18Jul2009

Landing Page Optimization with A/B Testing

Like many online games, Warrior Epic has a landing page to which we direct traffic from our web marketing campaigns. Luckily for us, our first landing page actually turned out to have a surprisingly good conversion rate.

Using Google's website optimizer, we recently tried out a couple of new landing pages to see if we could improve upon it.

I've been pretty happy with our initial landing page. Although it's quite long, it showcases the game well and I feel does a good job of selling it to a new visitor.

Warrior Epic landing page #1 (click to view larger)

Like I said, we were getting conversion rates above what is usual for banner traffic so I didn't feel a strong need to do a lot of tweaking.

However, marketing wanted to try out some new concepts and so we tested out version 2 which was a variation of the original landing page.

Warrior Epic landing page #2 (click to view larger)

The goal of the second landing page was to brighten the page up a little, move more content up above the fold, and remove any non-conversion-related links from the main content area.

I thought we achieved this pretty well; however, the landing page performed very slightly worse than the original.

The third landing page featured a completely new design.

Warrior Epic landing page #3 (click to view larger)

I'll be honest; I wasn't a fan of this design at all. The white background felt too stark to me and it removed the content which highlighted the key features of the game.

The great thing about using an A/B testing tool to optimize your designs is that you get a definitive answer as to which works better. The only thing you have to invest is the time spent developing the variations.

It took less than a day of A/B testing against the original design to show that this new version dramatically outperformed it. It's a good job I didn't listen to myself.

We plan to run a few more variants of the winning design to see if changing the call-to-action wording has much of an effect.

We also have a version in the works which has the account sign up form embedded in it. I'm really keen to see how that performs, as I simply have no idea.

25 Comments Posted (Add Yours)

Nice post, mate! keep up the good work!

1. Posted by zoliky on July 19, 2009

Great! I'm looking forward to see the what's the impact on call-to-action with new designs,

2. Posted by Oliver Giam on July 19, 2009

Thanks a lot
Regards

3. Posted by ilic on July 20, 2009

I can see why the second performed better than the others. I'm not really a fan of the white, but the contrast works well, the heading at the top, 'Join Now for Free' was hard to find in the originals, and the new ad is more succinct - the less is more concept without extra text and navigation.

Thanks for sharing your tests with us.

4. Posted by Michael Swartz on July 21, 2009

Those are some intense graphics, and I like the feel. Good to hear you do testing on the web design too, I'd be interested to hear what you learn.

5. Posted by Ted A on July 22, 2009

The design and graphic layout is really good.

6. Posted by codingmind on July 27, 2009

In design 2, the call to action buttons don't stand out as much. Again in design 2 the screen shots are smaller as well. Could that have played an important part of the conversions. Call to action and a quick feel for what the game is about through the screen character shots are important. Design 2 changed that up quite a bit.

7. Posted by Brandon Tran on July 27, 2009

Great post! it's very interesting to see experiments in this domain. I like the new landing page, I think it has more personnality.

8. Posted by Diane on July 28, 2009

Design 1 is my preferred. Brandon had a good point about the call to actions and screenies so I'm not suprised it performed slightly worse. Both are nice though.

9. Posted by Evan Skuthorpe on July 29, 2009

I agree with you partially? Does this affect on page SEO when you are doing this optimization?
I don't think its worth it if it has a negative affect on Google search results or am I misunderstanding what you are saying?
Great article though. Thanks for sharing your web knowledge smiley cat. :D

10. Posted by CT Web Design on July 29, 2009

helping stuff. thanks

11. Posted by tutorialslounge on July 30, 2009

Version #1 is what I really prefer. it looks really nice and agree with you - white color doesn't fit game's general feeling. Black is good! Good landing page.

12. Posted by Mike @ Toronto SEO on August 03, 2009

Helpful Info, Thanks alot Great Post

13. Posted by Daniel Smith on August 05, 2009

I like your all landing page,really too good design.

14. Posted by Simran on August 07, 2009

Definitely like the white background. It is the most simple, and it seems that simple works best nowadays. I have always been a fan of dark and black in gaming sites, but that shows that white can work wonders.

15. Posted by Jeff H. on August 07, 2009

Very usefull thank you. Great landing page and design.

16. Posted by duffman on August 31, 2009

Great post here, I will try the Google Optimiser tool - looks good.

17. Posted by We Are Web on September 04, 2009

Design is really good, very attractive and incredible.

18. Posted by Nurdin on September 05, 2009

Your landing page is really too good.

19. Posted by Boston on September 18, 2009

I like the white background the best because it's more 'out of the box' than a typical gaming site. All 3 are great but both of the first 2 reminded me of Warcraft and Starcraft II - the 3rd one felt much more unique.

Also I think 'directed information' is better than 'more information' in general.

-Don (Elliott Design)

20. Posted by Don Elliott on October 02, 2009

Оооо! Вот это в точку сказано. Люблю, когда все к месту и при этом понятно для простого смертного.

21. Posted by Ecotiag on October 14, 2009

The video frame on the first one is very attractive. The call to action on the third one is great but the page itself doesn't make me want to play. The first one does. Maybe the top graphic shouldn't be as tall on the first one?

22. Posted by Discover Your Site on October 16, 2009

Great job for new visitors.I also support your opinion.

23. Posted by mbateam on November 09, 2009

Thanks for sharing your idea on Landing Page optimization

24. Posted by Plywood india on December 22, 2009

I think its important to try different things. It interesting to see which paths people take once arriving on a landing page. The important thing is that the changes are trackable and you know the differences are otherwise it could be down to a large number of different things on the page.

25. Posted by web design london on January 29, 2010