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ChatGPT is generating a lot of buzz in the marketing industry, and if you‘re a marketer, you’re probably wondering how to use the technology to its full potential.

Fortunately, I’ve compiled a list of 190 prompts to enter into ChatGPT to take the guesswork out of figuring out how to use the AI.

If you‘re unfamiliar with ChatGPT, here’s what you need to know.

What is ChatGPT?

65 ChatGPT Prompts for Marketing

How to Use These Marketing ChatGPT Prompts

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Business

27 ChatGPT Prompts for Content Creation and Social Media

9 ChatGPT Prompts for Analytics

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Email Campaigns

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Resume

11 ChatGPT Prompts for Ecommerce

23 ChatGPT Prompts for Customer Service

20 ChatGPT Prompts for Sales

What is ChatGPT?

ChatGPT is a publicly accessible tool owned by OpenAI. It uses natural language processing to pull information from around the web to answer search queries and fulfill content requests.

ChatGPT’s answers are original and have not been copied and pasted from the web.

Aside from a paid subscription version called ChatGPT Plus, the tool is free.

ChatGPT is one of the latest developments in AI tools. Suppose you‘re looking for other ways to integrate AI into your marketing workflow.

In that case, you may be interested in HubSpot’s suite of generative AI tools to help you ideate, create, and share remarkable content quickly and efficiently.

Now, let’s get into the wide range of prompts you can use to get the most out of ChatGPT.

65 ChatGPT Prompts for Marketing

1. “List [number] ideas for blog posts about [topic].”
2. “Write a minute-long advertisement script about [product, service, or company].”
3. “Create a three-month social media campaign calendar for our product to [insert goal] and mention the channels we should focus on.”
4. “List [number] viral Instagram Reels ideas about [company, product, or service].”
5. “Generate [number] of viral TikTok ideas about [company, product, or service].”
6. “Create three call-to-action button ideas based on the contents of this blog post.” Then, paste in the content.
7. “Create an advertising campaign about [company, product, or service] targeting [target audience]. Include key messages and slogans and choose the best media channels for promotions.”
8. “Write [number] Google Ad headlines from [URL].”
9. “List common challenges faced by [buyer persona description].”
10. “List the key marketing segments in [industry]. Which segment has the biggest opportunity for our [company, group, organization, business]?”
11. “Write marketing copy to make my marketing emails more engaging. The copy must be about our [product, service, or company].”
12. “Write an email subject line convincing potential customers to switch our service.”
13. “What are 10 main points crucial to marketers trying to acquire new customers?”
14. “Generate an AIDA for [product or service].”
15. “Write five tweets to generate interest in [product, company, or service].”
16. “Write a promotional LinkedIn post about [product or service].”
17. “Write three seconds of Facebook Ad copy about [product or service].”
18. “Write a press release about our upcoming event. Include the event’s date, time, location, and purpose.” Make sure to give ChatGPT the necessary details.
19. “Generate five different YouTube descriptions for our video about [topic].”
20. “Generate questions for a Facebook poll about [topic].
21. “What marketing channels have the highest ROI?”
22. “List ways to market my brand on TikTok.”
23. “How can influencer marketing generate leads?”
24. “What marketing tactics should I leverage to reach my target audience.” Make sure to describe your target audience.
25. “What marketing channels have the lowest ROI?”
26. “This email is to [audience]. Please rewrite it with [another audience] in mind. Their pain points are [pain points.] Be sure to keep the tone similar.” Then, paste into the email.
27. “Take this blog post and turn it into 10 Twitter posts and four LinkedIn posts.” Then, paste in the blog post.
28. “Turn this LinkedIn post into an email to [audience].” Paste in post content.
29. “How can I turn this blog post into an infographic. Please give me an outline.” Then, paste in the blog post content.
30. “I’m writing an email about [topic] to [audience]. Give me five key talking points.”
31. “I need to A/B test subject lines for this email. Give me 10 subject line ideas and 10 pre-headers.” Then, paste in the email. 
32. “What are the biggest pain points of [audience] in [industry]?”
33. “I am a [title] in a [describe company] that sells [product/service type]. We market to [audience] whose pain points are [list pain points]. What objections are they likely to have?”
34. “Give me 5 blog titles for a post about [insert subject] for [audience].”
35. “Write a 30-second script for an explainer video about [product] that [what the product does.]
36. “Here’s a 30-second explainer video script for our [product] that [what the product does] for [audience type]. Please give me a list of some of the different shots or animations I should include.” Paste in the script.
37. “Here’s our latest whitepaper. We primarily market using [channels]. Give me at least 15 ideas for how we can repurpose this and turn it into a multichannel campaign.” Then, upload the whitepaper.
38. “We’re a [type of company] launching a new [what you’re launching] in three months and need to start building out the runway. Our audience is [describe audience]. Give me an outline for what we need to do for a successful launch.”
39. “Here’s our launch outline. Please create a marketing calendar for the different stages and milestones we’ll need to reach.” Then, upload the launch outline.
40. “We goofed. [Describe what happened.] Give me an outline for an email and social media posts to explain what happened, apologize, and share what we’re doing to fix it.”
41. “These are our three strategic priorities for this year [list them]. What are some KPIs to consider as we measure success?”
42. “These are our three strategic priorities for this year [list them]. What tactics can we use to reach these goals?”
43. “Here’s a transcript of me talking about my onboarding process. Please help me outline a document I can share with clients to communicate it to them.”
44. “I’m creating a re-engagement campaign. Give me six ideas for emails I can send to re-engage people who haven’t opened an email in the last nine months.”
45. “My company is known for [value prop]. Give me 10 blog post ideas that can communicate this to our audience.”
46. “My company is known for [value prop]. What are four ways I can communicate this expertise in our proposals?”
47. “Most of my business comes from referrals. Help me create referral language I can give to past clients and referral partners that make it easy for them to send me business. I need three versions: 1. a single sentence; 2. an email; and 3. a social media post.”
48. “I need to get more reviews. Please help me create a campaign that asks clients for referrals.”
49. “Help me write a script for a 30-minute workshop on what parents need to know about helping their kids get scholarships.”
50. “Here’s my script for my upcoming training. Help me turn it into a checklist I can use as a free giveaway.” Then, upload the script.
51. “Here are the five key takeaways for this webinar I’m teaching. [List the takeaways.] Help me turn it into a marketing outline to get people to come to the webinar.”
52. “I need to create a sales sequence for the people who attend my webinar. Please give me an outline for those emails so I can convert them.”
53. “Give me six headline ideas for a landing page about [product name] for [audience].”
54. “Write a conclusion for my blog post.” Then, paste in the blog post.
55. “Help me write a creative brief for developing a new logo so I can hand it over to my designer.”
56. “Here’s a transcript from a recent call about client experience. Please use it to outline two blog posts: one focused on benefits to clients, the other focused on teaching other people in my industry about the importance of building a client experience.” Upload the transcript.
57. “What’s another way to say “feeling the pressure”? Give me email subject lines for [audience] that speak to those pain points.”
58. “Help me plan a photo and video shoot for a hot tub and sauna company that emphasizes the lifestyle.”
59. “Help me write an email to potential clients that draws parallels between March Madness and home building and urges them to contact us for a consult.”
60. “Give me some playful marketing language for a May email and social media campaign for a gardening store that’s tied into seasonality. I’d like five campaign ideas.”
61. “I’m creating a new coaching offer targeted to online businesses. Here are details on the program [insert details]. Please give me 10 name and tagline ideas.”
62. “We’re closing our showroom for a few weeks due to a family medical emergency. Please give me some copy for emails, a door sign, and social media posts to communicate this.”
63. “Here are our current mission and values statements [insert statements]. Help me develop four ideas for messaging I can use to bring this into our marketing campaigns and operational communications.”
64. “You’re an HR professional stressing out about employee turnover who feels like you’re going through the motions. What are 10 of your biggest pain points?”
65. “You often hear ‘it will calm down next week’ from your clients. What are 10 other things that busy and burned-out people might say? Please also outline how a [describe your company] can help them solve each of these problems.”

Once you have all the ideas, need help putting them together? HubSpot’s FREE AI Email Writer makes it easy to generate more emails in less time. Try it here.

How to Use These Marketing ChatGPT Prompts

ChatGPT is a fantastic tool, but it’s just that, a tool. So, like any tool, to use it effectively, you have to understand how it works and what you can do. Here are six tips for making these marketing ChatGPT prompts work for you.

 

1. Understand what kind of output you want.

Garbage in, garbage out definitely applies here. So before you even dive into any of these prompts, make sure you have a good understanding of what it is you even want to accomplish.

If, for example, you’re asking it to create a landing page, make sure you know what a good landing page should look like so you can be hyper-clear in the beginning. You can also be clear in your feedback to ChatGPT as you refine its responses.

2. Give it a job.

Make sure the ChatGPT knows what its role is and what you’re trying to create. Tell it, “You’re an expert ____ (role) creating a _____ (what you’re creating) for your audience of (describe audience).”

I’ve found that this approach provides the context and helps get the output you want. What’s more, because you understand the kind of output you want (step one), you can better describe the job you want ChatGPT to do.

3. Offer as much detail as you can.

When I say be as detailed as possible, I mean go overboard here. ChatGPT is a robot, a smart robot, but a robot. You have to spell out what you’re looking for. Things I always recommend people consider:

• Any messaging or tone of voice guidelines.
• Information you have about your target audience.
• Specific outcomes you want it to provide, like “I need X versions of this headline or subject line.”
• Anything you might include if you were tasking this to a team member.

Don’t be afraid to ask ChatGPT if there’s any additional information it needs. If anything seems missing, you can always add details later OR go back to the drawing board and start over.

If you’re providing a lot of information and hitting enter multiple times, consider including a note at the end, “Please don’t start yet. I’m dropping more information next. Please just say, ‘Got it,’ and I’ll add the next bit of information.”

4. Get granular and specific.

Ask questions that get right to the point. Don’t be generic here. Instead of asking, “What marketing tactics should I consider?” try a query that’s more specific.

You might consider saying, “My audience of _____ (describe your audience) has responded well to messages and campaigns about how to solve XYZ problem. My company does ______ (explain your value prop). What are some related ideas I could try?”

Let’s try another example. Granted, this isn’t marketing-focused, but it gives you an idea of the specificity.

