Split Tests: What to Know and How it Can Improve Your Campaigns

April is here and that means it’s Genius Monkey’s very own brand optimization month!! The first topic to kick off this month is A/B testing, or split testing. In programmatic advertising, every little uptick in performance matters and can affect your bottom line. Advertisers need to carefully craft the right message, the right landing page, and the right form fill or sales funnel to have the greatest impact. There’s a lot advertisers need to get right, and there’s no better method for doing so than split-testing. Let’s dive in:

What is Split-Testing?

Split-testing is a technique for continually optimizing your advertising strategy. It involves making variants of marketing materials or processes to discover which performs best with your consumers. Over time and with multiple tests, split-testing allows advertisers to find the “sweet spot” with their branding and messaging while minimizing risk and big spending.

The specific items advertisers can change between split test variants is innumerable. Common variables include:

• Creatives - Advertisers can run different sets of creatives with different:
• Call-to-actions (Buy Now, Book an Appointment, Sign Up, Learn More, etc)
• Sales/Offers
• Imagery (Ex. man vs women, red car vs blue car)
• And much more
• Website design:
• Form fills on the left vs right
• Button colors
• Phone number placement
• And much more
• Website content:
• Sales content vs informative content
• Statistical number-filled content vs written content
• Sales Funnel / Sales Process:
• Driving traffic straight to a product page
• Driving traffic to a variation of product page
• Removing or adding steps to a sales funnel
• Simplifying the purchase process
• Target Audience:
• ex) Campaign A for a national home builder targets newlyweds looking to start their new lives. Campaign B targets new parents looking to move into a bigger home.
• Social Media Interactions:
• Polls, comments, games, photo uploads, contests; there are many great ways to get your audience engaged and interacting with your brand. Try different methods and see which ones generate the best response
• Different Sales offers:
• BOGO vs 50% off vs $500 off
• Copy size/font
• Tone/Voice

Regardless of the subject, using a split test will allow you to see what works with actual data.

What’s the Difference Between Split-Testing and A/B Testing?

At their core, split-testing and A/B testing are practically the same technique. While “split-testing” is an industry-standard term in the advertising world, A/B testing and multi-variant testing are a more general term that is used in many other contexts.

How to Implement Split-Testing

First, it’s important to have a goal in mind for what you want to learn about your audience before you begin the test. Make variations that will demonstrate a specific preference from your customers; for example, you could use two versions of ad copy: one that uses data and appeals to logic, and another that appeals to emotions and sentimentality.

Second, develop a control ad from which to test the others. A crucial aspect of setting up an A/B test is making small changes that deviate from a solid baseline. Doing so ensures that the advertisers’ changes are what causes the difference in performance. Every variant must be tested against the control, otherwise advertisers will be left guessing which changes actually drove the lift.

Third, the test itself. Try to place the variants in equal numbers for the best, most true results. Split tests can have varying durations, generally dependent on the size of the test or material in question. Small email campaigns can be reasonably tested in a day or so, while the larger multimedia campaigns should run much longer. Genius Monkey recommends no shorter than 45 days to give the campaign the necessary time and repetition to drive real brand recognition.

Finally, tracking. All this work will be for naught if you don’t have the correct method of tracking the success of each variant. Genius Monkey users enjoy a full view-through tracking model that allows them to see every touchpoint on the consumer’s path to conversion. Our industry-leading dashboard and reports allow users to quickly see the outcomes of all campaigns, including split tests. Carefully monitor the success throughout the campaign, but be careful not to rush to conclusions and make changes too quickly.

What are the Benefits of Split-Testing?

Understand Your Audience: By seeing which variants customers are more prone to engage with, you gain knowledge regarding customer preferences and tastes. With this knowledge you can readdress all assets of your business to optimize from top to bottom.

More Conversions: A more engaged customer is far more likely to take an interest in your offer and convert faster.

Confidence in Ad Creative: Split-testing removes guesswork from the ad creation process!

Reduced Cost-per-conversion: Better engagements mean less advertising touch-points before conversions. Fewer placements means less money spent!

A Real-Life Case Study: Onsemi (formally ON Semiconductor) was looking to narrow their advertising target to a more specific audience, and switched to the Genius Monkey platform. After incorporating extensive split-testing into Onsemi’s marketing, website traffic and conversions began to increase.

Results were immediate, but an extended period of testing and optimizing eventually led to massive savings for the company. Before split-testing, Onsemi was averaging a $2,000 cost per conversion; two years later, the average cost-per-conversion was $0.92. Yes, you read that right: $2,000 to $0.92; a 99.9% reduction in costs.

Every vertical and strategy is different; not all testing or campaigns will produce equal results. Regardless, split-testing is an essential tool that will benefit your bottom line no matter your business type, size, or goals.

What NOT to Do While Split-Testing

Not Consider Outside Factors

Advertising never happens in a vacuum, and it is important to consider what other factors could have played a role in your results. For example, an advertiser might conduct a split test right as peak season was beginning, meaning an uptick in conversions was already expected to happen. This is why April is a great time to focus on such tests: it’s a relatively slow period for advertising that can be used to plan and prepare for the busy back-to-school and Holiday seasons.

Test for the sake of Testing

As mentioned above, testing should be done with a goal in mind. Testing just to test is likely to lead advertisers to the wrong conclusions, which can harm advertising efforts to come.

Test Too Many Variables at Once

In creating your variations, be sure that only one or perhaps a few very minor things change. Should your variations be wildly different and one performs better than the other, it will be difficult to nail down which differences are to thank (or blame).

Make the Differences Trivially Small

While you want to avoid massive differences between your variations, the changes you do make should have a noticeable impact on the feel of the message. Merely changing one word on a webpage filled with copy isn’t enough for most consumers to notice; such a test is unlikely to yield useful data.

Only Split-Testing Once

Your audience is constantly changing, so you need to be optimizing, testing, and growing right with them. Split-testing is all about refinement over time, and you must be prepared to shift your creative efforts toward what the data is saying works best. Every split test is a lesson learned that should be applied to all your marketing going forward.

There’s No Better Time to Grow with Programmatic

In association with our partners, Genius Monkey is running a special limited-time promotion through April 2025, allowing new and long-time users of the platform to more easily expand their programmatic efforts. Split-testing is a great way for users to experiment with new ideas and reach a larger audience than ever before, and there’s no better time than now to see what heights your advertising can rise!

Are you ready to start increasing your conversions and lowering your costs? Learn all the details about the April promotion here! If you’re ready to evolve your marketing strategy to the next level, get in touch with Genius Monkey today!