Brainy Days: Lateralization & Website Optimization

Results

The task of measuring results for this experiment was more challenging than the SEM agency had originally anticipated. Each program landing page ran through the GWO system for varying lengths of time depending on the amount of traffic and conversions, ultimately providing a clear winner. The results for an indiscriminate group of programs are as follows:

However, drawing conclusions from these results was not as cut-and-dry. The SEM agency hypothesized that the right-brain dominant programs would perform better with a left form (again, because the left hemisphere of the brain controls the right side of the body) and vice versa. In addition, they anticipated that the right form would be more popular because of the prevalence of left-brained individuals.

Discovering a connection between brain lateralization and contact form location could have had a major impact on the SEM and web design industries. Instead of randomly assigning a side or letting tradition dictate, advertisers and web design firms would determine the form placement based on the common characteristics of their target audience.

Unfortunately for Westwood, the agency and the SEM industry as a whole, concrete and prevailing results were not found. A few possible reasons for these discrepancies exist: (1) Too many outside variables; (2) those seriously interested in the program would fill out a form regardless of the side; or (3) brain lateralization simply has no connection to online conversion activity.

In the reports below, the “Original” combination had the form on the right side of the page. The second combination was the version with the form on the left. These reports reveal several items of interest: Estimated Conversion Rate Range, prophesy of future conversion rate if this combination is adopted and shown to all users; Chance to Beat Original, probability that this combination’s mean conversion rate will beat that of only the original; Chance to Beat All, probability that this combination’s mean conversion rate will beat that of the original and all combinations; Observed Improvement, percentage of increased conversions compared to the orginial version; and Conversions/Visitors, data revealing the number of actual visitors that saw that version and conversions that occurred.

GWO report for Criminal Justice landing page; reveals that original page with form on right performed better.

GWO report for MBA landing page; reveals that version of page with form on left performed better.

GWO report for Airframe landing page; reveals that original page with form on right performed better.

GWO report for HVAC landing page; reveals that version of page with form on left performed better.

GWO report for Healthcare landing page; reveals that version of page with form on left performed better.

GWO report for Game Art landing page; reveals that original page with form on right performed better.

GWO report for Construction landing page; reveals that version of page with form on left performed better.

GWO report for Marketing & Sales landing page; reveals that original page with form on right performed better.

Although the SEM agency did not find a correlation between brain lateralization and form location, they did succeed in optimizing Westwood’s program landing pages. On average, the program pages saw a 39.87% conversion rate improvement, with 83.1% being the highest upgrade. After significant results were revealed, the agency stopped each experiment and changed the format for every page to reflect the best-performing contact form location.

While this experiment may not have had a significant impact on the entire SEM industry, it did affect Westwood’s campaign considerably by increasing conversion rates—a positive outcome no matter what the experiment. Additionally, the SEM agency can now apply this knowledge of successful contact form location in accordance with degree programs to future landing page designs for Westwood, Redstone and Westwood Online.