Comments on: Multivariate and A/B testing – the power of competition http://edralph.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/multivariate-and-ab-testing-the-power-of-competition/ Just a few things that drop out of everyday life building a successful e-Commerce business... Thu, 10 Sep 2009 13:34:19 +0000 http://wordpress.com/ hourly 1 By: Photolithography http://edralph.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/multivariate-and-ab-testing-the-power-of-competition/#comment-19 Photolithography Thu, 19 Jun 2008 16:08:51 +0000 http://edralph.wordpress.com/?p=21#comment-19 Somehow i missed the point. Probably lost in translation :) Anyway ... nice blog to visit. cheers, Photolithography! Somehow i missed the point. Probably lost in translation :) Anyway … nice blog to visit.

cheers, Photolithography!

]]> By: Chris Goward http://edralph.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/multivariate-and-ab-testing-the-power-of-competition/#comment-14 Chris Goward Mon, 12 May 2008 17:16:11 +0000 http://edralph.wordpress.com/?p=21#comment-14 @Ed > Why pay someone else to do it if you can build that resource yourselves? That is a question for the business. You're correct there, Ed. Some businesses like to do everything in-house and others identify their core competency in another area and are happy to outsource to companies like WiderFunnel that have focused expertise in conversion rate improvement. Some good posts on this blog. Keep it up. @Ed

> Why pay someone else to do it if you can build that resource yourselves? That is a question for the business.

You’re correct there, Ed. Some businesses like to do everything in-house and others identify their core competency in another area and are happy to outsource to companies like WiderFunnel that have focused expertise in conversion rate improvement.

Some good posts on this blog. Keep it up.

]]> By: Ed http://edralph.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/multivariate-and-ab-testing-the-power-of-competition/#comment-13 Ed Mon, 12 May 2008 08:52:00 +0000 http://edralph.wordpress.com/?p=21#comment-13 <strong>> what do you do *after* the first or second round...</strong> Good point. If you have a big site, then the opportunities are everywhere. Especially if you have never tested before. The idea really is to work on building up an expert group of testers. Getting a wider group of people to help come up with things is just one idea to help the web group drum up ideas. <strong>> hire experts in Conversion Optimization...</strong> One thing I'd like to say is that website testing will be mainstream (if it isn't already) and a fundamental skill that should be developed within every web/ecommerce group. As with everything a business will have to go through the process of proving why it is worth doing - but after that it depends on the amount of resource available as to what you do. A company with enough resource may go straight out to an expert third-party - certainly one good way of getting a quick return. More technically savvy businesses with existing in-house resource could easily build up that expertise themselves through tactical hiring or a good learning and development programme. Why pay someone else to do it if you can build that resource yourselves? That is a question for the business. > what do you do *after* the first or second round…
Good point. If you have a big site, then the opportunities are everywhere. Especially if you have never tested before. The idea really is to work on building up an expert group of testers. Getting a wider group of people to help come up with things is just one idea to help the web group drum up ideas.

> hire experts in Conversion Optimization…
One thing I’d like to say is that website testing will be mainstream (if it isn’t already) and a fundamental skill that should be developed within every web/ecommerce group. As with everything a business will have to go through the process of proving why it is worth doing – but after that it depends on the amount of resource available as to what you do. A company with enough resource may go straight out to an expert third-party – certainly one good way of getting a quick return. More technically savvy businesses with existing in-house resource could easily build up that expertise themselves through tactical hiring or a good learning and development programme. Why pay someone else to do it if you can build that resource yourselves? That is a question for the business.

]]> By: Raquel Hirsch http://edralph.wordpress.com/2008/05/03/multivariate-and-ab-testing-the-power-of-competition/#comment-12 Raquel Hirsch Mon, 12 May 2008 03:18:50 +0000 http://edralph.wordpress.com/?p=21#comment-12 Great post! But here is the catch: what do you do *after* the first or second round? The idea of continuing to run internal contests to generate ideas will exhaust itself soon enough. In our experience, the only way to get quantum leap improvements on the conversion rate (and *all* our clients at www.widerfunnel.com have seen conversion rate lift ranging from 10% to 270%!) is to commit to *continuous improvement* through ongoing experimentation… but the biggest challenge is coming up with new hypothesis to test, leveraging results on to the next experiment and the next and the one after that. This is why you need to hire experts in Conversion Optimization: they do this relentlessly. It’s not about the testing technology (as you point out, Google Website Optimizer is free and easy) – it’s all about *what to test* Great post! But here is the catch: what do you do *after* the first or second round? The idea of continuing to run internal contests to generate ideas will exhaust itself soon enough.

In our experience, the only way to get quantum leap improvements on the conversion rate (and *all* our clients at http://www.widerfunnel.com have seen conversion rate lift ranging from 10% to 270%!) is to commit to *continuous improvement* through ongoing experimentation… but the biggest challenge is coming up with new hypothesis to test, leveraging results on to the next experiment and the next and the one after that.

This is why you need to hire experts in Conversion Optimization: they do this relentlessly. It’s not about the testing technology (as you point out, Google Website Optimizer is free and easy) – it’s all about *what to test*

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