# Shop by Category moved under the homepage hero: -6.2% conversion

- Outcome: Lost
- Page type: Homepage (Ecommerce)
- Elements: Collection banners & headers, Layout, fonts & visual design
- Test run by: [Clean Commit](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/clean-commit/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://cleancommit.io/ab-tests/shop-by-category-moved-below-the-homepage-hero/
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/cleancommit-shop-by-category-moved-below-the-homepage-hero/

Moving the Shop by Category section up to sit directly under the homepage hero cut conversion rate 6.2% and revenue per visitor 7.6%. Clean Commit ran this test for an anonymized Shopify store and published it in its A/B test library. The drop was not significant, but it was enough to keep the change from shipping.

## Result

**-6.2% conversion**

- Conversion rate: -6.2%. Negative, but not statistically significant.
- Revenue per visitor: -7.6%, and orders fell 6.4%.
- Add-to-cart rate: -11.0%, the largest drop.
- Click-through rate, the goal metric: flat at -0.1%. By device, mobile conversion fell 13.6% while desktop rose 8.8%.

## Control

The Shop by Category section sat lower down the homepage.

## Variant

The Shop by Category section moved up to sit directly beneath the hero, putting category links earlier on the page.

## Why it likely lost (our reading)

- The section it pushed down may have done more selling, such as featured products or offers.
- On mobile, category tiles under the hero take up the whole screen, which may have delayed shoppers from seeing products.
- Visitors who wanted categories could likely already reach them through the menu, so moving the section added little.

## Caveats

11,001 visitors over 18 days, a small sample, and the drop was not significant. Mobile and desktop moved in opposite directions.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we move Shop by Category directly under the hero, then more visitors will click into categories because the links are seen sooner.
- Primary metric: Category click-through rate
- Guardrail: Conversion rate
- Guardrail: Add-to-cart rate
- Guardrail: Mobile revenue per visitor
- Who should test it: Stores with broad catalogs where many visitors arrive unsure what to buy. If your homepage already sells through featured products, moving them down may cost you, as it did here.

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Credit: Clean Commit ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/cleancommit-shop-by-category-moved-below-the-homepage-hero/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.