Adwords Split Testing Dilemma…

My wife and I are flying to Paris tomorrow for a well deserved vacation! So you can imagine that I’m super busy today – I’m keeping this post short and sweet.

Here’s the dilemma…

When you’re split testing two ads on Adwords you can either test for CTR or Conversion Rate.

Not only can making a small change in your ad change your CTR significantly, it can also impact the conversion rate of your ad – sometimes significantly.

But here’s the problem, you can’t optimize for both CTR and Conversion rate simultaneously. Having an ad with a higher CTR does NOT mean it has a higher conversion rate.

For example, you can put your product price in your ad and it will most certainly lower your CTR, BUT your conversion rate will almost always go UP.

So what should you optimize your ad for : highest possible CTR or highest possible Conversion Rate?

The advantage of having a higher conversion rate is obvious – you make more sales.

The advantages of having a higher CTR are significant as well :

1. With a higher CTR you get more traffic
2. Google rewards you with a better quality score, which means your ad either moves up while you pay the same CPC or Google lowers your CPC + your min bids can drop as well.

Think about it, if you double your CTR and your ad jumps up several spots you can potentially increase your traffic by 4X, 2X from doubling your CTR and another 2X from your ad moving up. If your quality score gets high enough and you move into the sponsored link section, than you can expect a jump in Conversion Rate as well!

Here’s the bottom line : OPTIMIZE YOUR AD FOR MAX CTR

Why?

There’s several reasons :

1. There’s a 2-fold benefit to improving your CTR : more traffic + a higher quality score. Getting a high quality score is a BIG DEAL.
2. Optimizing for CTR is fast since it’s based on clicks. Optimizing for Conversion Rate takes a LONG TIME, in most cases you need at least 20-30 conversions on each ad to make a statistically valid decision, compared to 20-30 clicks on each ad to make a decision as to which one has a higher CTR. After a month of split testing you can make HUGE gains in CTR, however, if you’re optimizing for Conversion Rate, chances are after a month you won’t have enough data to even make ONE change.
3. By optimizing for Conversion Rate of your Ad you’re neglecting the CTR, and if your CTR suffers it will hurt your quality score at the keyword, campaign, and even the account level – potentially raising your min bids and your CPC costs account wide.

So start split testing your ads, continually and systematically, and blow your competitors out of the water!