Smart Traffic | An Easier Way for Marketers to Optimize Landing Pages

Wish to seize extra conversions together with your touchdown pages? (Foolish query, proper?)

The acquired knowledge is that it is best to A/B take a look at and optimize till you’re changing as many guests as potential. For years, you’ve been instructed by trade leaders (and, sure, by Unbounce) that A/B testing is important to your digital advertising observe

And why not? There’s loads of proof that exhibits A/B testing works by letting you squeeze extra conversions out of your present belongings. Sensible.

However when you’re on a small advertising group—heck, you simply is perhaps that proverbial “I” in a group of 1—then working checks additionally calls for time, excessive volumes of site visitors, or CRO experience that you simply may not have.

For some entrepreneurs, a typical touchdown web page changing at 5% would possibly see 50 guests a day. To see a carry of 20% to your conversion charge in these circumstances, you’d must run an A/B take a look at for 304 days (to achieve 95% significance, in accordance with our A/B test duration calculator). Ready for nearly a 12 months for a take a look at isn’t viable, particularly since these checks don’t at all times produce useable insights.

Plus, what occurs whilst you await the outcomes to roll in? Your time-sensitive campaigns (like that huge Black Friday sale) start to wither on the vine earlier than you’ll be able to optimize them. Your affords can expire. And also you’re probably delaying choices you can make about updates to your positioning till you crown a winner.  

It’s one thing of an open secret that, for entrepreneurs with restricted sources, the expertise of A/B testing might be disappointment and frustration. Like cardio, it’s one thing you recognize try to be doing on the common—individuals hold telling you that try to be doing it—however the actuality is that you simply’ve bought an excessive amount of to do already. 

Can anybody blame you for accepting a sure flabbiness to your touchdown pages? (Not when the present, most traditional technique to optimize might be so complicated, no.)

Regardless of all of the exhausting work it requires, the reality is that…

A/B testing isn’t your solely choice.

At Unbounce, we’ve been advocating for A/B testing for a very long time. (For so long as there’s been an Unbounce.)

It was straightforward to obsess as a result of it really works: entrepreneurs who optimize landing pages on this manner see important lifts of their conversion charges. They’re capable of experiment with completely different layouts, affords, and content material to seek out the simplest strategy for his or her guests. 

Right now, we nonetheless stand behind A/B testing as an awesome instrument for confirming an knowledgeable speculation. It completely works while you’ve bought the site visitors volumes and experience to interpret your outcomes correctly. However we’d be remiss to not tackle the truth that loads of entrepreneurs have felt left behind by the A/B testing revolution.

Even its devotees will admit that A/B testing isn’t perfect. 

For all its good, A/B testing has a deadly flaw.

As we explored new methods that can assist you convert extra, Unbounce saved working up into the limitations of A/B testing. Even when your online business will get boatloads of site visitors and may maintain lengthy take a look at durations, optimizing with A/B testing helps you serve up a single touchdown web page that appeals to as many guests as potential. 

By attempting to create a champion touchdown web page that tries to focus on most individuals, you’re truly simply focusing on the typical individual. That signifies that you find yourself not changing to your potential.

This “one-size-fits-all” strategy to optimizing means you’re letting potential clients slip proper by means of your internet: the individuals who’d by no means convert in your so-called champion.

You already know your clients aren’t all the identical. They arrive from completely different locations, use completely different units, have completely different motivations, reply to completely different affords, and so on. So why ship all of them to the identical web page?

An illustration of A/B testingAn illustration of A/B testing

Irrespective of how straightforward Unbounce makes it so that you can A/B take a look at, optimizing solely works beneath the precise circumstances and with the precise objectives. 


So let’s recap. If we’re being actual, A/B testing can allow you to down in three huge methods:  

  • It’s very complicated. If A/B testing evokes imposter syndrome in you, you’re not alone. Whereas 95% of marketers recognize A/B testing has value for their business, 42% assume it’s too troublesome. From the preliminary speculation, what to check, isolating only one merchandise to check, calculating the period of time you want, and decoding outcomes, it’s no joke and positively not for everyone.
  • It could actually devour your time and calls for tons of site visitors. It’s the small and medium companies—paradoxically, entrepreneurs who want to maneuver sooner and smarter than the large guys—who are inclined to hit this impediment hardest. In case you’re a David trying to topple a Goliath, you’ve bought different issues in your thoughts.
  • It results in “optimized” pages that aren’t truly optimized for every customer. Positive, you’ll be able to personalize in different methods—even manually—however that simply results in extra complications as you additional break up the essential site visitors that it’s essential run A/B checks. 

