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With the survey created yesterday, along with message 4, we now have almost 2 weeks of time laid out for the autoresponder series. So the rest of this second week of the challenge will be spent on optimizing and enhancing the list.

Today’ tasks:

• Create several variations of opt-in forms
• Split test those variations on the squeeze page

This is a very profitable but underused set of tasks. Let me show you how it’s done…

Why Split Test?

Just in case you haven’t heard this a million times before, you need to split test because failing to do so is like turning away half your customers with money in their hands. I got this drilled into my head by my mastermind partner Dan Kelly.

Split tests are simply variations of the same page or form, the results of which tell you what variations convert the best. You can guess til the cows come home which version will work best. But only real traffic will tell the truth. The numbers don’t lie! (although there may be some reason behind them!)

Think about it this way. Let’s say you’re doing okay with your squeeze page, with a 10% conversion. And let’s say that your entire business model relies on selling your products and services to the people who are on your list.

Everything else kept equal (what economists call ceteris paribus), increasing your opt-in conversion from 10 to 15% would result in a 50% increase in your revenue!  Then imagine what would happen if you kept going up from there.

Now of course, you won’t have 100% of your revenue dependent on this one list. But I think you do get the point.

So now that you trust that it is good, let me show you how easy it is to do split testing with Aweber. (This is another one of those things I rely on Aweber for, and I don’t know how easy this is with other services).

Create Your Control

As with any experiment, you need a control or baseline to start with. Since we created the initial squeeze page the other day, we have our control.

So I simply make sure that I have that specific webform labeled in some way to show it’s the control. For me, it’s called “front-squeeze-box1″. My other versions will be front-squeeze-box2, front-squeeze-box2-button2, and front-squeeze-head2-button2.

Split Test 1 Variable At A Time

It’ important when you split test to only change 1 thing at a time, so you know for sure that’s the attribute responsible for the change (whether positive or negative). If you have some fancy split testing software system, you can do multi-variate and multi-variable split testing. But for now I’m keeping things simple. (One such software though is the Your Squeeze Page System from Matthew Glanfield. You might like it…)

My recommendation to you is to test your opt-in form headline and the text on the submit button.

I’m going to run with two versions of my headline, and 2 versions of my button, giving me four total versions to split test.

My headlines are:

Where Do You Want Me To
Send My Secrets, Strategies,
And Time Savers?

and

Claim Your Free
Internet Marketing Secrets,
Strategies,
And Time Savers

I’ll test these two headlines until I have at least 1000 displays for each (preferably 1000 signups) to get statistically meaningful results. If there’s a clear winner early, then I may make a change, but you want as many visitors as possible to know for sure.

Meanwhile, my 2 submit buttons are:

• Activate My Free Membership
• Send Me Free Lessons!

I split test these four by using that feature in the Web Forms area at Aweber. I’m giving each version 25%, and any other form in that list 0.

Add Your Split Test To The Squeeze Page

I get the new HTML for that specific split test, and I replace the code on my squeeze page with it. Now it’s just a matter of waiting to collect the data.

Once I get a clear winner, I’ll make it the control, and split test some more. For the headline, I may make the font Arial instead of Verdana. Or red instead of black. Or one font size larger or smaller. Use “quotes” or an exclamation point. There are so many little things that can make a difference.

You could test til your blue in the face; but the reality is you keep doing it because you’ll be more green in the wallet!

Some time in the future, we’ll split test the entire page. We can use Google Website Optimizer for that, or the previously mentioned Your Squeeze Page System. For now though, the built in tool in Aweber will do.

Bob Jenkins

p.s. If you get some results that surprise you with your split test, please feel free to share them here! What may work for you could work for someone else as well!

p.p.s. To learn how to use Google Website Optimizer, and get a further understanding of split testing, go to DiscoverSplitTesting.com.

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