of the button.

But only test one thing at a time. If you were to change both the text and the color and you saw your conversion rate rising, you wouldn’t know which change was effective. The same is true for every aspect of your copy.

Most sales platforms you use will help you set up a split testing campaign. You just need to decide what you want to test first.

For example, you’re not sure whether you’re placing the CTA button in the right place. You want to see if you get a better click-through rate if it’s placed towards the beginning of the short post you’re writing rather than at the end.

Or, you don’t know if you need a photo in your short copy. You want to see if you get a better conversion rate with one. These are great opportunities for split-testing to determine if one small change can make a significant difference in sales.

Tips For Split Testing

Split testing isn’t a quick process if you approach it methodically. You need to let it run for a while to make the results useful. Keep your test live at least one or two weeks, or even more depending on the level of visibility your copy is getting.

Don’t stop the test before the end of your testing period or introduce new elements that weren’t part of your original intention, or your results won’t be reliable.

Action Steps

Review the analytics you can access via your existing platforms. Check that you can find data for conversion rates, click through rates, open rates, and cart abandon rates.

Split test an aspect of your chosen piece of copy:

• Decide what you’re going to test (e.g., CTA button color, email subject title)
• Set up your first split test
• Evaluate the results by looking at the metrics
• Take steps to make changes as necessary.