Two-column landing page redesign lost to the placeholder by 85.51%
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsXBanker's quickly built placeholder landing page converted 85.51% better (relative) than a two-column redesign with refined copy and a shorter quote form.
The test was submitted by Ryan Hutchings and published as a MarketingExperiments web clinic review.
The redesign bundled several changes, so the loss can't be pinned on any one of them.
- Quote request conversion: the control beat the redesign by 85.51% relative. Raw conversion rates and lead counts were not shared.
- A second, more colorful two-column treatment also lost to the control, by 51.52%.
- Clinic attendees predicted the redesign would win, so expert opinion was wrong here.
- Verdict: a loss for a bundled redesign. We can't credit or blame any single element.
The change
Single-column placeholder vs two-column redesign with a shorter form.
Simplified mockup drawn by LiftArchive from the shared screenshots.
Control
A fast mock-up landing page for PPC traffic with a direct eye path, few links or side options, and a quote request form whose button echoed the headline.
Variant
A two-column redesign with the quote form in the right column, a refined value proposition, more supporting copy, a shorter form and new button copy.
Why it likely lost
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- The plain page put the form right in the reading path, so there was little between the visitor and the action.
- The source suggests the redesigns did not follow how prospects think through the offer as closely as the original did.
- Splitting attention across two columns and more copy may have slowed down visitors who arrived from an ad ready to request a quote.
Caveats: Several changes shipped together, so the result reflects the whole redesign. Sample size, duration and confidence were not shared, and the data is from 2009.
Who ran it
XBanker ran this test for a lender running PPC lead generation and published the results (MarketingExperiments). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on XBanker →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we keep our PPC landing page single-column with the quote form directly in the reading path, then more visitors will request a quote because there is less to process before acting.
- Primary metric
- Quote request conversion rate
- Guardrails
- Lead quality (qualified or funded rate)
- Cost per lead
- Who should test it
- Lead-gen businesses such as lenders or insurers sending paid traffic to a quote form. Complex or high-trust offers may need more copy, so test rather than copy this layout.
Questions
Do redesigned landing pages always beat simple ones?
No. Here a quick placeholder beat two more polished redesigns by 85.51% and 51.52%.
Simple pages can state the offer more directly.
Is a two-column layout better for lead forms?
This test doesn't prove either way, because the layout changed along with copy, form length and button text.
Test layout on its own if you want to know.
Should I trust expert predictions about which page will win?
Use them to pick what to test, not to skip testing.
The clinic audience backed the redesign, and it lost.