One tiny little layout change netted us an almost 20% increase in on-page conversions. They say a butterfly flapping its wings can cause a rainstorm on the other side of the Earth. Well, today’s story makes me think that maybe that’s true. Conjurer of conversion, Rebecca Hinton, is back with another test you can try for yourself. This time it’s all about social proof and where it belongs on your page. But before you jump straight to the how-to, I’ll also cover why you shouldn’t run off and do this without testing it first. Butterflies and Best Practices It’s pretty […]

As someone who does conversion rate optimization (CRO) for a living, I can’t express to you how excited I get when a simple change makes a big impact. And this particular example? It doesn’t get much simpler or more impactful. Sure, I’m a self-proclaimed CRO geek, but if you were able to increase the conversion rate on a web page by 560%, I bet you’d be geeking out, too. Personalization as an Optimization Tool As a member of HubSpot’s web strategy team, I’ve been optimizing the core website pages on HubSpot.com for the last eight years. Prior to that, I […]

When I first heard how HubSpot’s YouTube team bumped one channel’s views up by over 400%, I begged for permission to share the story. (I’m not above debasing myself on your behalf.) It’s a lesson that applies to nearly all content marketing — and one I promise you’re not going to hear anywhere else. Are you ready for it? Not all distribution is good distribution. And that includes your own. Below, I chat with our head of YouTube about how and why cutting off all external distribution actually increased our YT performance. And his advice for when you should consider […]

When I asked today’s HubSpotter to share an SEO tactic, he asked if he could share a cautionary tale instead. And I accepted because his story proves that technical SEO basics still matter — even in the face of major search changes. It’s the scary story of how we lost, and then recovered, 41% of targeted organic traffic and conversions. Presented for the approval of you masters in marketing, I bring you a story I call … The Tell-Tale Tag. (The Cask of the Canonical? I’ll find the joke eventually.) A Scary Day in Search Our story begins with a […]

Today, I’ve got a special treat for you, something most companies won’t share: a peek at one of our losses. A “best practice” that failed so hard we had to pause part of the test early. And, if I can wax clickbait-y for a moment, it’s a tactic you may be using in your calls-to-action as we speak. So come for the trainwreck, but stick around for the lesson, because what we learned led to 4% more leads from our CTAs. And I’m going to show you how to recreate it. (The improvement, that is. Not the trainwreck.) The Best […]

Our CRO team made a change that lifted the performance of our paid ads by almost 11% — and they didn’t have to make any deals with supernatural beings to do it. So while I’m a little bummed that I don’t get to use my Ouija board, the good news is that you’ve already got everything you need to try this out for yourself. In fact, this tactic is all about what you don’t include on the landing page. Below, I chat with our sorceress supreme of conversion rate optimization to find out what that cryptic advice actually means. But […]