Why "We have a problem" Is The Best News To Hear: Research, Testing and the Research XL Model - A Review
“It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts.” — Arthur Conan Doyle, A Scandal in Bohemia
I am rarely accused of being lazy, but I know differently. My laziness takes a more subtle and far more sinister form: I assume too much. I believe I know things. Assumption is a great evil, for it often leads me to act on that which doesn’t really matter. And this is a problem, because deep down, I care. I didn’t go into business or ministry without heart and passion. Whatever I do, I am trying to positively affect people and shape a better world. I’m not the best at it, but I’m trying to be my best at it. I know you relate. You don’t do what you do in order to be ineffective, unsatisfied or irrelevant. You care. But, like me, you can fall into the trap of assuming too much. When we do, we work hard, but we get frustrated because we aren’t seeing the results we figured we would see. We think we know what is needed, but, in reality, we don’t know what we don’t know.
Which brings us to Growth Marketing and the leverage of optimization. We do website optimization because we care about why we do what we do; we are driven by the experience and end result of users who are the reason we got into our business in the first place. We have to know exactly what matters to our customers, or we are lazily acting on assumption.
In Growth Marketing, a course by CXL Institute, the founder, Peep Laja, describes conversion optimization as a process, a systematic way of finding opportunities for growth and developing data-based ideas for how to build on those opportunities. The process will tell you where the problems are on your site and what these problems are. In turn, you can convert these discoveries into hypotheses and test for the best solutions. Optimization seeks to test and make more effective changes to your website while reducing costs and improving speed. Testing is critical, and it requires knowing what to test. Just testing gets you nowhere.
It all starts with research. Research is the work that counters my lazy approach to marketing. Specifically, conversion research is the foundation for everything because it provides understanding and delivery of what users need in order for you to give them what you want. Anything less is an assumption that misses the mark, tests that waste time, energy, abilities and money, and results in disappointment. And we have all had enough of disappointment.
The Research XL Model, developed by Peep Laja and CXL, helps you gather six types of data in order to identify problems and determine the best ideas to test for your website optimization. Each type falls within being experience-based assessments, qualitative research and quantitative research.
The first step in the Research XL model is Heuristic Analysis that uses experience-based techniques for problem solving, learning and discovery. Results that are discovered in this analysis still require data to back it up, but essentially, it is a site walk through of each page that is focused on six essential issues:
- Clarity. “Clarity trumps persuasion,” (Dr. Flint McGlaughlin). Clarity analysis concerns itself with both design and content clarity. Design is a user’s visual experience, content is a user’s mental experience and both drive the emotional experience. The eye needs to clearly see, the mind needs to understand, and both draw user motive into action.
- Relevance. The page matches the expectation of what the user assumed the page would be about.
- Incentives to take action. This is all about the copyright. Copy is the most influential element telling where someone will convert, two times more effective than design. Copy ensures that the information is complete and that the benefits offered actually matter.
- Sources of friction. Friction is anything that slows a person down or refrains them from taking action, such as complicated processes, spammy design, slow page loads, visual or textual miscues.
- Distractions. Generally, distracting elements occur when anything else but one goal on one page is communicated.
- Buying phases. A person often passes through three phases in a buying process: awareness of the opportunity, consideration of its value to them, and purchase. In actuality, that means a person identifies a need, is introduced to your solution, seeks some information about it, and possibly looks to “try” before committing. Failure to understand that a person processes like this, and failure to have multiple points of communication along the way, leads to drop-off.
Technical Analysis follows a heuristic analysis. Essentially, website optimization depends on everything working correctly. It’s one thing to have nailed down clarity and friction in your site. It’s another if a user can’t, well, use your site. Technical analysis ensures that your website is functional across different browsers and different devices while checking on speed and load times. We have to fix what’s broken, and without testing, we don’t know what we don’t know to fix.
Money leaks from your website. We utilize Digital Analytics to discover where the leaks are. A user has a journey, a flow, that they experience on your site. Digital analytics discover where people get stacked up in the process, where the drop-offs are. In addition, digital analytics allow us to see certain correlations between a user’s behavior and outcomes. Digital analytics measures everything a user does on the site.
Digital analytics begins with a health check, because running with bad data leads to useless work. Further tools include analysis of funnels and goal flows, audience insights, site searches, content reports, custom reports, and conversion research reports.
Following Heuristic, Technical and Digital analyses, Qualitative Research depends on user experience through user surveys and tests. Surveys help us understand how customers view our brands and those of our competitors, and help us to understand our customers as well as their evaluation of new products.
Surveys will concentrate on new users and non-users. Surveys may be on the site, such as exit surveys, or via email. The key is to be clear about the goal you are after, to code the data, interpret it and produce a summary of findings.
In addition to surveys, qualitative research is discovered in review of Live Chat transcripts and in talking with customer support. Both reveal the top questions and concerns being raised by customers, as well as what the most effective responses to users have been. All of that informs your website copy.
A fifth step in the Research XL model is User Testing. The goal is to identify bottlenecks in order to promote usability. User testing reveals if the process makes sense, and it can be conducted in person or remotely. It’s best used when optimizing a new website, or if your site is undergoing a makeover in whole or in part.
The final step in the model is Mouse Tracking. It’s essential to collect data at the start of each project. Mouse tracking aims for the data of 2000-5000 visitors per page. It utilizes heat mapping (not as reliable as other indicators), and mostly click maps and scroll maps. Click maps identify what a user did or did not click on, and a scroll map will show at what point a user stopped scrolling a page. The maps are a valuable tool for understanding a user’s motive and experience of clarity and friction.
The Research XL Model consists of:
- Heuristic Analysis
- Technical Analysis
- Digital Analytics
- Qualitative Research
- User Testing
- Mouse Track Analysis
I have found it to be a clear and comprehensive paradigm for optimization. One of my companies is set to release a new app for Chiropractors. The emphasis on research and testing, as opposed to assumption and risk, has proven invaluable in laying the foundation for a successful rollout.
Sometimes, being lazy is just a posture for not knowing where to start. The Research XL Model is the guide that is needed to start well and steer clear of hazards along the way. In the end, you will know what you need to know.