'Net Features : 3242011

Landing Page Testing - Translating the Terminology

Administrator — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 19:00:00 GMT

Before you can start doing any testing on your website landing pages, you need to understand some common concepts and definitions used in landing page testing. But be forewarned: while members of the testing community refer to the same concepts some may use different language to describe them.

The primary objective of landing page testing is to predict the behavior of your audience given the specific content on the landing page that they see. You will collect a limited sample of data during your test, summarize and describe it (descriptive statistics), and predict how people from the same traffic sources will act when interacting with the page (inferential statistics). In other words, the ultimate goal is to find the best possible version of the landing page among all of the variations that you are testing.

Input and Output Variables

A landing page test has two basic components: a set of input variables (also called “independent variables”) that you can control and manipulate, and one or more output variables (or “dependent variables”) that you measure and observe. Independent variables as discussed here are simply the tuning elements that you have chosen for your test.

Variable

The word variable (when used by itself) means a tuning element that you have selected. Variables can be of any granularity or coarseness. For example, a variable might be the headline of your landing page, or a whole-page redesign. In multivariate testing, a variable is also commonly referred to as a factor.

In a multivariate test, you will have more than one variable. To distinguish among them I use the following notation: a capital “V” followed by a unique number that has been assigned to a particular variable. For example, let’s assume that you have a simple landing page with a headline, some sales copy test, and a call-to-action on a button, You might decide to test alternatives to each of these page elements and name them as follows:

• V1 = Headline
• V2 = Sales copy
• V3 = Button text
• V4 = Button color

Note that the variables do not necessarily define a unique physical location on the page. In fact, V3 (the button text) and V4 (the button color) actually occupy the same space. Nor do they have to be localized. For example, I can choose a variable to test a larger font size (for improved readability) versus an existing smaller one. In this case, the font size change would take effect throughout my whole landing page and would overlap with other variables (such as the actual text on the page) that I might also be testing.

Value

A value is a particular state that a variable can take on. When traditional multivariate testing is used in other fields, variable values are often continuous (which means they can vary smoothly across a range). This allows you to predict the behavior at interpolated values of the variable (in between the places where you actually sample). For example, if I know that the output of a car engine at 1000 RPM (revolutions-per-minute) is 100 horsepower, and at 2000 RPM is 200 horsepower, I can interpolate between these two values to estimate that the output should be 150 horsepower at 1500 RPM.

In landing page tuning, variable values are almost always discrete (distinct from each other, and countable). For example, a button color might be green, blue, or red. I will number the possible choices by successive lowercase letters. By convention, the letter a represents the original version of the variable (as seen on your baseline pretest landing page). The letter is combined with the variable name to exactly specify the value of a particular variable. If V4 is our button color, an example assignment might look as follows:

• V4a = green button (the original)
• V4b = blue button
• V4c = red button

Unlike continuous variables, measuring the effect of discrete variable values does not give us any information about the other possible values. Continuing our example from earlier, even if we had measured the average conversion rates with the green and blue buttons, we would not have any information about the performance of the red one.

Branching Factor

The total number of possible values for a discrete variable is called its branching factor. For discrete variables, the branching factor must be at least 2 (the original version and one alternative). Some experimental designs require that the branching factor be the same for all variables in the test.

In the button color example, V4 has a branching factor of 3 (because it can take on the values signified by a-green, b-blue, and c-red). In traditional multivariate testing, the number of values for a variable is called the level of the factor. Each value is also called a level because historically it was drawn from continuous variables. For example, if your variable only has two values, they might be signified by “low” and “high” (or “-1” and “+1”).

Recipe

A recipe is a unique combination of variable values in your test. It is a sequential listing of the specific values that each variable takes on in the specific version of the landing page. For example, let’s assume that you had set the following variable values from my previous example for a particular landing page in your test: V1b, V2c, V3a, V4a. The recipe could be abbreviated as bcaa.

Each recipe is unique. By convention, the recipe with all a’s is the original or baseline recipe to which all others will be compared.

