# Bolder category links on collection pages: -20.1% conversion

- Outcome: Lost
- Page type: Collection page (Ecommerce)
- Elements: Navigation & mega menus, 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/updated-category-link-design/
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/cleancommit-updated-category-link-design/

Restyling the category links on mobile collection pages, with a new order and color highlights, cut conversion rate 20.1% and revenue per visitor 26.3%. Clean Commit ran this test for an anonymized Shopify store and published it in its A/B test library. The test stopped a change that looked like an improvement from going live.

## Result

**-20.1% conversion**

- Conversion rate: -20.1%. Negative: the original had a 98.5% probability of performing better.
- Revenue per visitor: -26.3%, the largest drop in the test.
- Orders: -21.4%, and average order value fell 7.8%.
- The source says the result fell just short of full significance, but every key metric moved down.

## Control

Mobile collection pages showed the original category links in their usual order and style.

## Variant

The category titles and links swapped order, and each category got a color highlight so it stood out from the rest of the page.

## Why it likely lost (our reading)

- Bright highlights may have pulled attention away from the products, which are what shoppers came to see.
- Changing the order of titles and links may have made the links harder to scan, not easier.
- Louder navigation can invite shoppers to jump around between categories instead of picking a product.

## Caveats

The test ran for 11 days on 8,563 mobile visitors. The source reports a 98.5% probability that the original was better, short of full significance.

## How to run this test

- Hypothesis: If we make category links on collection pages more prominent, then more shoppers will buy because they can find the right products faster.
- Primary metric: Mobile conversion rate
- Guardrail: Revenue per visitor
- Guardrail: Product card click-through rate
- Guardrail: Add-to-cart rate
- Who should test it: Stores with many subcategories where shoppers clearly struggle to find the right list. If your category links already work, this result suggests louder styling can hurt more than help.

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Credit: Clean Commit ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/cleancommit-updated-category-link-design/).
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.