By Owen Fay . Posted on July 27, 2022Every marketer and ad manager understands the value of A/B testing because it allows us to compare different designs and validate a direction for ads with live feedback. A/B testing is a strategic approach for comparing designs, concepts, features, and other resources.
This method of testing can be a useful tool if you want to understand what version of a design works best, learn what headline or copy is most powerful, analyze ad creative, or determine the effectiveness of various ad directions.
In recent years, LinkedIn has emerged as the best platform for networking, industry research, and direct marketing to people you know are in your target audience. Facebook and Twitter are becoming less effective for B2B marketing and advertising.
LinkedIn is the best platform for reaching a targeted audience of professionals and other businesses meaning A/B testing your ads on their platform can be a great tool for any marketer. However, there can be some major roadblocks that hurt the effectiveness of LinkedIn A/B testing. In this blog, we will cover the issues with LinkedIn A/B ad testing and a great alternative that allows you to validate design decisions before launching a campaign.
The Issues with LinkedIn A/B Testing
In theory, A/B testing is a great tool to find the ads or designs that have the biggest impact, create the most conversions, and provide the results you are looking for.
LinkedIn A/B testing is a live method of comparing two versions of an ad to see which one is more effective. This can be done on any two variations of an ad with any differences. LinkedIn suggests only using identical ads with different audiences, but the difference can be with headlines, copy, or creative.
A/B testing an ad on LinkedIn is a technique that follows these steps:
- Create the ad campaign you want to launch, the budget, bid, content, and other variables are all up to you.
- Make an experiment or A/B test on the platform with a change to the audience for one of the ads.
- Run the A/B test and monitor conversions, clicks, traffic, etc. until the experiment is completed, and the ads gather enough traffic for LinkedIn to make a decision on what ad is more effective.
While this sounds like a simple and effective way to validate an ad design LinkedIn is a highly competitive and expensive advertising platform. Small to medium-sized organizations might not have the time or money to conduct an effective live A/B test with LinkedIn.
The biggest challenges with testing on their platform are the high CPC and the amount of time it takes to complete a test. According to tuffgrowth.com, the average CPC is $5.26 and CPM (cost per 1,000 impressions) is $6.59, with a lot of industries having even higher costs. Additionally, it’s suggested to give an A/B test at least two weeks, with a lot of tests in a low-volume environment taking months to gain reliable results.
If you do some quick math, it’s obvious that you’re A/B test could eat up a significant amount of your advertising budget. Poll the People offers a cost-effective and rapid alternative to get the same valuable feedback before launching your campaign.
Usability A/B Testing LinkedIn Ads with Poll the People
In order to learn more about preferences, effectiveness, and user experiences, Poll the People uses a human-centered testing technique called usability A/B testing. This type of A/B testing can be used to gather real feedback, from real people, in under an hour.
With usability A/B testing, two variations of your ads are shown to users to find the version that delivers the biggest impact. A usability A/B test is an excellent approach to ensure that the money spent on advertisements is worthwhile.
Usability testing ads enables you to make data-backed decisions from the feedback you gather, the user feedback may provide you with fresh ideas that come directly from your audience, it helps you understand what types of ads your audience will respond to, and it eliminates the risk of wasting time and money on ineffective ads.
Poll the People eliminates the high-cost commitment with each response costing about $1.00, and it only takes a fraction of the time, a typical test with a few hundred users completes in less than an hour. Businesses large and small can find the most effective ad designs, launch ads that convert more users, and understand more about their customers with the help of Usability A/B Testing from Poll the People.
If your organization doesn’t want to commit to spending hundreds of dollars and waiting months to gather actionable data, Poll the People is the way to go.
Usability A/B Testing Compared to LinkedIn A/B Testing
Other than the environment (pre-live vs live) the cost and time commitment are the only real differences between testing with Poll the People and running a LinkedIn A/B test.
You will receive similar insights from real users to inform directions for your ads, users will interact with each version of the ad, compare, and provide feedback.
Poll the People allows testers to segment their testing audience similar to a live A/B test. You can choose several different demographics targeting and advanced criteria options to test with the users you need feedback from.
With Poll the People you will see a results dashboard, that tracks all the feedback you receive in a social media-style timeline. When a test receives all of the responses you can analyze the quantitative and qualitative data that tells you what ad won the A/B test.
But possibly the biggest benefit of testing on our platform is the qualitative feedback. Each respondent is required to give a written explanation of their experiences with the ads and provide insights into their preferences and opinions.
The qualitative feedback might show you issues with the ads, identify the most important elements, or give you new ways to optimize ads. Unlike live A/B testing on LinkedIn, you will understand the “why” behind the test.
The time and cost commitment associated with usability A/B testing is another massive benefit. You will spend less time validating designs and decisions because tests are done in under an hour. LinkedIn A/B tests can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars with the cost growing as the test runs longer. With Poll the People you will know the cost of your test before it is launched, and it will surely be far less expensive.
Conclusion
Now that we have covered issues with LinkedIn A/B testing, the best alternative, and its benefits you can organize your tests and maximize your marketing resources.
Even before you launch a campaign, usability A/B testing of your ads can help you improve the performance of your campaigns. Using our simple process, you can quickly analyze elements like headlines, ad copy, creative, and audience.
The biggest benefit of Poll the People’s platform compared to LinkedIn A/B testing is the time and cost associated with the test. LinkedIn tests take weeks or months to finish, with high CPC and CPM on the advertising platform a test could cost thousands. Poll the People tests take less than an hour and cost about $1.00 per response, with subscription plans that fit businesses of any size.
If you found our guide helpful, please share it with others so they can avoid making the same mistakes or facing similar difficulties while running digital ads. If you are ready to optimize your LinkedIn ads sign up for free or head to our examples page to see how a test is done.
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