In case you’ve been vigorously nodding your head as you learn alongside, it most likely feels straightforward to shrug your shoulders and settle for that conversion optimization isn’t best for you. As a small biz, you might really feel such as you’ll by no means have the time, the site visitors, the experience, or the sources to make it occur.

However… 

What if Unbounce taught a machine to optimize your touchdown pages for you?

Right now, we’re proud to carry you Good Site visitors, a proprietary touchdown web page optimization instrument constructed on machine studying. 

Powered by AI, Smart Traffic robotically optimizes your touchdown pages by sending every customer to a web page variant the place they’re almost definitely to transform. It avoids the issue of optimizing for the typical customer with a “one-size-fits-all” champion.

It’s additionally dead-simple to make use of. And it begins optimizing shortly, after as few as 50 visits, with out the necessity to babysit or manually apply your learnings. 

Better of all, clients in our beta noticed a mean 20% carry in conversions in comparison with an A/B take a look at, and now clients see nearer to 30% carry. (We don’t name it a simple button, nevertheless it’s a simple button.)

Right here’s the way it works:

1. You create touchdown web page variants.

You’re not constrained to only one change at a time—or only one variant—so get artistic. Simply wish to make a small tweak? Do it. Trying to get wild? Heck yeah. Your group can’t determine between two choices? Why not each? You’ll be able to even add new variants at any time—which is ideal for individuals who’s finest concepts come to them within the bathe, or in site visitors, or in the course of the duller moments of Thanksgiving dinner.

Screenshot of creating landing page variantsScreenshot of creating landing page variants

2. Set a conversion aim, then activate Good Site visitors.

Be certain that your variants have a conversion aim in order that the instrument understands your required end result. Then simply publish (or, when you’re including Good Site visitors to an present marketing campaign, republish) your touchdown web page. Our machine will instantly start a brief studying part the place it explores the probabilities.

Screenshot of turning on Smart TrafficScreenshot of turning on Smart Traffic

3. Good Site visitors optimizes robotically.

Right here’s the perfect half: you’re carried out.

You’ll begin to see higher conversion charges as soon as Good Site visitors begins making use of its learnings about your guests. With the magic of machine studying, the instrument can even proceed to adapt and enhance over time. This manner, it higher understands the place guests will convert—even when your site visitors sources change. In different phrases, you’ll see a carry in your conversions, no additional actions required. This factor’s fairly intelligent.

Oh, and it’s out there to Unbounce clients proper now—as you learn this very sentence. So if you wish to stop studying and go flip that switch, I wouldn’t blame you. 

For CRO aficionados or those that already take pleasure in tons of site visitors, Good Site visitors has potential as a hands-free manner of organising your already optimized campaigns for progressive, long-term enhancements. Through the use of Good Site visitors alongside traditional A/B checks, you’ll be able to see the advantages of each worlds. (We’re very excited to see what the specialists can do with it.)

However for small but scrappy advertising groups—or actually anybody tight on time and sources—Smart Traffic is a freakin’ sport changer as a result of it allows you to optimize your pages with out the stresses related to A/B testing. 

Create your variants. Flip it on. See outcomes. 

A Smarter Technique to Optimize

Every part you’ve simply learn is all it’s essential know to get began. For the curious, although, let’s go into a little bit extra element about how Good Site visitors makes optimizing your touchdown pages straightforward.

Good Site visitors knocks down the limitations to entry.

As Carl Schmidt, CTO and co-founder of Unbounce, describes it, “Good Site visitors is step one on our journey in direction of turning the tides for small companies by enabling [you] to attain unprecedented outcomes utilizing the facility of AI.”

