A Roadmap for Your Google Optimize Alternatives Assessment
As Google’s long-standing A/B testing tool recently rode off into the sunset (9/30/23), the online marketing world is buzzing with activity as a multitude of marketers seek the Google Optimize alternative that’s right for them.
For many teams, such an unexpected and obligatory transition is bringing up a flurry of questions, such as:
What exactly do we need in an A/B testing solution, really?
Should our focus be replicating Google Optimize’s specific functionality?
Is a paid solution in our budget, if we were using the free version of Optimize?
Could this situation be leveraged as an opportunity to upgrade?
How much value can we get without stressing our budget?
What other options have free versions comparable to Optimize?
Should we just hit the pause button on A/B testing until the dust settles?
The goal of this article is to provide a realistic…
Integrating technical SEO within the development release cycle
Being a great online marketer also means being an excellent communicator and project manager. And search engines’ increased focus on content, usability and engagement means it’s more important than ever to integrate SEO with development, UX and editorial.
This teamwork is never more important than during a development release, when one line of code can mean your search performance (and traffic, and sales) can fall through the floor, but the reality of a release cycle and the ideal are usually very different. Top-level management input, commercial requirements, the dev team’s internal processes/structures and issues that crop up during the work can all mean that budgets are squeezed, priorities are forgotten, timeframes are reduced and projects are side-tracked.
[si_guide_block id="138423" title="Download our Individual Member Resource – Digital development brief" description="Creating campaign landing pages or make improvements to your existing campaigns using our dedicated development brief. By…
An in-depth case study from our work with Conversion Rate Experts, including before and after images of winning A/B tests
It's fair to say we talk a lot about how you can improve your digital marketing results here at SmartInsights. It's kind of our thing. I like to think nobody does it better. But those who talk the talk should also be made to walk the walk, else how else do they know their advice is actually relevant and applicable to real business?
Since we're always talking about the need to optimize across the whole customer journey and constantly test messaging to boost your conversion rate, we worked with Conversion Rate Experts to do exactly this. We wanted to share what we did and the changes we made with you so you can make similar improvements to your own sites which can deliver big boosts to your CRO.
Start out with deep research
Stripped…
How to boost CRO for non-ecommerce sites
When you think of Conversion Rate Optimisation and AB testing, what comes to mind first is probably ecommerce websites, product pages, baskets and checkouts.
But the scope of optimisation programs is much wider than this. We work with several brands, from car dealership groups to home improvement to charities, where the objective is to create a lead, usually via a form – the sale or activity happens in a branch, over the phone or in a customer’s home, rather than on the website.
The challenges when optimising these lead generation sites can be quite different to e-commerce. Here are some of the things we’ve learned over the years.
1. There is no such thing as ‘best practice’ in a lead generation websites
Arguably, there’s no such thing as best practice on any website, but, still, there are some conventions and expectations around checkouts and product pages that…
Get the right strategy in place before you start testing
Starting and running a conversion programme is all about asking the right questions. The questions you want to ask of the tests themselves, but also the questions you need to ask yourself and your team to get the most out of the programme.
Here are our 18 chronological questions to ask yourself and your team if you have recently started a conversion optimisation programme.
Before you test
1. Are a broad range of specialisms feeding into the optimisation programme?
The most effective optimisation programmes need input from strategists, user-centred designers, front end developers, copywriters and analysts.
2. What sources are you using to feed into the ideation process?
Typically the highest quality tests (i.e. the ones that will deliver the biggest uplifts and/or provide the greatest insight into the business) make use of a number of the following techniques/sources: persuasion/emotion/trust (PET), heuristics, user research (remote or moderated)…