“Give me a kid-friendly meal plan for five days” will give you five days of breakfast, lunch, dinner, and a snack based on foods you may or may not have or want to eat.

Instead, when you give it more context, it can help you create exactly what you’re looking for.

“I have chicken breast, salmon, and ground beef in the freezer and eggs in the fridge. I also have lots of veggies and a full dry pantry. Please give me a five-day dinner plan with Mediterranean-inspired, kid-friendly meals I can make in 30 minutes or less.”

The prompt above leads to five meal ideas, complete with ingredients and a recipe, which is much easier to use. You can use the same principles in your marketing.

5. Give helpful feedback.

If ChatGPT delivers a hot load of garbage, don’t say, “Nope, that’s not it. Try again.”

Give it the same context and type of feedback that you’d share with someone on your team. “The idea is right on, but your tone is far too formal. Try again, cutting the number of words in half and keeping things more casual yet professional.”

You can also say something like, “This completely misses the mark. I think we need to focus on ____ outcome instead.” Or you might say, “Let’s try that again. Can you give me a version that

Or if it’s spot on, say, “That’s spot on. I really like the tone, cadence, message, etc. Let’s keep going.”

6. Don’t trust it farther than you can throw it.

Because ChatGPT is designed to sound human, it often creates language that sounds good or seems logical or reasonable. The only problem? That means ChatGPT is also notorious for making up facts and statistics, so always double- or triple-check anything it spits out.

9 Statistics About AI and Marketing

Generative AI may be the new kid on the marketing block, but since GPT-4 dropped in March 2023, I’ve seen huge changes in how marketers use AI to improve and streamline productivity. And, based on HubSpot’s recent State of AI report, most marketers seem to agree.

• 35% of marketers report using AI-driven tools in their day-to-day roles.
• 90% believe that AI makes it easier to spend less time on manual tasks, with 88% agreeing that AI frees them up to focus on the most important parts of their roles.
• 77% believe that AI helps pull insights from data that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to find.
• 68% believe that people should use AI and automation but avoid becoming overly reliant on it.
• Across the board, people say that AI and automation saves them 1 hour and 49 minutes every day.
• The number 1 benefit marketers see in AI and automation is that it makes them more effective in their jobs. Increased productivity and less time on manual tasks make up numbers 2 and 3, respectively.
• 89% of all marketers who use generative AI consider it effective for content creation.
• 97% of all marketers who use generative AI consider it effective for data analysis.
• The two most effective strategies for prompting generative AI are experimenting with different prompts to see what works best for your specific use case (#1) and providing relevant context or background information in your prompt (#2).

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Business

1. “What are the top trends in [your industry] for 2023?”
2. “What are the most important metrics to measure the success of our business?”
3. “List ways to reduce cost and increase profitability.”
4. “How can we use social media to increase brand awareness?”
5. “How can we improve search engine optimization for our business?”
6. “How can we improve our customer service experience?”
7. “What are some ways we can boost productivity and employee engagement?”
8. “What are the best tools for budgeting?”
9. “How can A/B testing improve our website’s performance?”
10. “How can we use automation to simplify our marketing and sales tactics?”
11. “List the ways we can use a webinar to increase brand awareness and leads.”
12. “What are the best practices for creating a strong company culture?”
13. “Generate ways to use virtual tours to showcase products and services.”
14. “List the benefits of using a digital asset management tool to organize and share company assets.”
15. “List the benefits of using a customer journey mapping tool to improve the customer experience.”
16. “Generate different ways to use augmented reality to enhance our [product or service].”
17. “How can blockchain technology improve business processes and boost security?”
18. “List the different ways we can implement a customer loyalty program to increase sales and retain customers.”
19. “How can we use customer testimonials to boost our brand’s trust and credibility?”
20. “What are some customer onboarding best practices?”
21. “What are some employee onboarding best practices?”
22. “What are common mistakes start-up companies often make?”
23. “How can I boost employee retention?”
24. “What are best practices in maintaining high morale within your organization?”
25. “What are best practices for start-up businesses?”

27 ChatGPT Prompts for Content Creation and Social Media

1. “Write an 800-word blog post about [subject], and include the following keywords in the headline, subheading, and body paragraphs.” Then, list the keywords you want ChatGPT to include.
2. “Write a list of blog titles that include statistics on [topic].”
3. “Write a YouTube video script about [product, blog, company, etc.].”
4. “Write a 100-word Instagram caption about [topic] in an informative and friendly tone and include relevant hashtags.”
5. “Write 10 YouTube headlines about [topic] and include the words [keywords].”
6. “Generate a Twitter thread about [topic].”
7. “Analyze this blog post for plagiarism.”
8. “Check this blog post for spelling and grammar mistakes.”
9. “Generate five ideas for YouTube videos about [topic, industry, company, service, product, etc.].”
10. “Create a script for a web series that educates viewers about [topic].”
11. “Write a script for an hour-long podcast episode about [topic].”
12. “Write an engaging script for a virtual product launch.”
13. Generate a simple, high-quality image for social media for a [type] company. The goal of the image must be to acquire new customers.”
14. “Translate the following company into [language]: [copy].”
15. “Write an outline for a blog post about [topic]. Include the keywords [keywords] in the headline and subheadings.”
16. “Build a reader persona for [page description].”
17. “Make the following copy more creative: [copy].”
18. “Simply the following copy to make it easy for Grade 3 children to read.”
19. “Rephrase the following copy.”
20. “Write an engaging video script about [topic].”
21. “What are YouTube marketing best practices?”
22. “What are common mistakes marketers make in content creation?
23. “What are best practices when marketing on Instagram?”
24. “How can companies find influencers to collaborate with?”
25. “What are the benefits of influencer marketing?
26. “List five ways to generate leads from YouTube.”
27. “List ways to convince customers to buy a product via Instagram.”

9 ChatGPT Prompts for Analytics

1. “What are the most important KPIs for [industry].”
2. “Write a SWOT analysis for our website traffic.”
3. “What is a good bounce rate for our website?”
4. “How do we boost leads on our website?”
5. “What are the best website analytics tools?”
6. “How can I track my company’s analytics on social media?”
7. “How did I determine which channel generates the most web traffic for my brand?”
8. “What social media platform generates the most leads?”
9. “How can I optimize my website to rank higher in SERPs?

 

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Email Campaigns

1. “Generate [number] subject lines for an email campaign about [product or service.].”
2. “Write [number] holiday-themed subject lines about clothes shopping.”
3. “What are the best subject lines to increase open rates?”
4. “What are best practices for writing an engaging email subject line?”
5. “Write 10 post-purchase email subject lines for [company].”
6. “Write the body copy for a promotional email campaign about [company] spring sale. Write in an upbeat and friendly tone.”
7. “Write a follow-up email for [your brand] with the subject line: [your subject line].”
8. “Write an outline for a weekly email newsletter from [brand] to [target audience]. Include an intro, main point, conclusion, and call-to-action in the outline.”
9. “What are best practices for writing engaging email copy for a marketing campaign?”
10. “List five topics I should write about in my next email newsletter.”
11. “How can I avoid my emails being marked as spam?”
12. “How can I improve my sender reputation?”
13. “How can I ensure my emails are easy to read and navigate on mobile devices?”
14. “How can I make my emails load faster on mobile devices?”
15. “How should I format my images and media to load properly on mobile devices?”
16. “List the most common reasons emails are not delivered to the inbox.”
17. “List the best practices for optimizing an email for mobile devices.”
18. “What are the most common reasons customers unsubscribe from email lists?”
19. “What are some of the best tools to manage marketing email lists?”
20. “How can I boost email subscribers?”
21. “How can I get off the email blacklist?”
22. “How can I improve my business’ email list?”
23. “What factors can decrease email open rates?”
24. “What factors can boost email open rates?
25. “List the top five email marketing tools.”

25 ChatGPT Prompts for Resume

1. “Write a summary showcasing my skills and experiences relevant to a Social Media Manager role.”
2. “Generate a summary highlighting my past achievements.”
3. “Craft summary demonstrating my ability to [skill.”
4. “Generate five bullet points highlighting achievements in [field].”
5. “Create bullet points about my most recent [job title] role highlighting my achievements.”
6. “Generate bullet points showcasing my ability to [skill.]”
7. “How can I make my resume stand out against other candidates?”
8. “What are common mistakes job seekers make on their resumes?”
9. “What are some resume best practices to improve my job search?”
10. “What are common formatting mistakes I should avoid in my resume?”
11. “Copyedit my resume for any spelling or grammatical errors.”
12. “What are some [industry] resume best practices?”
13. “What resume design tools can I use to make my resume stand out?”
14. “Review my resume and suggest improvement and edits.”
15. “What are the most important keywords for applicant tracking systems to include in my resume.”
16. “How can I make my resume more concise?”
17. “What should I include on my resume if I’m applying in [specific industry].”
18. “How do I tailor my resume to specific job postings?”
19. “How can I make my resume more visually appealing?”
20. “How can I make my resume more visually appealing?”
21. “How can I get my resume directly to the hiring manager?”
22. “How soon after submitting my resume should I follow up on a job posting?”
23. “What should I include on a marketing resume?”
24. “Based on this job description, what words should I include in my resume?”
25. “How do I condense my [number] years of experience into a one-page resume?”

11 ChatGPT Prompts for Ecommerce

1. “Write a description for a [product type] and include [product attributes] and [keywords].”
2. “Generate a list of 20 audience demographics that would benefit from a [product or service].”
3. “Think like an ecommerce expert and write 10 frequently asked questions for [your website name and URL.”
4. “Think like an ecommerce SEO expert and write a meta tile for [your brand name] in the [inser industry] industry.”
5. “Behave like an ecommerce SEO expert and write a meta tile for [ product name] from the [industry name] industry.”
6. “Write a title page for [ecommerce website URL] and include [keywords].”
7. “Write a meta description for [ecommerce website URL].”
8. “Craft informative content for our ecommerce About Us page.”
9. “Act as an ecommerce expert and craft a product collection description for the [product] from [brand].”
10. “Act as an ecommerce merchandising specialist and draft a product title for [product] from [brand].”
11. “Create an ecommerce campaign for [product, brand, or service].”