You don’t want an unrealistic quantity of holiday makers to begin seeing outcomes. (It positively received’t take 305 days.) However there’s additionally one other time achieve price noting. As a result of, in contrast to conventional A/B testing, there’s no prolonged exploration part wherein you’re sending 50% of your site visitors to the eventual loser (probably lacking out on but extra conversions). 

By design, A/B testing splits all of your guests randomly between a number of variants.

With Good Site visitors you’re off to the races and optimizing (virtually) straight away. Evaluate it to conventional A/B testing, and the distinction turns into very clear:

Comparison of A/B testing, Multi-Armed Bandit testing, and Smart TrafficComparison of A/B testing, Multi-Armed Bandit testing, and Smart Traffic

On the left, you see the discover/exploit sample of a typical A/B take a look at. Protracted durations of random testing are required earlier than every studying might be confidently utilized through handbook intervention. (And there’s no assure any given A/B take a look at will produce important outcomes.) 

On the far proper, you’ll be able to see how Good Site visitors makes use of machine studying to conduct steady (contextual multi-armed bandit) optimizing for you. It begins making use of its learnings to your conversion charges with a pattern as small as 50 guests, so you’ll be able to enhance your conversion charges on campaigns of all sizes. Each subsequent go to represents one other probability to study and optimize.

You’ll see higher outcomes than an A/B take a look at in much less time and with much less work. Some beta testers noticed unbelievable good points with little time or effort once they utilized it to present pages.

The actual fact we bought 10% extra conversions with out doing any work is a giant deal. You’ll be able to’t ignore that.

Kyle Carline, Model Supervisor at Salem Internet Community


Good Site visitors matches guests with the variant almost definitely to transform.

As a substitute of optimizing for the typical individual, Good Site visitors begins matching every and each customer to the touchdown web page variant that’s proper for them, primarily based on the distinctive attributes that set them aside from the group. 

An illustration of Smart TrafficAn illustration of Smart Traffic

You win extra conversions as a result of the expertise will probably be extra related. So Sally from Brooklyn and Peter from Kansas Metropolis will every see the touchdown web page that proper for them—as an alternative of 1 “champion” web page that appeals to the plenty. There’s no assure they’ll convert, however Good Site visitors provides you the very best probability of changing as people.


Lastly, Good Site visitors frees you to do nice advertising.

It took a group of information scientists—together with a literal string theorist—and three years of analysis, however Good Site visitors’s patent-pending machine studying algorithm places the complexity again the place it belongs: behind the scenes. It’s every kind of automagical that manner. By crunching knowledge and dynamically matching guests to variants, it’s doing one thing that no human being may.

However Good Site visitors has worth past the expertise: it frees you to do issues that machine studying algorithms merely can’t. It frees you to have interaction with the human a part of advertising—the higher a part of advertising, I’d say—like creating progressive campaigns and technique, smarter and extra partaking content material, and extra compelling customer experiences. 

So go forward and go away the complicated stuff to us.

Photo of Carl Schmidt at CTAConfPhoto of Carl Schmidt at CTAConf
Carl Schmidt (Unbounce Co-Founder & CTO) factors out the artistic drawbacks of A/B testing at this 12 months’s Call To Action Conference.

The World’s First AI-Powered Touchdown Web page Product

It’s straightforward to get over-hyped relating to AI and machine studying, however that’s not why we’re so proud to carry Good Site visitors to you right this moment.

You see, Unbounce was based on the concept of serving to companies of all sizes obtain higher advertising. We strongly imagine that insights and actions drawn from knowledge would be the key.   

The aim behind introducing machine studying into our product is to improve your capabilities as a marketer.

It’s possible you’ll not have time to study the nuances of A/B testing. It’s possible you’ll not at the moment see the site visitors quantity it’s essential break up take a look at efficiently.  And you will have 100 different issues in your plate.

However now, you can also optimize. (And actually, you ought to optimize.)

By decreasing handbook hassles concerned with optimizing, AI helps you ship higher, extra related experiences, join together with your clients in private methods, and—yep—rating extra conversions. (I’d love to show the machine 🤖 to carry me my espresso within the morning, however the group assures me they’ve greater, higher plans.)

Simply in case you have been questioning, we’re simply gettin’ began.