Rounded 'Start' box on insurance quote page: CTR 17.79% to 17.01%
Test run byMarketingExperimentsResearch publisher
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsChanging the quote 'Start' box on an insurance landing page from square to rounded cut clickthrough from 17.79% to 17.01%, a relative drop of about 4.4%.
A student of MarketingExperiments (MECLABS) ran the four-way test on an insurance quote site and sent the data in; MECLABS analyzed it and published the interpretation.
The image swaps in the same test made no clear difference, so the box shape was the one change that stood out.
- Red car with rounded 'Start' box: 17.01% clickthrough to quote start, against 17.79% for the square-box control. This is a loss of about 4.4% relative.
- Family in car: 17.84%. Men falling off a log: 17.52%. MECLABS said neither image variant could be called better or worse than the control on this data.
- MECLABS said the sample was large enough to show a real difference among the four versions, and read the rounded box as the cause of the drop, since the image was the same as the control.
The change
Only the quote start box changed, from square to rounded.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
A landing page with a red car image and the site's usual square 'Start' box for beginning a quote.
Variant
The same red car image, but the 'Start' box had rounded corners. Two other variants kept the square box and swapped the image for a family in a car or men falling off a log.
Why it likely lost
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- The square box may have been the shape returning visitors expected, so the rounded version looked less like the familiar way to start a quote.
- A rounded box can read as a decorative badge rather than an input area or button, which may weaken the cue to click.
- The images likely did not matter much because visitors on a quote page are focused on getting a price, not on the photo.
Caveats: A student ran the test and MECLABS interpreted the results afterwards, and sample size and duration were not shared. The data is from 2007, and the conclusion about the box shape is MECLABS's inference from a four-way test.
Who ran it
MarketingExperiments ran this test for an insurance quote site (student-submitted test) and published the results (MarketingExperiments). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on MarketingExperiments →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we change the shape of our quote start box, then clickthrough to the quote form will change because the shape affects how clearly visitors see it as the place to begin.
- Primary metric
- Clickthrough rate to quote start
- Guardrails
- Quote completion rate
- Bounce rate
- Who should test it
- Insurance and other quote-driven lead-gen sites with steady traffic and a clear start box or button. With low traffic, a gap of under one percentage point will take a very long time to confirm.
Questions
Does button shape affect conversion rates?
It can, but usually by a small amount.
In this test the rounded box lost by under one percentage point, so you need a lot of traffic to detect effects like this.
Should I test images on my quote landing page?
You can, but here three different images performed almost the same.
Changes to the form or call to action may be a better place to start.
What if my test has more than two variants?
Compare each variant against the control, and look for patterns between versions that share elements.
That is how MECLABS isolated the box shape in this test.