23 ChatGPT Prompts for Customer Service

1. “What’s the best way to reach out to potential customers?”
2. “Generate a list of ways to improve customer service?”
3. “Create a template for an email response to customers inquiring about [product].”
4. “Write a customer service email that addresses the following pain point.”
5. “Generate five helpful suggestions for customers struggling with using [product].”
6. “What are the most frequently asked questions about our [product, service, company, brand]?”
7. “Generate a list of common issues customers have with [product name] and provide solutions for them.”
8. “Write four personalized messages for customers asking about our [product] in a friendly tone.”
9. “Generate 10 chatbot prompts related to our [product].”
10. “Create a help page that explains how to use [product].”
11. “List 10 phrases customer service agents can use to show empathy.”
12. “Provide a template to explain standard retail return policy.”
13. “Rewrite this paragraph to sound more friendly: [paragraph].”
14. “Chat as if you’re a customer who can’t log into their account.”
15. “Summarize the following knowledge base article to give step-by-step instructions.”
16. “Write five questions for a customer experience survey.”
17. “List the qualities of good customer service.”
18. “What are customer service mistakes companies often make?”
19. “How can I streamline the customer service process without losing customers?”
20. “What’s a friendly way to respond to this message from a customer?”
21. “Act as a customer service representative and answer the following question: [question].”
22. “List five different ways a chatbot can greet customers.”
23. “List five ways a chatbot can say goodbye to a customer.”

20 ChatGPT Prompts for Sales

1. “What are cross-selling opportunities available for my [type] business?”
2. “What are some creative ways to generate leads?”
3. “Create a personalized sale email for potential customers. Include [topic, brand name, promo offers, etc.].”
4. “What product customization would you recommend for this customer?” Include customer details in the prompt.”
5. “List 10 keywords people might use when searching for our [product].”
6. “Create five persuasive points to encourage customers to buy our [product].”
7. “List three compelling reasons our customers should buy [product or service].”
8. “List [number] personal branding types I can use for social selling.”
9. “What kind of content categories and topics can I create for social selling on Instagram?”
10. “Write a sales landing page description for [product].”
11. “Write a cold email to a prospective customer introducing my [company or organization] and how it can benefit them using [selling points].”
12. “Write a sales pitch about [product].”
13. “Act as a salesperson and market [product or service] to me.”
14. “Act as a salesperson and answer this question about [product or service].”
15. “Write the text for a social media ad highlighting the [product or service]. Highlight paint-point-specific questions.”
16. “Generate five buyer personas I should include in my cold outreach.”
17. “List five personal branding archetypes I could use for social selling on LinkedIn.”
18. “Generate a script to use when cold-calling start-up founders in my area.”
19. “Craft an answer to this sales question.”
20. “What questions should I ask potential buyers to uncover pain points and priorities to decide if they are a sales-qualified lead for my product?”

Using ChatGPT in Marketing

Generative AI tools like ChatGPT have the power to change everything about the way we market. I’ve already seen huge time savings when it comes to analyzing transcript and brainstorming.

And, I suspect we’re only seeing the tip of the iceberg.

However, a word of caution: ChatGPT has a ton of potential as a tool, but it’s still just a tool, which means you have to know how to use it. That’s why we’ve provided this article.

When you use the prompts here, you’ll have a leg up when it comes to knowing how to create a prompt to build out marketing campaigns, answer pressing sales questions, and free up time so you can focus on the more creative aspects of marketing.

Now that you know the prompts, it’s your turn. Time to dive in and experiment with ChatGPT to see how it fits into your marketing processes.

If Hubspot is of interest and you'd like more information, please do make contact or take a look in more detail here.

Credit: Original article published here.

Our view at Stack - Simplify growth with an all-in-one platform. Powerful marketing, sales, and support automation. Integrated CMS. Scalable software. Crafted for customer experience.

So, you want to discover what truly works for your audience, and you’ve heard about this mythical form of marketing testing. But you have questions like: “What is A/B testing in marketing, anyway?” and “Why does it matter?”

Don’t worry! You’ll get all the answers to your burning questions. I’ll even tell you the second answer straight away…

When marketers like us create landing pages, write email copy, or design call-to-action buttons, it can be tempting to use our intuition to predict what will make people click and connect.

But as anyone who’s been in marketing for a minute will tell you, always expect the unexpected. So, instead of basing marketing decisions on a “feeling,” you’re much better off running an A/B test to see what the data says.

Keep reading to learn how to conduct the entire A/B testing process before, during, and after data collection so you can make the best decisions based on your results.

Table of Contents

• What is A/B testing?
• History of A/B Testing
• Why is A/B Testing important?
• How does A/B testing work?
• A/B Testing in Marketing
• What does A/B testing involve?
• A/B Testing Goals
• How to Design an A/B Test
• How to Conduct A/B Testing
• How to Read A/B Testing Results
• A/B Testing Examples
• 10 A/B Testing Tips from Marketing Examples

 

If you’re a visual learner, never fear: This video walks you through everything you need to know. 

History of A/B Testing

It’s hard to track down the “true” origins of A/B testing. However, in terms of marketing, A/B testing — albeit in its initial and imperfect form — arguably started with American advertiser and author Claude Hopkins. Hopkins tested his ad campaigns using promotional coupons.

Still, Hopkins’ “Scientific Advertising” process didn’t include the key principles we use in A/B testing today. We have 20th-century biologist Ronald Fisher to thank for those. Fisher, who defined statistical significance and developed the null hypothesis, helped to make A/B testing more reliable.

That said, the marketing A/B testing we know and love today started in the 1960s and ‘70s. It was also used to test direct response campaign methods. Another key marketing moment came to us in 2000. At this time, Google engineers ran their first A/B test. (They wanted to know the best number of results to display on the search engine results page.)

Why is A/B testing important?

A/B testing has many benefits to a marketing team, depending on what you decide to test. For example, there is a limitless list of items you can test to determine the overall impact on your bottom line. But you shouldn’t sleep on using A/B testing to find out exactly what your audience responds best to either. Let’s learn more.

You Can Find Ways To Improve Your Bottom Line

Let’s say you employ a content creator with a $50,000/year salary. This content creator publishes five articles weekly for the company blog, totaling 260 articles per year.

If the average post on the company’s blog generates 10 leads, you could say it costs just over $192 to generate 10 leads for the business ($50,000 salary ÷ 260 articles = $192 per article). That’s a solid chunk of change.

Now, if you ask this content creator to spend two days developing an A/B test on one article, instead of writing two posts in that time, you might burn $192, as you’re publishing fewer articles.

But, if that A/B test finds you can increase conversion rates from 10 to 20 leads, you just spent $192 to potentially double the number of customers your business gets from your blog.

… in a Low Cost, High Reward Way

If the test fails, of course, you lost $192 — but now you can make your next A/B test even more educated. If that second test succeeds, you ultimately spent $384 to double your company’s revenue.

No matter how many times your A/B test fails, its eventual success will almost always outweigh the cost of conducting it.

You can run many types of split tests to make the experiment worth it in the end. Above all, these tests are valuable to a business because they’re low in cost but high in reward.

You Can Find Out What Works for Your Audience

A/B testing can be valuable because different audiences behave, well, differently. Something that works for one company may not necessarily work for another.

Let’s take an unlikely B2B marketing tactic as an example. I was looking through HubSpot’s 2024 Industry Trends Report data for an article last week. I noticed that 10% of B2B marketers planned to decrease their investment in NFTs as part of their strategy in 2024.

My first thought was, “Huh, NFTs in B2B?”

Then it hit me. To have that decrease, B2B marketers must’ve been using NFTs in the first place. Even more surprising than this revelation was that 34% of marketers plan to increase investment in NFTs as part of their B2B strategy.

That’s just one example of why conversion rate optimization (CRO) experts hate the term “best practices.” Because that “best practice”? Well, it may not actually be the best practice for you.

Buuut, this kind of testing can be complex if you’re not careful. So, let’s review how A/B testing works to ensure you don’t make incorrect assumptions about what your audience likes.

How does A/B testing work?

To run an A/B test, you need to create two different versions of one piece of content, with changes to a single variable.

Then, you’ll show these two versions to two similarly-sized audiences and analyze which one performed better over a specific period. But remember, the testing period should be long enough to make accurate conclusions about your results.

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A/B testing helps marketers observe how one version of a piece of marketing content performs alongside another. Here are two types of A/B tests you might conduct to increase your website’s conversion rate.

Example 1: User Experience Test

Perhaps you want to see if moving a certain call-to-action (CTA) button to the top of your homepage instead of keeping it in the sidebar will improve its click-through rate.

To A/B test this theory, you’d create another, alternative web page that uses the new CTA placement.

The existing design with the sidebar CTA — or the “control” — is version A. Version B with the CTA at the top is the “challenger.” Then, you’d test these two versions by showing each to a predetermined percentage of site visitors.

Ideally, the percentage of visitors seeing either version is the same.

Learn how to easily A/B test a component of your website with HubSpot’s Marketing Hub.

Example 2: Design Test

Perhaps you want to find out if changing the color of your CTA button can increase its click-through rate.

To A/B test this theory, you’d design an alternative CTA button with a different button color that leads to the same landing page as the control.

If you usually use a red CTA button in your marketing content, and the green variation receives more clicks after your A/B test, this could merit changing the default color of your CTA buttons to green from now on.

To learn more about A/B testing, download our free introductory guide here.

A/B Testing in Marketing

Here are some elements you might decide to test in your marketing campaigns:

• Subject lines.
• CTAs.
• Headers.
• Titles.
• Fonts and colors.
• Product images.
• Blog graphics.
• Body copy.
• Navigation.
• Opt-in forms.

Of course, this list is not exhaustive. Your options are countless and differ depending on the type of marketing campaign you’re A/B testing. (Blog graphics typically won’t apply to email campaigns, for example. But product images can apply to both email and blog testing.)

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But let’s say you wanted to test how different subject lines impacted an email marketing campaign’s conversion rates. What would you need to get started?

What does A/B testing involve?

Here’s what you’ll need to run a successful A/B test.

