What Is a CRO Test? Top 4 Methods of Testing Used in CRO

Introduction

If you want your brand to succeed in the modern competitive market, you need to optimize your conversion rate. CRO testing provided by partners like Prismfly can make that happen, thanks to our comprehensive conversion rate optimization services.

So, how do we perform a CRO test, and what testing methods do we employ? Read on to discover the answers to these questions and more.

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What Is a CRO Test?

A conversion rate optimization or CRO test examines your website’s functionality, intuitiveness, user-friendliness, and overall suitability for conversion rate optimization. "CRO" is the science of improving, adjusting, and iterating your website's design, layout, and other factors so visitors are as likely to convert into customers or subscribers as possible.

Simply put, you want more of your site visitors to buy something. An optimized conversion rate will lead to increased revenue, a higher customer account, and greater brand loyalty.

If you want to optimize your conversion rate, you'll need to perform CRO tests regularly. The best CRO tests can tell you what the best arrangement of variables, site elements, and other factors is to get the highest conversion rate possible. However, there are different means by which you can test your site for CRO.

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What Are the Top 4 Methods of CRO Testing?

At Prismfly, we use four primary methods of conversion rate optimization testing. Here’s a deeper breakdown.

1. A/B Testing

A/B testing means testing two (or more) very similar versions of the same webpage, product, or app with the same traffic source. For example, you host two nearly identical versions of the same landing page with a few different elements.

By seeing which of the two types of landing pages (A or B) performs better, you can then adopt the better-performing version going forward. You can often take the lessons learned from A/B or split testing and use them for other pages, web elements, or applications.

2. A/A Testing

A/A testing is technically a type of A/B testing. As its name suggests, it involves testing two identical versions of the same page or web element against each other. 

A/A testing is useful for ensuring that the tool used to run the experiment is fair and functioning properly. With a "successful" A/A test, your testing tool should record any significant difference in conversions between the control page and the variable page.

A/A testing, by nature, doesn’t tell you which of the two pages performs better, so it’s meant to be used in conjunction with other test types.

3. Multi Variant Testing

Multivariate testing, or MVT, is a CRO test type that takes multiple variables and tests them at the same time on a given webpage. MVT testing is practical when you want to see what complex combination of changes or web elements works best to maximize conversion.

Say you want to test three different versions of a call to action or advertisement and three different versions of your logo. You can use MVT to do this, resulting in sixteen different unique combinations to examine from the same traffic pool. With Prismfly’s help, MVT testing will help you understand how your website and marketing materials work with all their elements.

4. Multi-Armed Bandit Testing

Multi-armed bandit testing is essentially a more complex version of traditional A/B testing. Multi-armed bandit testing leverages machine learning algorithms to allocate traffic to variations that perform well over time. It also allocates less visitor traffic to variations of a webpage or app that aren’t performing well.

It's called "multi-armed bandit testing" from an experimental hypothetical where an individual has to choose between several actions — the titular one-armed bandits — without knowing the payout or payoff. In theory, multi-armed bandit testing can help you determine your website's most profitable or successful range of settings.

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What Other Key Tools Are Used in CRO?

Alongside the above four CRO testing methods, the experts at Prismfly use a variety of other tools, software types, and analyzes to optimize your brand’s conversion rate as much as possible.

Experimentation Software

Naturally, we use a variety of experimentation software solutions to help carry out the above tests. These software platforms integrate well with each other into a comprehensive tech stack that we can bring to bear on any conversion rate problems your brand might experience. 

Popular tools like Google Analytics, GitHub, and FullStory are just a few examples of the experimentation software Prismfly uses.

Personalization and Dynamic Content Software

But we also use personalization and dynamic content software for your brand and its customers. That way, you can learn more about which type of content works best for your target audience. 

You can use that information to provide your audience with dynamic, emotionally resonating content.

Analytics Platform

Prismfly uses analytics platforms to gather, analyze, and provide actionable insights on users and their behaviors. Data is king in any business, especially regarding marketing and conversion rate optimization. 

We often use data gathered from our analytics platforms for CRO tests.

Heat Maps

Heat maps are useful tools that paint or color areas of a webpage or app that are frequented or clicked on often by your users. 

By seeing exactly where your users spend their time and where they click, you'll better understand how they interact with your ecommerce store and the steps you can take to make their experiences even better.

Session Recording Software

The amount of time your users spend on your website is important information. That’s why Prismfly uses session recording software to determine how long people spend on your site, when they tend to bounce or click away from your site, and other related information.

Form Analysis

If your site uses any kind of form for subscriptions, email marketing messages, or loyalty programs, those forms may be negatively impacting your conversion rate. 

With our form analysis tools, we’ll be able to tell you how to improve your forms to both maximize the completion rate and minimize users abandoning the forms before filling them out.

User Feedback Tools

Feedback straight from your target users is worth its weight in gold. To that end, Prismfly leverages user feedback tools to collect feedback and insights straight from the proverbial horse’s mouth. In this way, we can back up our raw data from analytics platforms with subjective testimonies from your key customers. 

Combined, both data sources will help you optimize your conversion rate for the long term.

Review Analysis

Prismfly uses review analysis tools and techniques to look at reviews on your website and customer reviews on other platforms and sites. These include Amazon, Google, Walmart, and anywhere else your brand's products might have been sold and reviewed by the public. 

By analyzing public reviews, we can help you take steps to correct common issues or optimize your website for better results.

Customer Service Reports

Customer service tickets are inevitable in business. With customer service reports, we can help you identify weak spots in your current customer service processes and help you optimize your conversion rate by bolstering CS practices.

User Journey Mapping Software

The better you understand your users’ journeys, the better you can anticipate their needs and tailor your website to their preferences. We use user journey mapping software to tell you exactly how people progress through your site.

Quality Assurance Monitoring

Prismfly further provides quality assurance monitoring for your brand. In this way, we can help you detect whether there are any weak spots in your brand’s QA processes, plus provide insights to fix issues later on.

Validation Testing

Through validation testing, Prismfly can ensure that every element of your website functions as needed. That way, you can avoid glitches or hiccups that might interrupt your customers’ journeys through your ecommerce shop.

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Boost Your Conversion Rate With Prismfly

Overall, Prismfly could be just the partner you’ve been looking for to optimize your brand’s conversion rate and maximize revenue for a long time to come. With our help, your site will be as effective as possible, and each visitor will be treated to a personalized, emotionally resonating experience.

Why wait? Contact Prismfly today and see how we can help your brand thrive through CRO, UI and UX design, and more.