subject: Using Google Adwords As A Proving Ground To Test The Website [print this page] Ive written before on the value of testing your marketing, and there is no better place to test quickly and efficiently than Google Adwords. Almost everyone is concerned with conversion success, meaning of the total number of prospects hitting the website, it is the percent of people actually taking an action on the website, in particular signing up for a free something or actually placing a phone call.
There are several vital features of a website to test, but one must remember the website must match up and be very congruent to the ad bringing people to the site for a conversion mechanism to be tested properly. For now, Ill assume this is the case.
On the site itself the most important points to test are: the offer, supportive sales copy, headlines, call to action, graphics and website real estate.
Each of these items, depending on your landing page and its complexities, need to be tested and Google Adwords has a great tool to do so. It is called the Website Optimizer, and this tool will let you automatically test one landing page against another and give you real time results of the tests.
I like to begin testing with the offer, or what I would refer to as the unrefusable offer, as it is the #1 most important feature to your site. To do this, you simply make a duplicate copy of your main landing page except for the offer. Youll create a new offer or a variation of your current offer on the new landing page to test against the first. Over a very short testing period, often less than a week, you can determine through Googles metrics which offer is the statistical winner.
With your better offer, you can now use it as the control for your next set of offer tests, the results of which youll have soon. And the cycle happens over and over until your winning offer cant be beat anymore. Now you have a winner, and you can move on to your next set of tests of the next most important area of your website. And so on and so forth until you have a monster website.
The process is simple and systematic. It doesnt take a genius, just a little patience.
