Most people conduct A/B tests wrong. Why? They create tests based on opinions they have. Not on useful data. That’s a waste of your time and resources. Gather data before you brainstorm ideas. You'll come up with more effective A/B variations, and a better conversion rate.

This is the process we use at Demand Curve to A/B test all our clients’ landing pages.

Phase 0: Make Folder

For starters, create a folder in your storage platform of choice (Google, Dropbox). Name it A/B Testing.

Create a separate document for each of the steps we outline below, and place them inside your A/B Testing file. By the end of this lesson, you should have up to seven documents inside your A/B testing folder, titled:

1. Experience-based assessment
2. Landing page inspiration
3. Competitors’ sites
4. On-site behavior
5. Sales team input
6. User surveys
7. Ad performance

You’ll record your work and findings inside each of these documents, and share them with your team.

Note: You may not have the time or resources for all these data-gathering sources. The first three are the easiest to gather. Gather data from these sources, at least, before any test. Any research is better than none when conducting A/B testing.

In future tests you can dig deeper with the other data sources.

Phase 1: Experience-based assessment

Your first step is to conduct an experience-based assessment of your landing page.

Other approaches deliver more concrete data. But this type of assessment is quick and easy to execute.

As you assess your landing page, you’ll group your findings into five main categories:

• Relevancy: Does this page deliver the experience your visitors expect?
• Clarity: Is the content on the page clear?
• Value: Does the page present the value of the product to visitors? Or is there room for improvement?
• Friction: Are there parts of the page that cause confusion, doubts, or hesitation?
• Distraction: What elements on the page distract from the main purpose/CTA?

The most effective experience-based assessments are a team effort. Get your writers, designers, and other key stakeholders to perform this test.

Their perspectives will give you a fuller picture of where you can improve your page.

What does this experience-based assessment look like?

• Use annotated screenshots (with tools such as CloudApp).
• Avoid adding random comments. Keep your observations focused on the five categories listed above.

Here’s an example of an experience-based assessment of OpenPhone's landing page.

This assessment is a good start. And it's easy to perform, even if you're strapped for time or resources.

Now it’s time to expand your research.

Phase 2: Online inspiration

Browse websites like Good Web Design. Good Web Design features dozens of landing page designs and new approaches. Bookmark that page and revisit it whenever you’re lost for new A/B ideas.

We recommend keeping a swipe file inside your A/B folder of ideas you want to test.

Phase 3: Competitors’ sites

Identify successful competitors in your space and mine their pages for inspiration. Do they structure their content differently? Do they use a different tone? Take screenshots of new ideas, and keep them in a document inside your A/B folder.

Mine their reviews. Especially on Amazon. This is a gold mine.

When Demand Curve was an agency, we performed a competitor analysis report for all new clients. This report was an invaluable resource for future A/B testing ideas.

We had you do this at the beginning of the course. Rip from it.

Phase 4: On-site behavior

Use a visitor recording tool like Hotjar to find patterns in visitors' engagement:

• What are they clicking?
• What are they ignoring?
• What does this imply about the type of content that most appeals to them?
• How does this on-site behavior align or conflict with your own experience assessment?

We’ll be covering this later in the course. Skip it for now and come back to it when we work on conversion.

Phase 5: Sales team input

Team members who interact with your customers know best what appeals to them. Have your sales team answer the questions below. And encourage them to include screenshots of conversations and direct quotes from prospects.

• What (about the product or onboarding experience) are prospects most confused about?
• Why do prospects say they chose not to buy the product?
• What questions are you (the sales team) asked most by prospects?

The answers to these questions will help you:

• Know the language your audience uses
• Identify key objections and address them in your landing page
• Reduce confusion by adapting your landing page copy

Phase 6: User surveys

Your sales team is an incredible source of information on what works, and what doesn’t. But when possible, go straight to the source: your customers.

Conduct surveys (with tools like SurveyMonkey) to find out your users' favorite features and biggest concerns.

You may also consider using on-page surveys (Hotjar offers this). These visitor surveys can provide you specific details on where (and why) your visitors are confused or frustrated.

But use them sparingly. They can annoy your visitors.

Gather your survey responses in a single document, and file them in your A/B folder.

We’ll be covering surveys later as well. You can skip this for now if you haven’t already run a survey.

Phase 7: Ad performance

Your best-performing ads have value props, text, and imagery that you can repurpose for your site. In fact, you should run ads explicitly to discover the optimal combination of text and images.

Take screenshots of your best-performing ads, and record them in a document inside your A/B Testing folder for future reference.

Now that you have a folder of data to work with, you’re ready to turn that data into actual theories.