What triggered this experiment?

The inspiration for this experiment came from a buyer survey where over 900 respondents were asked for their opinions of the products. One of the questions was: what is the main reason you buy this brand’s clothing? 35% of the respondents indicated that the design (the all over prints) of the products is the decisive point for them. Not totally surprising, because this brand is known for its fun prints and unusual designs. Our team felt – rightly so – that we could get more out of it. Therefore, we proposed to experiment with showing the designs of specific garments in more detail.

The effects

Like any CRO specialist, we prefer to work on scalable experiments that are easy to execute and automate. Especially if you need to get creative with budgets or want to get te most out of your budget. This also applies to this experiment. An experiment where you deploy an on-hover magnifying effect over product photos was not realistic. Creating new product photography was even less realistic. What was possible was a small, magnified photo of the design next to a photo of the overall product. Like a sticky magnifying glass that always showed a piece of fabric.

This was a relatively easy experiment because every product shot was shot the same way. We knew exactly where to zoom in on a product shot. We didn’t need a script for this, just style rules. This allowed us to determine which part of the photo showed the print, which we enlarged next to the original product shot.

We chose to test swimwear. Firstly, because all product photos were shot in the same way, secondly, because this is a big product category for this client, and thirdly, the timing. We conducted this test in late spring, which is when the swimwear PLP’s get relatively high traffic. This allowed us quickly gather the necessary data.

The results

This is where it gets interesting. The average conversion increased by over 2% but differed immensely per device. On mobile, conversion increased by 8.8%. That’s incredibly high, hence our advice was to implement this feature as soon as possible. Surprisingly, on desktop, conversion decreased by 6.4%. The rates on both device types went in completely different directions, emphasizing the importance of device differences. So, a small change on the site can cause both a negative and a positive impact.

A good reason to iterate on this result is, for example, to find out why there is less need for enlarged photos on desktop. Is it because photos are already larger than on mobile? For now, this feature will be implemented on mobile, while iterations continue for desktop devices.

The conclusion

You can easily experiment with a completely new feature with a small budget. This case shows that a relatively easy test can have a great impact and that there is always more to test than you might think. Would you like a one-on-one meeting with one of our CRO-specialist to see what we could do for you? Please let us know, we are always happy to help.