• A campaign: You’ll need to pick a marketing campaign (i.e., a newsletter, landing page, or email) that’s already live. We’re going with email.
• What you want to test: You’ll need to pick the element(s) you wish to A/B test. In this case, that would be the subject line used in an email marketing campaign. But you can test all manner of things, even down to font size and CTA button color. Remember, though, if you want accurate measurements, only test one element at a time.
• Your goals: Are you testing for the sake of it? Or do you have well-defined goals? Ideally, your A/B testing should link to your revenue goals. (So, discovering which campaign has a better impact on revenue success.) To track success, you’ll need to select the right metrics. For revenue, you’d track metrics like sales, sign-ups, and clicks.

A/B Testing Goals

A/B testing can tell you a lot about how your intended audience behaves and interacts with your marketing campaign.

Not only does A/B testing help determine your audience’s behavior, but the results of the tests can help determine your next marketing goals.

Here are some common goals marketers have for their business when A/B testing.

Increased Website Traffic

You’ll want to use A/B testing to help you find the right wording for your website titles so you can catch your audience’s attention.

Testing different blog or web page titles can change the number of people who click on that hyperlinked title to get to your website. This can increase website traffic.

Providing it’s relevant, an increase in web traffic is a good thing! More traffic usually means more sales.

Higher Conversion Rate

Not only does A/B testing help drive traffic to your website, it can also help boost conversion rates.

Testing different locations, colors, or even anchor text on your CTAs can change the number of people who click these CTAs to get to a landing page.

This can increase the number of people who fill out forms on your website, submit their contact info to you, and “convert” into a lead.

Lower Bounce Rate

A/B testing can help determine what’s driving traffic away from your website. Maybe the feel of your website doesn’t vibe with your audience. Or perhaps the colors clash, leaving a bad taste in your target audience’s mouth.

If your website visitors leave (or “bounce”) quickly after visiting your website, testing different blog post introductions, fonts, or featured images can retain visitors.

Perfect Product Images

You know you have the perfect product or service to offer your audience. But, how do you know you’ve picked the right product image to convey what you have to offer?

Use A/B testing to determine which product image best catches the attention of your intended audience. Compare the images against each other and pick the one with the highest sales rate.

Lower Cart Abandonment

Ecommerce businesses see an average of 70% of customers leave their website with items in their shopping cart. This is known as “shopping cart abandonment” and is, of course, detrimental to any online store.

Testing different product photos, check-out page designs, and even where shipping costs are displayed can lower this abandonment rate.

Now, let’s examine a checklist for setting up, running, and measuring an A/B test.

How to Design an A/B Test

Designing an A/B test can seem like a complicated task at first. But, trust us — it’s simple.

The key to designing a successful A/B test is to determine which elements of your blog, website, or ad campaign can be compared and contrasted against a new or different version.

Before you jump into testing all the elements of your marketing campaign, check out these A/B testing best practices.

Test appropriate items.

List elements that could influence how your target audience interacts with your ads or website. Specifically, consider which elements of your website or ad campaign influence a sale or conversion.

Be sure the elements you choose are appropriate and can be modified for testing purposes.

For example, you might test which fonts or images best grab your audience’s attention in a Facebook ad campaign. Or, you might pilot two pages to determine which keeps visitors on your website longer.

Pro tip: Choose appropriate test items by listing elements that affect your overall sales or lead conversion, and then prioritize them.

Determine the correct sample size.

The sample size of your A/B test can have a large impact on the results — and sometimes, that is not a good thing. A sample size that is too small will skew the results.

Make sure your sample size is large enough to yield accurate results. Use tools like a sample size calculator to help you figure out the correct number of interactions or visitors to your website or participants in your campaign you need to obtain the best result.

Check your data.

A sound split test will yield statistically significant and reliable results. In other words, the results of your A/B test are not influenced by randomness or chance. But, how can you be sure your results are statistically significant and reliable?

Just like determining sample size, tools are available to help verify your data.

Tools, such as Convertize’s AB Test Significance Calculator, allow users to plug in traffic data and conversion rates of variables and select the desired level of confidence.

The higher the statistical significance achieved, the less you can expect the data to occur by chance.

Pro tip: Ensure your data is statistically significant and reliable by using tools like A/B test significance calculators.

Schedule your tests.

When comparing variables, keeping the rest of your controls the same is important — including when you schedule to run your tests.

If you’re in the ecommerce space, you’ll need to take holiday sales into consideration.

For example, if you run an A/B test on the control during a peak sales time, the traffic to your website and your sales may be higher than the variable you tested in an “off week.”

To ensure the accuracy of your split tests, pick a comparable timeframe for both tested elements. Be sure to run your campaigns for the same length of time, too, to get the best, most accurate results.

Pro tip: Choose a timeframe when you can expect similar traffic to both portions of your split test.

Test only one element.

Each variable of your website or ad campaign can significantly impact your intended audience’s behavior. That’s why looking at just one element at a time is important when conducting A/B tests.

Attempting to test multiple elements in the same A/B test will yield unreliable results. With unreliable results, you won’t know which element had the biggest impact on consumer behavior.

Be sure to design your split test for just one element of your ad campaign or website.

Pro tip: Don’t try to test multiple elements at once. A good A/B test will be designed to test only one element at a time.

Analyze the data.

As a marketer, you might have an idea of how your target audience behaves with your campaign and web pages. A/B testing can give you a better indication of how consumers really interact with your sites.

After testing is complete, take some time to thoroughly analyze the data. You might be surprised to find that what you thought was working for your campaigns was less effective than you initially thought.

Pro tip: Accurate and reliable data may tell a different story than you first imagined. Use the data to help plan or make changes to your campaigns.

How to Conduct A/B Testing

Follow along with our free A/B testing kit with everything you need to run A/B testing, including a test tracking template, a how-to guide for instruction and inspiration, and a statistical significance calculator to see if your tests were wins, losses, or inconclusive.

Before the A/B Test

Let’s cover the steps to take before you start your A/B test.

1. Pick one variable to test.

As you optimize your web pages and emails, you’ll find there are many variables you want to test. But to evaluate effectiveness, you’ll want to isolate one independent variable and measure its performance.

Otherwise, you can’t be sure which variable was responsible for changes in performance.

You can test more than one variable for a single web page or email — just be sure you’re testing them one at a time.

To determine your variable, look at the elements in your marketing resources and their possible alternatives for design, wording, and layout. You may also test email subject lines, sender names, and different ways to personalize your emails.

Pro tip: You can use HubSpot’s AI Email Writer to write email copy for different audiences. The software is built into HubSpot’s marketing and sales tools.

Keep in mind that even simple changes, like changing the image in your email or the words on your CTA button, can drive big improvements. In fact, these sorts of changes are usually easier to measure than the bigger ones.

Note: Sometimes, testing multiple variables rather than a single variable makes more sense. This is called multivariate testing.

If you’re wondering whether you should run an A/B test versus a multivariate test, here’s a helpful article from Optimizely that compares the processes.

2. Identify your goal.

Although you’ll measure several metrics during any one test, choose a primary metric to focus on before you run the test. In fact, do it before you even set up the second variation.

This is your dependent variable, which changes based on how you manipulate the independent variable.

Think about where you want this dependent variable to be at the end of the split test. You might even state an official hypothesis and examine your results based on this prediction.

If you wait until afterward to think about which metrics are important to you, what your goals are, and how the changes you’re proposing might affect user behavior, then you may not set up the test in the most effective way.

3. Create a ‘control’ and a ‘challenger.’

You now have your independent variable, your dependent variable, and your desired outcome. Use this information to set up the unaltered version of whatever you’re testing as your control scenario.

If you’re testing a web page, this is the unaltered page as it exists already. If you’re testing a landing page, this would be the landing page design and copy you would normally use.

From there, build a challenger — the altered website, landing page, or email that you’ll test against your control.

For example, if you’re wondering whether adding a testimonial to a landing page would make a difference in conversions, set up your control page with no testimonials. Then, create your challenger with a testimonial.

4. Split your sample groups equally and randomly.

For tests where you have more control over the audience — like with emails — you need to test with two or more equal audiences to have conclusive results.

How you do this will vary depending on the A/B testing tool you use. Suppose you’re a HubSpot Enterprise customer conducting an A/B test on an email, for example.

HubSpot will automatically split traffic to your variations so that each variation gets a random sampling of visitors.

5. Determine your sample size (if applicable).

 

How you determine your sample size will also vary depending on your A/B testing tool, as well as the type of A/B test you’re running.

If you’re A/B testing an email, you’ll probably want to send an A/B test to a subset of your list large enough to achieve statistically significant results.

Eventually, you’ll pick a winner to send to the rest of the list. (See “The Science of Split Testing” ebook at the end of this article for more.)

If you’re a HubSpot Enterprise customer, you’ll have some help determining the size of your sample group using a slider.

It’ll let you do a 50/50 A/B test of any sample size — although all other sample splits require a list of at least 1,000 recipients.

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If you’re testing something that doesn’t have a finite audience, like a web page, then how long you keep your test running will directly affect your sample size.

You’ll need to let your test run long enough to obtain a substantial number of views. Otherwise, it will be hard to tell whether there was a statistically significant difference between variations.

6. Decide how significant your results need to be.

Once you’ve picked your goal metric, think about how significant your results need to be to justify choosing one variation over another.

Statistical significance is a super important part of the A/B testing process that’s often misunderstood. If you need a refresher, I recommend reading this blog post on statistical significance from a marketing standpoint.

The higher the percentage of your confidence level, the more sure you can be about your results. In most cases, you’ll want a confidence level of 95% minimum, especially if the experiment was time-intensive.

However, sometimes, it makes sense to use a lower confidence rate if you don’t need the test to be as stringent.

Matt Rheault, a senior software engineer at HubSpot, thinks of statistical significance like placing a bet.

What odds are you comfortable placing a bet on? Saying, “I’m 80% sure this is the right design, and I’m willing to bet everything on it,” is similar to running an A/B test to 80% significance and then declaring a winner.

Rheault also says you’ll likely want a higher confidence threshold when testing for something that only slightly improves the conversion rate. Why? Because random variance is more likely to play a bigger role.

“An example where we could feel safer lowering our confidence threshold is an experiment that will likely improve conversion rate by 10% or more, such as a redesigned hero section,” he explained.

“The takeaway here is that the more radical the change, the less scientific we need to be process-wise. The more specific the change (button color, microcopy, etc.), the more scientific we should be because the change is less likely to have a large and noticeable impact on conversion rate,” Rheault says.

