A/B Testing for Geschenkidee.ch

Learn more about how the Swiss online retailer identifies what users want by means of A/B testing and how the company successfully uses this potential for optimisation for its online shop.

About Geschenkidee.ch

The Swiss e-commerce platform geschenkidee.ch stands for the joy of gift giving. Those who want to make themselves or others happy can find the right present for every occasion, every recipient and every budget there. Besides a wide variety of gift articles, the industry leader also offers all kinds of experience gifts. Customisable gifts are particularly popular. The online retailer was founded in 2002 and is part of the leading Swiss media group Ringier AG.

CLIENT	Geschenkidee.ch GmbH
INDUSTRY	Household & Leisure
BUSINESS FIELD	B2C
PROJECT	A/B Testing
SYSTEM	Magento, Google Optimize, Google Tag Manager, Google Analytics

Long-Term Success by Consistently Focusing on the User

The Jena digital agency dotSource has already been supporting the Swiss company in the field of e-commerce since 2014. As part of the cooperation, the online shop was migrated to Magento and an innovative gift finder chatbot was designed and successfully implemented. One of the main reasons for the success of geschenkidee.ch is that the company knows what its customers want and how they behave in the online shop.

Its consistent focus on the user forms the basis for all strategic decisions regarding the optimisation of the online shop. Accordingly, the Swiss company wanted to introduce A/B testing in order to allow for the continuous further development of the platform based on well-founded data.

Identifying and Realising the Potential for Optimisation with A/B Testing

In the past, geschenkidee.ch relied on data analysis, user surveys and usability testing to identify the potential for optimisation of its own e-commerce platform and to allow newly developed features to be used by the target group. The desire to establish A/B testing in the company was thus a logical continuation of these target-group-oriented measures. At the beginning of an A/B testing process, it is important to develop questions with regard to the potential for optimisation.

Therefore, the first step was a UX audit of the website by the dotSource UX experts. In joint workshops with geschenkidee.ch, potential for optimisation was identified and testing ideas were developed based on the obtained knowledge. In terms of methodology, the so-called PIE framework was used: this involves evaluating the testing ideas with regard to their potential, importance and feasibility (ease), thus prioritising the optimisation approaches.

Shortly after, the first A/B tests were started. The focus of these tests was on simplifying the path to purchasing a product for users with mobile devices. For this purpose, micro conversions such as add-to-cart and entering the checkout were optimised along the funnel. In a test carried out on the shopping cart page, for example, 18.6 per cent more users entered the checkout in the test version than in the original. Furthermore, an 11.2 per cent uplift in transactions was achieved. The tracking and analysis of the measures was based on the Google tools Optimize, Tag Manager and Analytics.

Making Adjustments Based on Data

Through A/B testing, website experiments can be implemented easily and independently of deployments. Changes in KPIs can be tracked and traced back to modifications made. Moreover, the modern data analysis continuously identifies potential for optimisation.

With the professional support provided by dotSource, geschenkidee.ch not only gained initial experience in A/B testing, but also continues to generate valuable results for improving the usability.

This way, the Swiss company is able to gain better insights into user behaviour. geschenkidee.ch now carries out tests both with support from dotSource and on its own.

With the help of consistent A/B testing, geschenkidee.ch makes the right decisions in terms of optimisation measures based on informative data. This, in turn, increases conversion rates and thus has a positive effect on sales in the long term.