How to Use A/B Testing To Enhance Your UX Design

A/B testing will not sound like a novel concept for you if you have been keeping yourself

updated with design news off late. This concept includes creating two or more page designs and

then offering them to a split percentage of visitors. With the use of a number of metrics

designers can choose a specific design style based on which features can perform at their best.

Though it's a brilliant technique, designers may need some time to comprehend and utilize it

completely.

In this blog post, I am presenting some tips for designers who wish to gain more knowledge

about A/B testing. Self-learning is the key to growth and progress. It also ensures that you are

updated with the latest technologies and can utilize this knowledge in your work. A/B testing is

an addition to your skill set and can help enhance your services which you deliver as a designer.

Layout Design for A/B testing

Quality website design is created keeping the user in consideration. To make interactions unique

and interesting, interactive layouts can be used. A/B testing can help you find out the flaws or

bugs in your design once you are ready with the mockup design.

At the outset, you must analyze the layout for elements which don't serve a purpose. Carefully

look at the buttons or input fields which are specifically used to derive user attention. They

must be designed in such a manner that they attract the attention of maximum number of users.

You need to emphasize the interactive elements whilst you can simply blend the non-interactive

ones.

Reading Measurements

Based on the number of changes made, each test will give back varying measurements. This

implies that the total number of days needed for accurate tests may differ a lot. Simply put, A/B

tests involve counting the percentage of specific actions taken by visitors. Two or more different

layouts are brought forth at random in front of the audience who are unaware about the test.

Here, you need to keep a check on the increase in the number of visitors performing certain

action. This action can include anything from registrations to product sales.

Debug and Solve UX Problems

A/B testing aims to debug any issues with the current design. As a designer, you might be

interested in making your design perfect for enhancing retention rate or to increase the number

of clicks.

Prior to testing, you must consider the features that may not work with legacy browsers. You

should also analyze the features that require backwards compatibility. You must understand the

impact of these features on retention rates. When you are done with thinking about what needs

to be done to enhance performance that is when A/B test come into picture.

You can also share your website with a small group of people and collect their opinions. It might

have taken days together for you to create a design and this may give you a wrong idea that

your design is flawless. However, you must regularly take a break and also check and analyze the

UX techniques utilized by other websites.

Tips for Coaxing User Interaction

Landing pages are the basic layouts for A/B tests. These designs are intended to entice action

from a visitor. Attracting attention to specific areas of page needs the use of clever ideas such as

using icons, flashy colors, emphasized text, etc. However, you must stay focused on what users

want to do and let the web design serve as a guide to the visitor.

For this, Visual Website Optimizer has introduced landing page analyzer which derives basic

results like CTA buttons, banners, and important links. If you are tracking A/B funnels then you

will get verifiable data to support the design which is more practical.

Tools and Resources:

There are some tools which can be utilized for A/B testing. These tools can be utilized even by

designers who are not well acquainted with the process. With time and practice, you can get

acquainted with A/B split testing. However, to derive valuable results you must test valuable

metrics.

Visual Website Optimizer: This exciting split testing platform offers a number of case-studies,

how-tos, and intro guides for A/B testing. The features page provides information on A/B test

integration. It also enlightens about tracking statistics on user dashboard. You can also check

performance o designs based on your custom metrics.

Optimizely: Though this platform doesn't really specialize in A/B split testing, you can track

analytics from any website or application to view the areas which attracted highest user

attention or interaction. You may also test the duration of time visitors stay on each page and

see if different interfaces could change these results. Optimzely offers free plan but with limited

testing functionalities.

Unbounce: Used usually by marketing professionals and webmasters, with little technical

knowledge, this platform is also helpful in launching websites and customized templates.

Without any coding knowledge it allows you to create a simple landing page and measure user

reactions. Their A/B testing page will give you more information about the working of the

Unbounce platform.

Google Experiments: This is the most affordable solution for free testing. It runs via Google's

Analytics platform. However, you need to be experienced with Google Analytics prior to shifting

onto Content Experiments. Those of you who are amateurs to this platform may go through any

tutorial which explains Google's Experiments platform from the scratch.

Web designers, in a way, serve as web developers and are now their role is extending towards

the marketing niche as well. However, with A/B techniques they can hone their designing skills.

Following the tips and tools, in this blog post, will make you an expert at performing split tests.