7. Make sure you’re only running one test at a time on any campaign.

Testing more than one thing for a single campaign can complicate results.

For example, if you A/B test an email campaign that directs to a landing page while you’re A/B testing that landing page, how can you know which change caused the increase in leads?

During the A/B Test

Let’s cover the steps to take during your A/B test.

8. Use an A/B testing tool.

To do an A/B test on your website or in an email, you’ll need to use an A/B testing tool.

If you’re a HubSpot Enterprise customer, the HubSpot software has features that let you A/B test emails (learn how here), CTAs (learn how here), and landing pages (learn how here).

For non-HubSpot Enterprise customers, other options include Google Analytics, which lets you A/B test up to 10 full versions of a single web page and compare their performance using a random sample of users.

9. Test both variations simultaneously.

Timing plays a significant role in your marketing campaign’s results, whether it’s the time of day, day of the week, or month of the year.

If you were to run version A for one month and version B a month later, how would you know whether the performance change was caused by the different design or the different month?

When running A/B tests, you must run the two variations simultaneously. Otherwise, you may be left second-guessing your results.

The only exception is if you’re testing timing, like finding the optimal times for sending emails.

Depending on what your business offers and who your subscribers are, the optimal time for subscriber engagement can vary significantly by industry and target market.

10. Give the A/B test enough time to produce useful data.

Again, you’ll want to make sure that you let your test run long enough to obtain a substantial sample size. Otherwise, it’ll be hard to tell whether the two variations had a statistically significant difference.

How long is long enough? Depending on your company and how you execute the A/B test, getting statistically significant results could happen in hours… or days… or weeks.

A big part of how long it takes to get statistically significant results is how much traffic you get — so if your business doesn’t get a lot of traffic to your website, it’ll take much longer to run an A/B test.

Read this blog post to learn more about sample size and timing.

11. Ask for feedback from real users.

A/B testing has a lot to do with quantitative data… but that won’t necessarily help you understand why people take certain actions over others. While you’re running your A/B test, why not collect qualitative feedback from real users?

A survey or poll is one of the best ways to ask people for their opinions.

You might add an exit survey on your site that asks visitors why they didn’t click on a certain CTA or one on your thank-you pages that asks visitors why they clicked a button or filled out a form.

For example, you might find that many people clicked on a CTA leading them to an ebook, but once they saw the price, they didn’t convert.

That kind of information will give you a lot of insight into why your users behave in certain ways.

After the A/B Test

Finally, let’s cover the steps to take after your A/B test.

12. Focus on your goal metric.

Again, although you’ll be measuring multiple metrics, focus on that primary goal metric when you do your analysis.

For example, if you tested two variations of an email and chose leads as your primary metric, don’t get caught up on click-through rates.

You might see a high click-through rate and poor conversions, in which case you might choose the variation that had a lower click-through rate in the end.

13. Measure the significance of your results using our A/B testing calculator.

Now that you’ve determined which variation performs the best, it’s time to determine whether your results are statistically significant. In other words, are they enough to justify a change?

To find out, you’ll need to conduct a test of statistical significance. You could do that manually, or you could just plug in the results from your experiment to our free A/B testing calculator. (The calculator comes as part of our free A/B testing kit.)

You’ll be prompted to input your result into the red cells for each variation you tested. The results in the template are for either “Visitors” or “Conversions.” Still, you can customize these headings for other types of results.

You’ll then see a series of automated calculations based on your inputs. From there, the calculator will determine statistical significance.

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14. Take action based on your results.

If one variation is statistically better than the other, you have a winner. Complete your test by disabling the losing variation in your A/B testing tool.

If neither variation is significant, the variable you tested didn’t impact results, and you’ll have to mark the test as inconclusive. In this case, stick with the original variation or run another test. You can use failed data to help you figure out a new iteration on your new test.

While A/B tests help you impact results on a case-by-case basis, you can also apply the lessons you learn from each test to future efforts.

For example, suppose you’ve conducted A/B tests in your email marketing and have repeatedly found that using numbers in email subject lines generates better clickthrough rates. In that case, consider using that tactic in more of your emails.

15. Plan your next A/B test.

The A/B test you just finished may have helped you discover a new way to make your marketing content more effective — but don’t stop there. There’s always room for more optimization.

You can even try conducting an A/B test on another feature of the same web page or email you just did a test on.

For example, if you just tested a headline on a landing page, why not do a new test on the body copy? Or a color scheme? Or images? Always keep an eye out for opportunities to increase conversion rates and leads.

You can use HubSpot’s A/B Test Tracking Kit to plan and organize your experiments.

Download This Template Now

How to Read A/B Testing Results

As a marketer, you know the value of automation. Given this, you likely use software that handles the A/B test calculations for you — a huge help. But, after the calculations are done, you need to know how to read your results. Let’s go over how.

1. Check your goal metric.

The first step in reading your A/B test results is looking at your goal metric, which is usually conversion rate.

After you’ve plugged your results into your A/B testing calculator, you’ll get two results for each version you’re testing. You’ll also get a significant result for each of your variations.

2. Compare your conversion rates.

By looking at your results, you’ll likely be able to tell if one of your variations performed better than the other. However, the true test of success is whether your results are statistically significant.

For example, variation A had a 16.04% conversion rate. Variation B had a 16.02% conversion rate, and your confidence interval of statistical significance is 95%. Variation A has a higher conversion rate, but the results are not statistically significant, meaning that variation A won’t significantly improve your overall conversion rate.

3. Segment your audiences for further insights.

Regardless of significance, it’s valuable to break down your results by audience segment to understand how each key area responded to your variations. Common variables for segmenting audiences are:

• Visitor type, or which version performed best for new visitors versus repeat visitors.
• Device type, or which version performed best on mobile versus desktop.
• Traffic source, or which version performed best based on where traffic to your two variations originated.

Let’s go over some examples of A/B experiments you could run for your business.

A/B Testing Examples

We’ve discussed how A/B tests are used in marketing and how to conduct one — but how do they actually look in practice?

As you might guess, we run many A/B tests to increase engagement and drive conversions across our platform. Here are five examples of A/B tests to inspire your own experiments.

1. Site Search

Site search bars help users quickly find what they’re after on a particular website. HubSpot found from previous analysis that visitors who interacted with its site search bar were more likely to convert on a blog post. So, we ran an A/B test to increase engagement with the search bar.

In this test, search bar functionality was the independent variable, and views on the content offer thank you page was the dependent variable. We used one control condition and three challenger conditions in the experiment.

The search bar remained unchanged in the control condition (variant A).

In variant B, the search bar was larger and more visually prominent, and the placeholder text was set to “search by topic.”

Variant C appeared identical to variant B but only searched the HubSpot Blog rather than the entire website.

In variant D, the search bar was larger, but the placeholder text was set to “search the blog.” This variant also searched only the HubSpot Blog.

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We found variant D to be the most effective: It increased conversions by 3.4% over the control and increased the percentage of users who used the search bar by 6.5%.

2. Mobile CTAs

HubSpot uses several CTAs for content offers in our blog posts, including ones in the body of the post as well as at the bottom of the page. We test these CTAs extensively to optimize their performance.

We ran an A/B test for our mobile users to see which type of bottom-of-page CTA converted best.

For our independent variable, we altered the design of the CTA bar. Specifically, we used one control and three challengers in our test. We used pageviews on the CTA thank you page and CTA clicks for our dependent variables.

The control condition included our normal placement of CTAs at the bottom of posts. In variant B, the CTA had no close or minimize option.

 

 

In variant C, mobile readers could close the CTA by tapping an X icon. Once it was closed out, it wouldn’t reappear.

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In variant D, we included an option to minimize the CTA with an up/down caret.

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Our tests found all variants to be successful. Variant D was the most successful, with a 14.6% increase in conversions over the control. This was followed by variant C with an 11.4% increase and variant B with a 7.9% increase.

3. Author CTAs

In another CTA experiment, HubSpot tested whether adding the word “free” and other descriptive language to author CTAs at the top of blog posts would increase content leads.

Past research suggested that using “free” in CTA text would drive more conversions and that text specifying the type of content offered would help SEO. In the test, the independent variable was CTA text, and the main dependent variable was conversion rate on content offer forms.

In the control condition, the author CTA text was unchanged (see the orange button in the image below).

In variant B, the word “free” was added to the CTA text.

In variant C, descriptive wording was added to the CTA text in addition to “free.”

Interestingly, variant B saw a loss in form submissions, down by 14% compared to the control. This was unexpected, as including “free” in content offer text is widely considered a best practice.

Meanwhile, form submissions in variant C outperformed the control by 4%. It was concluded that adding descriptive text to the author CTA helped users understand the offer and thus made them more likely to download.

4. Blog Table of Contents

To help users better navigate the blog, HubSpot tested a new Table of Contents (TOC) module. The goal was to improve user experience by presenting readers with their desired content more quickly. We also tested whether adding a CTA to this TOC module would increase conversions.

The independent variable of this A/B test was the inclusion and type of TOC module in blog posts. The dependent variables were conversion rate on content offer form submissions and clicks on the CTA inside the TOC module.

The control condition did not include the new TOC module — control posts either had no table of contents or a simple bulleted list of anchor links within the body of the post near the top of the article (pictured below).

In variant B, the new TOC module was added to blog posts. This module was sticky, meaning it remained onscreen as users scrolled down the page. Variant B also included a content offer CTA at the bottom of the module.

Variant C included an identical module to variant B but with the CTA removed.

Variant C included an identical module to variant B but with the CTA removed.

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Both variants B and C did not increase the conversion rate on blog posts. The control condition outperformed variant B by 7% and performed equally with variant C. Also, few users interacted with the new TOC module or the CTA inside the module.

5. Review Notifications

To determine the best way of gathering customer reviews, we ran a split test of email notifications versus in-app notifications.

Here, the independent variable was the type of notification, and the dependent variable was the percentage of those who left a review out of all those who opened the notification.

In the control, HubSpot sent a plain text email notification asking users to leave a review. In variant B, HubSpot sent an email with a certificate image including the user’s name.

For variant C, HubSpot sent users an in-app notification.

Ultimately, both emails performed similarly and outperformed the in-app notifications. About 25% of users who opened an email left a review versus the 10.3% who opened in-app notifications. Emails were also more often opened by users.