Search Space Size

The number of unique recipes in your test is your search space size. It can generally be computed by multiplying together all of the branching factors of the variables in your test (for a possible exception to this rule, please see the next section, “Test Construction”).

In my earlier example, let’s assume that there are three headlines, four versions of the sales copy, four calls-to-action, and three button colors (and “BF” stands for the branching factor for a particular variable).

Search space size
= BFV1 X BFV2 X BFV3 X BFV4
= 3 X 4 X 4 X 3
= 144

This example is a small one. As you can see, if you have more variables and higher branching factors for each one, the search space size will grow very rapidly. If the search space size is large, it can quickly exceed the practical limits of common tuning methods such as A-B split testing, fractional factorial parametric, and full factorial parametric testing.
Now that you understand the basic terminology of landing page testing you can begin to think about which items to test and how to construct your test.

Location Targeting in Adwords Improves

Pete Prestipino — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 18:15:00 GMT

Google announced improvements to its location-targeting controls today which will give Adwords advertisers the ability to target users (or exclude them) by their specific physical locations.

“By physical location, we mean the place where the user is actually located, such as ‘New York City,’ instead of the location that’s included in the search query, such as ‘restaurants in New York’,” said Google’s Lisa Shieh. “In addition, we’ve modified the default setting for locations that you don’t want to reach and made it more in line with your requests.”

Do note that the use of advanced location options will limit ad exposure. As such, Google recommends advertisers use the location targeting setting only when advertising campaign goals require more granular control than what is currently available.

Expect Google to continue making improvements to location targeting moving forward. Just this week, Google announced updates to Google Latinutde (which now includes check-ins) and Google Places (which is now available in 30 languages).

Elastic Path 6.3 Delivers Subscriptions & Testing Features

Pete Prestipino — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:40:00 GMT

Elastic Path Software released a new version (6.3) of the enterprise ecommerce platform. The platform now includes Subscriptions and A/B Split Testing-features which could help providers of digital goods and services stay competitive in the growing online market.

The Subscriptions feature of Elastic Path 6.3 enables enterprises to sell digital goods and services with a recurring charge as part of a bundle or as a standalone item - ideal for software and game vendors, consumer and business services, and providers of digital media such as books, publications, music, video, and information.

Elastic Path 6.3 will also include A/B Split Testing, integrating the multivariate testing capabilities of Adobe® Test & Target to combine price testing with web experience testing - giving enterprises the capability to discover the most profitable price points.

In addition to Subscriptions and A/B Split Testing, Elastic Path Commerce 6.3 also includes Advanced Search, which allows users to filter searches based on more complex criteria such as price ranges, and the exclusion/inclusion of certain brands-just one more feature from Elastic Path Commerce 6.3 to help enterprises stay competitive in the growing market of digital goods and services.

Miva Merchant Goes Mobile

Pete Prestipino — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:30:00 GMT

According to a recent Pew Research study, approximately 42 percent of people in the United States are smart phone owners. Of these, eleven percent routinely make purchases from their phones. This number is expected to increase in the coming years.

Ecommerce software company Miva Merchant has released a new mobile ecommerce framework, designed to give online store owners the ability to develop mobile commerce stores and target the growing number of smart phone users worldwide.

Merchants can purchase a mobile commerce design package for $699.00 which includes the full Miva Merchant store functionality, optimized checkout, integration with their existing 5.5 stores, and professional installation.

“With Miva Merchant’s new Mobile Framework any Miva Merchant store owner can quickly and easily convert their entire store to a mobile friendly version that allows for easy navigation and all the functionality of your full e-commerce store," says Miva Merchant Web Design Manager Brennan Hyde.

“More and more our phones and other mobile devices are replacing our desktop computers and the core of our technology has always supported the ability to be agile in terms of device response,” says Miva Merchant President and COO Rick Wilson.

Getty Images and Demand Media Enter Joint Licensing

Pete Prestipino — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:20:00 GMT

Demand Media announced that they will be drawing from Getty Images’ library of rights-managed images, video footage and audio clips for use on their websites including typeF, LIVESTRONG.com and eHow.

