Creating A/B Email Tests

Email testing is essential to honing your email communication to reach and exceed conversion goals.

When testing, email reports show the results of email campaigns in regard to performance and delivery.

This article will detail how to create email tests.

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Article Contents

• Understanding Email Testing
• Creating Tests
• Reviewing Results

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Understanding Email Testing

Email tests are comparative assessments of emails against one another. Effectively, these are A/B testing emails. Email testing is best used when you have emails that have the same conversion goal, formatted in different ways, to understand which is getting the highest conversion result.

When testing, Lead Gen & CRM will evenly distribute the emails across one list. Keep in mind that you can create a specific list for an email test that contains list members with similar characteristics. You can also create a sample of an existing list, so you can send an email test to only a small percentage of a specific list. In addition, suppressions by engagement will affect A/B tests.

A/B testing should occur before using emails with any sort of automation. Your testing should focus on general open rates and what is most effective. From there, you use the winning emails in your future campaigns. 

Creating Tests

You can create email tests that allow you to compare different sets of data.

To create email tests, start from the Analytics page in the left toolbar.

1. Click Email A/B Tests.
   
   

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2. Click Create Email Test. 
   
   

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3. Enter a title for the test.
4. Schedule a date and time for the test.
5. Click the Select a List drop-down menu and select the desired list.
   
   
   Important: The selected list is split when the email test is created. Any changes to the list after the fact will not be reflected in the test.
6. Optionally, choose to exclude unengaged recipients or recipients with low engagement using the checkboxes.
7. Click the desired emails to test.
8. If you are struggling to locate your emails, use the Filter field to search for the title of your email.  
   
   

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9. Optionally, if you would like to run an email test against another email that has already occurred, click the "Use Baseline?" checkbox. 
10. Choose the email that will be the baseline from the drop-down menu. 
11. Click Create Test.
    
    

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    Note: In order to create email tests, you will need to have multiple existing emails.

Reviewing Results

Once a test has been created, you will need to review the test results.

To review the created test, start from the Analytics page in the left toolbar.

1. Click Email A/B Tests.
   
   

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2. Search for and click on the title of the created test.
   
   
   Important: You can export reviewed results by clicking    Options and selecting either Export to .CSV or Export to .PDF.
   
   
   

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3. View the test results.
   
   

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With email tests, Lead Gen & CRM will identify both an overall Content Winner and Call-to-Action Winner.

Once you review the information and make a decision on which email to use, schedule the email.