10 A/B Testing Tips From Marketing Experts

I spoke to nine marketing experts from across disciplines to get their tips on A/B testing.

1. Clearly define your goals and metrics first.

“In my experience, the number one tip for A/B testing in marketing is to clearly define your goals and metrics before conducting any tests,” says Noel Griffith, CMO at SupplyGem.

Griffith explains that this means having a solid understanding of what you want to achieve with your test and how you will measure its success. This matters because, without clear goals, it’s easy to get lost in the data and draw incorrect conclusions.

For example, Griffith says, if you’re testing two different email subject lines, your goal could be to increase open rates.

“By clearly defining this goal and setting a specific metric to measure success (e.g., a 10% increase in open rates), you can effectively evaluate the performance of each variant and make data-driven decisions,” says Griffith.

Aside from helping you focus your testing efforts, Noel explains that having clear goals also means you can accurately interpret the results and apply them to improve your marketing strategies.

2. Test only ONE thing during each A/B test.

“This is the most important tip for A/B marketing from my perspective… Always decide on one thing to test for each individual A/B test,” says Hanna Feltges, growth marketing manager at Niceboard.

For example, when A/B testing button placement in emails, Feltges makes sure the only difference between these two emails is the button placement. No difference should be in the subject line, copy, or images, as this could skew the results and make the test invalid.

Feltges applies the same principle to metrics by choosing one metric to evaluate test results

“For emails, I will select a winner based on a predefined metric, such as CTR, open rate, reply rate, etc. In my example of the button placement, I would select CTR as my deciding metric and evaluate the results based on this metric,” Feltges says.

3. Start with a hypothesis to prove or disprove.

Another similarly important tip for A/B testing is to start with a hypothesis. The goal of each A/B test is then to prove the hypothesis right or wrong, Feltges notes.

For example, Feltges poses testing two different subject lines for a cold outreach email. Her hypothesis here is: “Having a subject line with the prospect’s first name will lead to higher open rates than a subject line without the prospect’s first name,” she says.

Now, she can run multiple tests with the same hypothesis and can then evaluate if the statement is true or not.

Feltges explains that the idea here is that marketers often draw quick conclusions from A/B tests, such as “Having the first name in the subject line performs better.” But that is not 100% true. A/B tests are all about being precise and specific in the results.

4. Track key test details for accurate planning and analysis.

“I keep a running log of how long my A/B tests for SEO took, and I make sure to track critical metrics like the statistical significance rate that was reached,” says NamePepper Founder Dave VerMeer.

VerMeer explains that the log is organized in a spreadsheet that includes other columns for things like:

• The type of test.
• Details about what was tested.
• Dates.

“If I notice any factors that could have influenced the test, I note those as well,” he adds. Other factors could be a competitor having a special event or something that happened in the news and caused a traffic spike.

“I check the log whenever I’m planning a series of A/B tests. For example, it lets me see trends and forecast how the seasonality may affect the test period lengths. Then I adjust the test schedule accordingly,” VerMeer says.

According to VerMeer, this form of tracking is also helpful for setting realistic expectations and providing clues as to why a test result did or didn’t match up with past performance.

5. Test often…

When I spoke to Gabriel Gan, head of editorial for In Real Life Malaysia, for my guide on running an email marketing audit, he set out two main rules for A/B testing. For the A/B testing email, Gan recommends setting email A as the incumbent and email B as the contender.

Like Hanna, Gabriel emphasizes changing only one variable at a time. “For example, in email B, when testing open rates, only tweak the subject line and not the preview,” says Gan.

That’s because if you have more than one variable changed from the old email, “it’s almost impossible to determine which new addition you made has contributed to the improvement in OPR/CTR.”

Aside from only changing one variable at a time, Gan recommends testing often until you find out what works and what doesn’t.

“There’s a perception that once you set up your email list and create a template for your emails, you can ‘set it and forget it.’” Gan says. “But now, with the power of A/B testing, with just a few rounds of testing your headlines, visuals, copy, offer, call-to-action, etc., you can find out what your audience loves, do more of it, and improve your conversion rates twofold or threefold.”

6. …But don’t feel like you need to test everything.

“My top tip for A/B testing is only to use it strategically,” says Joe Kevens, director of demand generation at PartnerStack and the founder of B2B SaaS Reviews. Kevens explains that “strategically” means that only some things warrant an A/B test due to the time and resources it consumes.

“I’ve learned from experience that testing minor elements like CTA button colors can be a waste of time and effort (unless you work at Amazon or some mega-corporation that gets a gazillion page visits, and a minor change can make a meaningful impact),” Kevens says.

Kevens recommends that instead, it’s more beneficial to concentrate on high-impact areas such as homepage layouts, demo or trial pages, and high-profile marketing messages. That’s because these elements have a better shot to impact conversion rates and overall user experience.

Kevens reminds us that “A/B testing can be powerful, but its effectiveness comes from focusing on changes that can significantly impact your business outcomes.”

7. Use segmentation to micro-identify winning elements.

“When using A/B testing in marketing, don’t limit your target audience to just one set of parameters,” says Brian David Crane, founder and CMO of Spread Great Ideas.

Crane recommends using criteria like demographics, user behavior, past interactions, and buying history to experiment with A/B testing of these different segments. You can then filter the winning strategy for each segment.

“We use core metrics like click-through rates, bounce rates, and customer lifetime value to identify the combination that converts the most,” explains Crane.

8. Leverage micro-conversions for granular insights.

“I know that it’s common to focus on macro-conversions, such as sales or sign-ups, in A/B testing. However, my top tip is to also pay attention to micro-conversions,” says Laia Quintana, head of marketing and sales at TeamUp.

Quintana explains that micro-conversions are smaller actions users take before completing a macro-conversion. They could be actions like clicking on a product image, spending a certain amount of time on a page, or watching a promotional video.

But why are these micro-conversions important? Quintana states, “They provide granular insights into user behavior and can help identify potential roadblocks in the conversion path.”

For example, if users spend a lot of time on a product page but do not add items to their cart, there might be an issue with the page layout or information clarity. By A/B testing different elements on the page, you can identify and rectify these issues to improve the overall conversion rate.

“Moreover, tracking micro-conversions allows you to segment your audience more effectively. You can identify which actions are most indicative of a user eventually making a purchase and then tailor your marketing efforts to encourage those actions. This level of detail in your A/B testing can significantly enhance the effectiveness of your marketing strategy,” says Quintana.

9. Running LinkedIn Ads? Start with five different versions and A/B test them.

“A best practice when running LinkedIn Ads is to start a campaign with five different versions of your ad,” says Hristina Stefanova, head of marketing operations at Goose’n’Moose. Stefanova reminds us that it’s important to tweak just one variable at a time across each version.

For a recent campaign, Stefanova started with five ad variations — four using different hero images and three having the CTA tweaked.

“I let the campaign run with all five variations for a week. At that point, there were two clearly great performing ads, so I paused the other three and continued running the campaign with the two best-performing ones,” says Stefanova.

According to Stefanova, the two ads performed best and had the lowest CPC. The A/B testing exercise helped not only the specific campaign but also helped her to better understand what attracts their target audience.

So what’s next? “Images with people in them are better received, so for upcoming campaigns, I am focusing right away on producing the right imagery. All backed up by real performance data thanks to A/B testing,” Stefanova says.

10. Running SEO A/B tests? Do this with your test and control group URLs.

“Given that the SEO space is constantly evolving, it’s getting increasingly difficult to run any sort of experiments and get reliable and statistically significant results. This is especially true when running SEO A/B tests,” says Ryan Jones, marketing manager at SEOTesting.

Luckily, Jones explains that you can do things to mitigate this and make sure that any SEO A/B tests you run now — and in the future — are reliable. You can then use the tests as a “North Star” when making larger-scale changes to your site.

“My number one tip would be to ensure that your control group and test group of URLs contain as identical URLs as you can make them. For example, if you’re running an A/B test on your PLP pages as an ecommerce site, choose PLPs from the same product type and with the same traffic levels. This way, you can ensure that your test data will be reliable,” says Jones.

Why does this matter? “Perhaps the number one thing that ‘messes’ with A/B test data is control and variant groups that are too dissimilar. But by ensuring you are testing against statistically similar URLs, you can mitigate this better than anything else,” Jones says.

Start A/B Testing Today

A/B testing allows you to get to the truth of what content and marketing your audience wants to see. With HubSpot’s Campaign Assistant, you’ll be able to generate copy for landing pages, emails, or ads that can be used for A/B testing.

Learn how to best carry out some of the steps above using the free ebook below.

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in May 2016 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

If Hubspot is of interest and you'd like more information, please do make contact or take a look in more detail here.

Credit: Original article published here.

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Our 2024 State of Marketing & Trends Report went live earlier this year, and I recently dug into the data and compiled a list of key marketing recommendations for this upcoming year to answer common questions like:

• Which industry trends and tactics are marketers investing in?
• What challenges are they facing?
• And, what are their plans and expectations for 2024 and beyond?

Let’s dive into my recommendations.

11 Data-Backed Marketing Recommendations for 2024

1. Produce short-form videos.

Our survey included more than 1,400 global B2B and B2C marketers, and over half of them told us that they’re leveraging short-form video in 2024, and it’s the format they plan to invest the most in this year. Moreover, it offers the highest ROI of any other content format.

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Short-form video is also incredibly effective with consumers. While I’ve yet to buy something on social media (I’m afraid of scams), the draw is certainly there for me and my consumer peers — 56% of them say they’ve bought something based on an ad they saw on TikTok.

So, why do consumers engage more with short over long-form content? When done right, short-form content is quick but concise, enabling fast-paced web users to quickly get most of the information they need. And, if a short-form video doesn’t pack all the information a person needs to convert, it usually forces marketers to point out the most important facts that will make viewers eager to learn more.

I think Miss.Excel (a company that offers Microsoft Excel courses) is a great example of using short-form videos on Instagram. In this quick video, its founder and CEO, Kat Norton, demonstrates her credibility as an Excel coach by showing viewers how to convert a list of names in all caps to proper text.

If you plan to leverage short-form content in the next year, read up on the latest trends and tips from experts in the video space to get inspiration for your strategy.