Under the agreement, Getty Images will also become Demand Media’s exclusive distributor of stock video, allowing Getty Images to license the videos for specific uses at gettyimages.com.

“Demand Media’s video library provides our customers with access to stock video across hundreds of new topical categories,” said Craig Peters, senior vice president of business development at Getty Images. “Our partnership also allows for Getty Images to reach new customers by distributing our digital assets through Demand Media’s fast growing network of web properties.”

Demand Media has over 200,000 short form videos in its library covering topics like cooking, home renovation and fitness tips.

“Like Getty Images, we strive to create and distribute high quality content to a broad audience,” said Steven Kydd, executive vice president of Demand Media Studios. “Licensing our videos through Getty Images and including their award winning digital assets across our online properties was a natural fit for both of us.”

A New Platform for Subscription-based Selling

Linc Wonham — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 12:00:00 GMT

A new e-commerce solution worth exploring launched last week at SXSW in Austin, Texas. SaaSy strives to be the most all-inclusive selling platform serving the growing market of software-as-a-service and Web services companies that offer subscription-based digital services and goods.

Because SaaSy is the product of billing and merchandising solutions provider FastSpring, the new service is part of an easy-to-use but powerful full-service e-commerce platform. FastSpring, a six-year-old trusted reseller of software products and services that already works with more than 1,000 companies, is the merchant of record for all SaaSy transactions.

This separates SaaSy from competitors in the online subscription billing space such as Chargify, Spreedly and Recurly, which offer basic recurring billing services for companies selling software-as-a-service. Those and others generally require that these SaaS, Web 2.0 and Web services companies obtain their own merchant accounts and find their own subscription e-commerce solutions, whereas SaaSy takes on those and other responsibilities such as purchasing and delivery, licensing and activation, buyer satisfaction and payment-based customer support.

Your subscription-based customers can pay for their services globally with major credit cards and SaaSy provides a customizable order page that can match the design of your website. SaaSy, and FastSpring before it, are the work of CEO Dan Engel, who directed Web marketing for the multi-billion dollar advertising products AdSense and AdWords as Google’s marketing manager.

Codero Offers Cloud Hosting by the Hour

Linc Wonham — Thu, 24 Mar 2011 11:00:00 GMT

An on-demand cloud hosting service from Codero is now available in monthly or hourly billing plans, and prices are below market price for those who sign up during the initial beta period. Set-up for both plans is at no charge and no contracts are required.

The hourly cloud computing plan allows consumers to turn on additional resources when their business demands it, and turn them off when their business does not, paying per hour of resource utilization instead of being forced into a monthly commitment. Cloud is designed to be elastic to accommodate traffic spikes and other variable load applications.

The Codero Cloud is especially well-suited for sites that expect to grow rapidly and sites with cyclical traffic. It has a control panel giving users the ability to manage their entire Cloud offering online. Codero’s cloud provides the benefit of changing the resources allocated to an existing Cloud VM, whether you want to increase or decrease the processing power, RAM or hard drive space.

PayPal Processing +$6 Million Per Day - In Mobile Transactions

Mike Phillips — Wed, 23 Mar 2011 23:30:00 GMT

According to PayPal Mobile Director of Product Management, Fabio Sisinni, "We are doing more than $6 million per day in mobile transactions and we’re on track to exceed $2 billion this year.

"We will top $7.5 billion in 2013 based on the growth we’re seeing. A mobile wallet in the cloud is not so distant based on our numbers."

That's serious growth. In fact, PayPal's own figures show it to be an increase of more than 250% from 2010. And, based on the current rate of growth, PayPal estimates that number to reach $7.5 billion in 2013.

So where are all these mobile payments taking place? Merchants using Express Checkout include Starbucks, Footlocker and Overstock.com, and of course eBay is using PayPal mobile. Massive growth potential is also seen in the physical retail world. For example, visit a store after receiving a coupon on a mobile device then redeem said coupon at the store -- technically, a mobile transaction.

Another driving factor in mobile payment growth might be the sudden increase in mobile search, as detailed in this Performics study.