Yesterday's Nugget was pretty long to get through, but we really needed to explain how to use Google Website Optimizer ( http://bit.ly/qEVCUP ). It is such an important tool and it's easier than Google Analytics. Although, if you are still wondering what you would want to test then today's Daily Golden Nugget is for you.
Some basic things to test with Google Website Optimizer:
1. Captions on images
2. Font size, line spacing, and font family
3. Adding or reducing white space around the site
4. Culling your content or swapping it with bullet points
5. Font and link colors, underlined or non underlined links
6. Button sizes and colors
7. Jewelry photography methods using different background other than pure white
8. Headlines
9. Repositioning your call to action message
Here's a brief explanation of each.
1. Captions on images - Most images on websites don't have captions, which is unfortunate since readers that scan your page will often read the headline, bolded, words and image captions. Other than normal captions like "14kt Pave Diamond Ring," the caption could say "Click to find out why this 14kt Pave Diamond Ring is one of our popular items." Be creative in your image captions and set them a small distance from the bottom of the image.
2. Font size, line spacing, and font family - Your chosen font will have a large impact on whether or not your visitors will actually read a page. To test your font styles, set up 2 pages with identical content using different families of fonts. Page A could be a serif font and Page B could be a sans-serif font. Put a clickable call to action text link within the body of the page. After some Google Website Optimizer testing you will see which font face people read more.
The font test results will be different for every jewelry website when you also take into account the overall design. You might find more people reading the serif font when the line spacing is larger. You might also find out that more people will read a sans-serif font when it is smaller.
3. Adding or reducing white space around the site - The white space we're talking about is the slight buffering between paragraphs of information and the design around it. You could start with small spacing and gradually increase the margins. Another common oversight is the margins around images. Make sure you have enough margins around the images to provide a clean look when next to your paragraph, but then test how much it should be. You might be surprised how much white space will influence flow of traffic through your site.
4. Culling your content or swapping it with bullet points - If you suffer from our diarrhea-of-the-mouth problem, your website content might be too long. Does anyone really read a lot of information on a website? You bet they do! But do they read it on your main landing pages or on your home page? Well, maybe they don't. It all depends on how interesting and compelling your writing is. Perhaps you are blessed with a writer's gift to craft every sentence as a compelling lead in to the next, or perhaps not. There is always a place on your site for those diarrhea-of-the-mouth pages, and you need them for good SEO; but on your main landing pages, consider testing blocks of paragraph copy against bullet point.
Speaking of diarrhea-of-the-mouth, this nugget is already long so we'll cover the rest of the 9 points on Monday.
Have a good weekend and Happy Nuggeting!