2. Make it easy to buy from you online.

We’ve written about social selling a lot here on the HubSpot Blog, but with good reason — it’s the new frontier for reaching consumers. Every time we re-run our Consumer Trends Survey, the number of people who look to social media to find products increases.

Those same users also buy products on social media, and 17% of social users bought a product in-app in the past three months.

Since consumers love it, marketers do it, and it pays off. They’re driving more sales on social media than in past years, and almost half of the marketers responding to our survey will increase their investments in social media shopping tools this year.

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As a result, one of my top recommendations in 2024 is to build a social selling strategy that makes it easy for people to buy from you on social media if it makes sense for what you sell. (SaaS businesses, please stay away from TikTok Shops).

However, whether you’re new to selling on social or improving your strategy, you won’t be successful without building trust.

My generational belonging tells me that I should be jumping at the chance to buy on social media, but I’m skeptical of it, as are 53% of consumers. This blog post about building trust with social selling is a great resource if you use the strategy.

 

3. Partner with micro-influencers.

Nearly 90% of influencer marketers say influencer marketing was effective for their company in 2023. We’ll only see it grow throughout 2024 as half of those using it plan to increase their investments.

The standout change in influencer marketing these past few years is that marketers find the most success with micro-influencers with 10,000 – 100,000 followers.

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As a marketer, this makes sense. These influencers are more affordable and, most significantly, have the most tight-knit and engaged communities. As a result, micro-influencers can offer more persuasive and effective product or brand endorsements.

This also makes sense to me as a consumer. I trust and relate more to the smaller influencers and creators I follow, much more so than those with millions and millions of followers.

And, as much as people might like to say that they make their own product decisions, influencer marketing works — last year, one in four consumers bought a product based on an influencer’s recommendation.

Want to leverage influencer marketing but don’t know where to start? Check out this handy checklist.

4. Bolster your SEO with thought leadership.

Google’s redefining of helpful content and adding “experience” to the existing expertise, authority, and trust (E-A-T) framework were among the biggest SEO changes in recent years.

Now, content that ranks best is most often created by those with experience and expertise in the subjects they write about, and they use unique personal experiences and anecdotes to give it the authoritative push it needs to stand out from the crowd.

On the blog team, we feel that the best way to bolster your SEO in this “new era” of search is with subject matter experts (SMEs) and thought leadership. These people have significant experience, expertise, and authority in their niche and can provide readers with helpful and actionable information.

A great way to include SMEs and thought leaders in your content is people within your organization who have experience in the subjects you write about. If they’re not writers, ask them to contribute quotes you can feature in your blog content.

5. Do more with AI and marketing automation tools.

I know you’ve read this sentence a million times, but I’m saying it anyway — AI and automation were everywhere last year. I did get a bit of AI fatigue, but the fact is that they’re helpful tools, no longer higher-priced, inaccessible technologies only used by giant corporations.

62% of marketers say AI and automation are important to their marketing, and they can help with most things, from running complex predictive analytics reports to personalizing marketing emails to simply streamlining basic tasks to give marketers more time for complex strategies or tactics that require the human touch.

Doing more with AI will be a marketing theme throughout 2024, and I recommend giving it a shot if you haven’t already, especially since there are many use cases:

• AI can be your content marketing assistant. Generative AI tools can help you create compelling, on-brand, and high-performing marketing content. 81% of marketers using gen AI say it effectively assists them in their role.
• AI can help you be more effective with your data. Feed your crucial marketing data to an AI tool to quickly analyze campaign performance and identify trends to be aware of. 6 out of 10 AI and automation users analyze data with AI.
• AI gives you time back to be more creative. Marketing is a creative role, but sometimes, we don’t have much time to be creative because of other required day-to-day tasks. It might be exciting to learn that marketers save and get back an average of 2.5 hours per day by incorporating AI tools into their processes.

Any recommendation I give for AI and automation also comes with a disclaimer: the tools you use shouldn’t be your replacements. Instead, I recommend working with your AI and viewing it as a trusty sidekick that will help you maximize your efficiency. Sean Downey, Google’s President, Americas and Global Partners, told HubSpot, “It isn’t about the technology itself. It’s about what you, as marketers, will do with it. AI can’t do anything without you — but you can do so much more with AI.”

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6. Champion social responsibility.

Consumers care that the brands they support are committed to social responsibility. They want to buy from brands that share their beliefs and attitudes, and their likelihood of purchase because of a brand’s commitment to diversity and inclusion jumped 17% from last year.

As a business, when you tell consumers about your values, you:

• Build deeper connections with audiences with the same interests,
• Fosters trust and loyalty,
• Stand out from the competition and attract new customers looking to patronize businesses that share their values.

Sharing this kind of content pays off, as marketers report it offers the second-highest ROI of all the trends they leverage, and most plan to invest more in it this year.

If you take anything away from this recommendation, though, let it be this: the content you share or commitments you make to social responsibility need to be genuine. Consumers can recognize fake appeals and won’t let you get away with it; they might even call you out for it online.

7. Leverage audio for engagement rather than ROI.

Audio-first platforms like Clubhouse have popped up in the last few years, and apps like Spotify have added more live audio features. The quick jump in popularity showed us just how viral audio content can be, even when branded.

And, in 2024, it’s still worth keeping on your radar. On the consumer side, 75% of Americans ages 12+ have listened to online audio in the past week.

With marketers, podcasts or other audio content are not among the most leveraged trends, nor do they offer the highest ROI, but investments will continue to grow in 2024:

• 39% of those who already leverage podcasts or other audio content will invest more in 2024
• 42% of those leveraging audio chat rooms plan to invest the same amount in 2022.
• Podcasts or other audio content are the top media formats marketers plan to leverage for the first time in 2024.

Why is this marketing format still so popular if it doesn’t offer the highest ROI?

My teammate Caroline Forsey spoke to Dan Stillgoe, Blend’s Marketing Manager, and he said it well: “It’s true you can’t directly attribute leads or revenue from a podcast, but that‘s not its purpose. Podcasts are a long-term brand-building channel that can improve affinity and connection for your brand like no other channel…Podcasting is the perfect way to craft content that’s engaging and authentic.”

Podcasts stand out to me, as a consumer, for their authenticity. Yes, hosts do research, plan episodes, and write out talking points, but I don’t get that kind of natural, free-flowing conversation from any other media I consume.

And, as Stillgoe mentioned, podcasts are a great way for your business to become a trusted voice and thought leader in your space. It’s not a true “behind-the-scenes” look, but hearing someone speak gives your business a human voice, which goes a long way in building a connection with listeners.

8. Use an omnichannel approach.

Marketers leverage an average of four platforms in their role, and Facebook (57%) and Instagram (55%) are the most popular. The two also tie for the highest ROI.

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But those are just two of many platforms, so how do you pick? I recommend these two guiding questions:

1. Where are your audiences spending time? You’ll post into the void if you focus on a channel your audience isn’t on. Our Consumer Trends Report will tell you where your target audience groups are.
2. How many people are on your team? Fewer hands mean choosing the most effective platforms for your business needs instead of more platforms to maximize your impact and ROI.

I know that a challenge to using multiple platforms is having enough content to share on each one. In a separate Social Media Trends Survey, we found that marketers usually share similar content across all platforms with small tweaks to tailor it to each platform. This means you aren’t pressed to create new content for every channel because you can repurpose what you already have.

9. Align sales and marketing teams.

Organizations with tightly aligned sales and marketing teams see 27% faster profit growth and 36% higher retention.

Despite its importance, aligning with sales is one of the top challenges marketers face, most significantly because of a lack of communication and needing to be clearer about overall goals and strategy.

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Monica Elgemark, Chief Marketing Officer at Oneflow says that, to address the challenges of sales and marketing alignment, “It’s imperative to define clear goals and objectives that both sales and marketing teams can rally behind. Clear goals and objectives that differentiate between awareness and revenue should be considered for both sales and marketing to understand the values different campaigns bring. It is a mutual dependency between these areas that needs respect.”

10. Make the most of your marketing budget.

Most marketers had their budgets remain the same between 2022 and 2023, likely because of the economic business landscapes accelerated by the pandemic.

For example, businesses with high-priced products saw a lack of sales floor performance as decision-makers needed to spend more cautiously. Meanwhile, online marketing provided exceedingly solid traffic and conversion opportunities as consumers and prospects were stuck inside on the web.

Marketers still say their budgets will remain the same this year, but they expect budgets and resulting ROI will be scrutinized somewhat more now than in the past, likely due to economic events of the past few years. Business leaders have placed more importance on how and why money is spent as it is to maximize efficiency.

If you‘re on a team receiving more eyes, I understand how you may feel strained to be as effective as possible, especially if you’re hoping to justify more budget in the future. I recommend reading this blog post about managing your entire marketing budget and downloading our free budget planning templates to help you plan your own.

11. Focus on building hybrid strategies.

45% of the global marketers we surveyed are hybrid employees, while just 24% are fully remote. Employees are not rushing back to the office full-time, so as you plan for 2024, consider building strategies that work best for a dispersed workforce.

Not only that, but hybrid is the most popular work model (preferred by 41% of employees), followed by remote (32%), with in-person coming last (27%).

The good news? Offering flexibility could result in great employee or team retention. The top reason people we surveyed want to stay in their jobs is to maintain their flexible work schedule, beating out competitive pay.

Want more recommendations?

This isn’t our only recommendation post leveraging our Marketing Industry Trends Survey data. To help you dive deeper into data-backed tactics, we’re continuing to publish content around specific findings, trends, and strategies highlighted in our survey.

Below are just a few of the posts we’ve written recently about specific trends and tactics discovered in our research.

• The 2024 State of Marketing & Trends Report: Data from 1400+ Global Marketers
• The Top Marketing Trends of 2024 & How They’ve Changed Since 2023 [Data from 1400+ Global Marketers]
• The Top 5 B2C Marketing Trends of 2024 [New HubSpot Blog Data + Expert Insights]
• Q1 Marketing Plays That’ll Start Your Year Strong, According to State of Marketing Data

Need even more guidance for your marketing planning? We’ve got you covered with the free resource below.

Looking for even more insight? Dive into more data-backed recommendations, trends, and yearly predictions with the free resource below. 

If Hubspot is of interest and you'd like more information, please do make contact or take a look in more detail here.

Credit: Original article published here.

