Testing-Tools: The best ap­pli­ca­tions for A/B testing

Running a suc­cess­ful website is a complex endeavor: there is no universal guide to at­tract­ing site visitors and gen­er­at­ing traction. The only con­sis­tent advice to be heeded is that focusing on the needs of the users is of the utmost im­por­tance, and should always be your top priority. Re­gard­less of whether you are focusing on website nav­i­ga­tion, the content you are pub­lish­ing or your marketing efforts – assessing the effect of changes to your site on overall user sat­is­fac­tion will lead to a greater chance of you achieving your desired result.

When it comes to de­vel­op­ing user-friendly elements and campaigns, luckily, you are not on your own: there are useful technical website testing tools that make website op­ti­miza­tion much easier. You can use A/B testing (also known as “Split” testing) to specif­i­cal­ly check out the effect of two different web designs on your site, rather than simply having to guess what the changes will look like. With A/B testing, your test audience will be presented with the different versions in order to ascertain their reactions. How the setup and eval­u­a­tion of these tests are carried out depends entirely on which A/B testing tools you use.

Website operators are more and more fre­quent­ly using the op­por­tu­ni­ty to measure how suc­cess­ful different versions of their pages, ads, etc., are. They are doing so in order to assess which one will be the most suitable for their website. Split-tests are par­tic­u­lar­ly popular in the ad­ver­tis­ing sector, and in e-commerce. It’ s hardly sur­pris­ing that the market offers a huge selection of testing tools, which provide a variety of functions and pricing models, ranging from simple ap­pli­ca­tions for small busi­ness­es to complex en­ter­prise solutions with an all-round service for websites with more traffic.

The in­di­vid­ual testing tools differ, not only in the scope of the test (user number, test duration etc.) but also in terms of their ad­di­tion­al functions. Among other things, website testing tools can be dis­tin­guished by the following technical features:

• ability/inability to create multiple accounts
• Si­mul­ta­ne­ous log-in possible/not possible
• In­di­vid­ual analysis of users (targeting) possible/not possible
• Test data vi­su­al­iza­tion
• Option to export the test data
• Email no­ti­fi­ca­tions
• Multiple in­ter­faces (CMS, analysis software, shop systems)
• Option to specify multiple con­ver­sion targets
• Sched­ul­ing options for A/B testing
• Heatmap / Clickmap
• Archiving test data

The decision for or against a par­tic­u­lar website testing tool can often come down to price – es­pe­cial­ly when some tools could set you back four-digit sums for the en­ter­prise sector. However, the skills and expertise of the company should also play a role in your selection process. If you do not know how best to use A/B testing tools for your own web project, or how to evaluate the test data, then the tool will be of little help to you without as­sis­tance. It may also be worth your while to employ an external agency to oversee the testing, rather than always using the rather expensive services of the tool providers.

If you have decided to choose a program, the following overview can help you make your choice. Through­out the course of this article we, will present you with some in­ter­est­ing programs for website op­ti­miza­tion based on A/B tests.

Adobe Target is aimed at both beginners and pro­fes­sion­als in the field of A/B testing. The tool provides some of the best practices, which can be used as a basis for your own tests and can be cus­tomized and refined. Targeting also plays an important role: the program is used for creating target groups and defining the desired variants for in­di­vid­ual code lines or entire websites. Step-by-step in­struc­tions guide the user through the setup process, which can be a tricky process to master, es­pe­cial­ly on the first use. The testing tool allows for si­mul­ta­ne­ous testing of multiple pages or channels as well as features to publish optimized content au­to­mat­i­cal­ly in real time. Other features include:

• Automized op­ti­miza­tion based on a defined mer­chan­dis­ing rule set (key figures, KPI thresh­olds)
• Option of targeted pro­mo­tions (ad­ver­tis­ing banners or videos)
• Option of in­te­grat­ing analysis functions via Adobe Analytics
• Options to optimize mobile content
• Creation of automated rec­om­men­da­tions.

Adobe Targets interface is cus­tomiz­able. The marketer is able to pick and choose how the various reports, diagrams, and daily summaries are displayed. The more data the software receives, the less you have to worry about the specifics of the A/B tests. Adobe Target not only accesses the users’ settings but also delivers its own input to optimize campaigns thanks to powerful al­go­rithms. For example, the targeting engine au­to­mat­i­cal­ly evaluates all test data, gaining in­for­ma­tion that helps perfect the process of grouping the test can­di­dates in the long term.

AB Tasty shows itself to be a very clear and user-friendly A/B testing tool. It is quick and easy to set up, per­son­al­ize and manage under the “Tests” section. Each analysis project is assigned a unique test ID code and can be started, paused or stopped at any time. Fur­ther­more, the user is able to adjust the settings at any time or bring up any report required and then export that file as a PDF or Excel file. Whether you’re testing a desktop site, the mobile version or a native app (only possible with the En­ter­prise package): mod­i­fi­ca­tions and target group settings can be modified in all versions of the website in just a single step. AB Tasty users can also take advantage of the following features:

• Unlimited number of con­ver­sions can be made
• In­no­v­a­tive algorithm, “Clever” Stats
• Unlimited number of user accounts
• Easy in­te­gra­tion of third-party ap­pli­ca­tions (web analytics, CRM and CMP systems).

The ca­pa­bil­i­ties of “Starter” and “Plus” models are more than adequate for ordinary A/B testing of smaller and medium-sized websites. However, if you want to improve the user ex­pe­ri­ence of websites or ap­pli­ca­tions that have a strong traffic volume, you should choose AB Tasty En­ter­prise. En­ter­prise sub­scribers can test mod­i­fi­ca­tions in mobile apps and also create mul­ti­vari­ate and multipage tests. In addition, you can also create heatmaps and manage the ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty of in­di­vid­ual tests. In terms of targeting, the En­ter­prise Edition is miles ahead of the two standard models, with more than 100 native criteria, enabling even more targeted campaigns.

etracker Optimizer provides step-by-step creation of test projects. At the start, the user selects the desired test type and which page they want to optimize. In the next step, they customize the original page in the visual editor as required. To do this, you just have to click on the desired element, whereupon a pop-up menu displays the cor­re­spond­ing options for editing JavaScript, CSS, HTML, and text elements. If the variant cor­re­sponds to your own ideas, the user can define rules for dividing visitors – if a variant is to be used only on a specific target group. For this purpose, the testing tool provides various iden­ti­fi­ca­tion features, which can be combined as desired – for example:

• String in the URL
• Source of origin (social media, search engine, ad­ver­tise­ment, type-in)
• Used search terms
• Dis­tin­guish­ing between new and returning visitors
• Whether or not a visitor is a newslet­ter sub­scriber
• Device type
• Location

Once the variant is created, the editor offers the option to define the start and end time of the test and define the per­cent­age of visitors to be included in the test. You can also adjust both settings afterward – for example, if a pause or premature end to the test is desired. The final step is to define the con­ver­sion goals. Here, you can select actions like clicking a link, calling a par­tic­u­lar page or pur­chas­ing a product as a des­ti­na­tion. The A/B testing tool now tracks the behavior of the sites’ visitors and de­ter­mines a con­ver­sion as soon as one of the actions you choose is executed.