VenueSphere Used VWO To Increase Homepage Form Submissions Using A/B Testing

Ben from VenueSphere believed that their original homepage was fairly broad – it didn’t perform brilliantly in getting conversions because it was not focused. So he wanted to get people’s attention and get them to read more about what VenusSphere does. VenueSphere selected VWO with the aim of improving lead generation by optimizing the form on its homepage.

To capture leads, VenueSphere had a simple form above the fold on their home page. The headline Looking for a venue in London? just above the form, described the service provided. The original version of the page also had a subheadline that read Call us or fill in a form to speak to a dedicated venue coordinator. This is how it originally looked on their home page:

Ben decided to play around with the subheadline in an attempt to increase the number of leads. He believed that a more dynamic and attention-grabbing headline would help generate more leads.

He created a variation with the new subheadline Stop right now! Call us or fill in the form and we’ll do the hard work for you for free. Using the VWO platform, this variation was tested against the original version (the control). The goal being tracked was the number of times the thank-you page popped up (which was shown to people who filled the contact form and submitted it). It was, therefore, a good indicator of the number of leads from the form.

This was how the home page looked with the new subheadline:

Close to 1,200 visitors became a part of this test, and the variation emerged as the winner.

The new subheadline resulted in a healthy 69% increase in leads. Having integrated VWO with Google Analytics, Ben was able to access and analyze a lot more data to gain more insights. He said “I was also able to see that our phone conversions were better with the variation, as was time on site, pages per visit and bounce rate.”

Here’s a comparison image showing the control and variation:

To understand why the variation generated 69% more leads, it is useful to deconstruct the new subheadline into 3 parts:

Part 1: “Stop right now! Call us or fill in the form”
After reading the headline, this part of the subheadline clearly directs visitors to what they need to do next. The “Stop right now!” phrase might sound a tad abrupt or even rude, but it definitely got visitors’ attention. Quoting Ben, “I was concerned that it might be too forceful, that it might put people off, but that didn’t seem to be the case. I think that there is a strong case for saying that users want to be told what to do in certain situations”.

Part 2: “and we’ll do the hard work”
This phrase assures the user that VenueSphere takes complete responsibility for helping them find the perfect venue. It also signals to the visitors that the task of finding the right venue is a lot of hard work, but VenueSphere would do it for them.

Part 3: “for free.”
The magic word “free” lets visitors know that all they have to do is to fill out the form and that the company (VenueSphere) will help them find the perfect venue at absolutely no cost.

Based on this test, it is hard to say exactly which part of the changed subheadline motivated visitors the most: the first, where they were directed to what-next; the second bit which told them that the company would take complete responsibility for the task; or the last, that it was all for free!

Additional testing (or using Multivariate Testing) can certainly improve the probability of ascertaining which element visitors valued the most.