Our view at Stack - Simplify growth with an all-in-one platform. Powerful marketing, sales, and support automation. Integrated CMS. Scalable software. Crafted for customer experience.

Facebook is an undeniably powerful platform for advertisers.

In fact, HubSpot Blog Research found Facebook is the most popular social media network for advertising in 2024, with 62% of companies currently leveraging it. Additionally, Facebook has proven to be the social media platform that generates the biggest ROI.

But getting started on Facebook advertising can be intimidating — particularly with a limited budget. You don’t want to waste all your ad spend before identifying a strong, effective, long-term advertising strategy.

I sat down with Tarcisio Ribeiro, Meta’s Director of Ads, to discuss his three tips for getting the most out of your Facebook ad strategy. Let’s dive in.

Tips for Creating Powerful Facebook Ads, According to Meta’s Director of Ads

1. Keep it simple.

When you first start with Facebook ads, you might feel overwhelmed by the many available options. For instance, you can create a boosted ad, a video ad, a poll ad, or a carousel ad (to name a few).

Ribeiro advises against getting too complex when you’re first starting out.

As he puts it, “One challenge I’ve seen with new Facebook Ads users is that they see the numerous capabilities we have in our Ads Manager, and without fully understanding how everything works, they try to play with everything. As a result, they end up wasting money because they’re either not being targeted enough, or they’re using the wrong capabilities.”

In other words, Don’t try to do too much, too quickly.

Start by identifying your objective — awareness, traffic, engagement, leads, app promotion, or sales. And, rather than creating a more complex video or carousel, start with a boosted post, which is an easy opportunity to discover your target audience. (More details coming shortly.).

From there, consider exploring the resources that can help you create an optimized ad. Ribeiro suggests that new Facebook Ads users take the time to take the Meta Blueprint training.

(P.S. Already a HubSpot customer? Integrate your HubSpot account with Meta Ads, and become eligible to win $15K to skyrocket your business ads strategy.)

2. Know your audience — including the details.

Ribeiro told me you must understand the audience you’re going to target — in other words, who is most likely to become a consumer.

And equally importantly, you must be willing to iterate over time to ensure your target audience becomes more refined.

“For instance,” Ribeiro says, “Perhaps you sell baby strollers. But beyond that, you have certain characteristics that pertain to your target audience — maybe it’s a higher-income market, or parents who are very mobile and need a lightweight stroller to take on trips.”

In the beginning, Ribeiro says, you may have a cohort of ten different kinds of profiles who might buy your stroller.

“But, over time, you’re going to see that 20% of those audiences are the ones who are most likely to purchase your product,” he says.

Facebook ads can help you target a more specific and niche audience. If we use the above example, perhaps you’d expected parents in the suburban areas surrounding Boston to purchase your strollers.

Still, your Ads analytics show that most of your consumers are metro-based. As you discover your true consumer, you can refine your ads strategy accordingly.

Once you’ve identified your target audience, you can leverage Facebook’s Lookalike feature to ensure your ads capture the attention of people who match the same characteristics as your current buyers.

Already a Meta customer? Click here to get 20% off HubSpot products.

3. Pay attention to the creative.

“One of the first things users notice and react to is going to be your creative,” Ribeiro told me, “so it’s important you pay attention to how you’re designing your ad.”

For context, an ad creative is the visual attributes of the advertisement, whether it be an image, video, or another format.

Consider, for instance, the fun, lighthearted, and bright designs in the Blue Bunny Ice Cream creative, shown below:

The ad itself needs to grab the attention of your users. If you’re unsure what type of creative will resonate best with your audience, try A/B testing different styles to identify what works best.

Additionally, the type of ad you create is equally important to consider.

Ribeiro says, “Video always performs best because it‘s the most engaging. But you don’t need a big budget or sophisticated equipment for video. If you’re a small business and you only have pictures, you can actually convert those pictures into a video in our Ads Manager through our partnership with Vimeo.”

Whether you’re ready to get started with Facebook ads or take your ad strategy to the next level, hopefully, these three tips have enabled you to focus on what matters most.

The power of Facebook Ads is in the large variety of tools and the features it offers to businesses — but it’s imperative, for your purposes, that you start simple, take the time to identify your correct target audience, and design a creative that will compel your audience to take action.

Meta’s Top Tips for Great Facebook Ads

What better way to optimize your Facebook Ads by taking advice from Meta itself? Let’s take a look at what the company has to say

1. Get on the carousel bandwagon.

You can showcase several ecommerce products or different sections of the same product in a single, swipe-able advertisement and carousel ads.

Although attention is drawn to images and/or videos, consider the importance of catchy headlines, descriptions, and call-to-action buttons that provide encouragement, context, and details. Each carousel advertisement can have up to ten cards.

With carousel advertisements, marketers can link to several landing pages from each ad panel and showcase up to ten pictures or videos with various call-to-actions. You shouldn‘t feel limited if you’re not aiming for online sales because they work well on desktop and mobile devices and are compatible with most Facebook ad objectives.

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2. Evoke the emotions.

Your ad copy should showcase a story about the company and emphasize its characteristics.

Among the best strategies for engaging an audience is storytelling. The secret is to create an experience that affects individuals on an emotional level by leveraging their psychological and emotional characteristics.

One of the first and most important requirements is a compelling story arc that transports the viewer on an emotional journey. Second, to further connect the audience with the advertisement’s message, storylines should center on people they can relate to and identify with.

Facebook has put out a statement saying, “People tell us that authentic stories are the ones that resonate most. So we work hard to understand what type of posts people consider genuine so that we can rank them higher in Feed.” Advertisers should lean more toward the emotional side of things.

Let‘s take a look at John Lewis’ famous Christmas advert that touches hearts everywhere:

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3. Captivate with visuals.

Not only does Facebook’s algorithm prefer visual content more highly than text-based information, but visual content is also more likely to be viewed, shared, and remembered.

So, what does this mean for Facebook marketers?

The answer is that your image must be visually appealing regardless of the advertisement you produce.

A potential buyer will see an advertisement‘s image or video first. Your choice or creation of an advertisement’s image may persuade viewers to click through, learn more about a company, or simply scroll on.

A good example is Coca-Cola‘s striking color-blocking ad, with a sizable focal point (the “New” emblem). It’s surely something that‘ll catch someone’s eye!

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4. Keep your copy short and to the point.

The text is one of the first aspects of your ads to which people will pay attention. Ad copy appears in multiple places throughout an ad, even though most people only pay attention to the main text of the advertisement.

Moreover, since most people have shorter attention spans, it’s crucial to make sure your message comes across in a few words.

Look at this great example from Cash App that gets its point across with its to-the-point copy:

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You see, ad formats can come in various forms, each with specific benefits, whether compelling visual ads, captivating videos, interactive carousels, or immersive slideshows.

Pro tip: When looking at examples of Facebook ads, focus on those that can help you craft ads that best reach your target audience while effectively conveying your message.

5. Put user-generated content at the forefront.

When choosing which brands to invest in, customers feel more confident knowing that people are using the product/service.

According to a survey done on millennials, user-generated content is 50% more trustworthy and 35% more effective than other media types.

Even Bill Connolly, Director of Content at Monotype/Olapic, said, “We find that UGC works particularly well with dynamic product ads. In addition to using product feed images, it helps diversify the creative and minimize fatigue.”

GoPro does this incredibly well by always keeping its customers at the forefront. This way, more potential buyers can see how others use the product and whether it’s useful for them, too.

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You see, ad formats can come in various forms, each with specific benefits, whether compelling visual ads, captivating videos, interactive carousels, or immersive slideshows. Don‘t forget that successful ads won’t always continue to perform extraordinarily well. You should always bring fresh ideas and periodically retest them to identify another maybe optimal combo.

Pro tip: When looking at examples of Facebook ads, focus on those that can help you craft ads that best reach your target audience while effectively conveying your message.

Tips for Making Great Facebook Ads

If you want to create a single high-converting Facebook ad that truly generates results, many moving parts must align. Something I’ve seen over the years is that your ad can only succeed when you listen to your audience.

Even Facebook has said it’ll only show users content that is “meaningful, relevant, and informative.”

Besides that, how else can you stand out when putting out a Facebook ad?

The customer is king.

A Brand Rated study shows that 95% of consumers check internet reviews before purchasing any product or service. What does that mean for your ads? You’ll have to highlight customer feedback to convince the rest of your target market that your brand is worth exploring.

Partner Stack has done that wonderfully by leveraging their user reviews and awards, as you can see below:

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Stay on trend.

Customers value the new, fresh material. Customers enjoy reading anything that genuinely captivates them. Your brand will remain on top if you provide engaging content that speaks to them.

Look at how Butternut Box does this beautifully with this meme of an ad that guarantees to make an impact.

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Target your audience properly.

It’s crucial to select the potential buyers to see your Facebook ads and help you connect with them. Additionally, leveraging demographic data gives you important insights into the people purchasing from your ads, allowing you to make future adjustments and optimizations more effective.

You can see that ActiveCampaign’s ad does exactly that! It reaches out to the audience by simply stating what marketing tools are available so those interested can use them.

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Create an engaging CTA.

By encouraging users to perform a specific action, like completing a purchase, subscribing to a newsletter, or visiting a website, a call-to-action button can help boost conversions from Facebook advertising.

You can establish a sense of urgency and make it obvious to the user what you want them to do next by adding a CTA button. This increases the likelihood that they will take the intended action.

You can see how the CTA for the ad below pops up right when someone clicks on the story. This makes it easy for anyone to sign up for IDP’s event. Facebook has even more options for calls to action as well.

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Add movement to your ads.

Your ads don’t need to be a static image or a graphic; they also have the option to be GIFS, reels, videos, and more. They are far more effective at conveying a message quickly and increasing brand exposure.

If you follow Facebook’s guidelines, you should only make videos that are no longer than 15 seconds. So you have about three seconds to grab their attention.

Here’s HP pulling the perfect video ad in only a few seconds. With the slogan “Lighter than air,” the message is clear and direct without the need for any sounds.

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With the crowded Facebook ads space, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to stand out. That’s why you should concentrate on what works best for you and test multiple formats.

Otherwise, you might miss out on making a splash with your ads!

If Hubspot is of interest and you'd like more information, please do make contact or take a look in more detail here.

Credit: Original article published here.