Do you dare to experiment?

What if we told you that those businesses who use experimentation to improve their customer experience, increase their revenues on average by 9%?

Experimentation has always been seen as a costly, non-specific, intangible art form… Therefore it’s not surprising that many businesses see it as something which is reserved for large multi-nationals with endless budget and time on their hands.

However, with digital experience provider Episerver’s recent acquisition of the world’s fastest experimentation platform, Optimizely, this opens it up to a much greater audience than ever before.

As Episerver CEO Alex Atzberger himself said at a recent event we attended:
“Experimentation is not just going to be the tool of a few elite companies anymore - it will now be democratised to everyone."

The time for experimentation is NOW. With this year’s turbulent landscape, uncertainty is high around the globe. This is a prime opportunity to get to know your customers better than your competitors, test different scenarios and ultimately drive growth.

Experimentation has measurable business impact

1/3 of companies saw an increase in digital revenue of 5-9% 
More than 1/3 saw an increase in digital revenue of 10+%

So, if the time is right to give experimentation a go – what are the real benefits?

• For decades, companies have run focus groups, where customers were asked what they thought of products, or asked to test them out and watch them being used in action, to research user behaviour. But experimenting digitally, gives the opportunity to test any number of variables on an extraordinary scale, giving rich data on which to base decisions.
• It is difficult to test and experiment in physical spaces – so within retail, products can be moved around the store or placed at eye level, at checkouts etc. but this is much more limited than in the digital space.
• The goal of any digital marketing programme is to attract visitors, and convert these into customers, then moving those customers into advocates. Experimentation gives you greater ability to get to know your customers in-depth, what they want, what they don’t and ultimately, to deliver on these needs, improving customer satisfaction, and therefore loyalty.

And when should we get started on this?
We all know the stories of large companies like Amazon, Netflix and Booking.com already doing this many times throughout the day. They are incredibly well-versed in making tiny tweaks on their digital estate, testing multiple scenarios, and being able to implement the best performing to become incrementally more customer centric. There are reports that they undertake 10,000 experiments annually.

In his presentation, Alex Atzberger assured us all that this was not meant to be a big and scary number – simply to show that there is a sense of urgency in this. These types of business have been reaping the benefits of these techniques every day for years, getting to know their customers better and better.
So, why don’t we all give it a try?

Experimentation needs to be part of your CX programme
A successful customer experience programme should be able to tell you exactly what your customers want and need from your business, where you currently are on this journey, and what the gap is. Not only identifying what you need to do to get better, but how will you be able to close this gap.

Digital experimentation can provide you with this valuable insight. Where previously, customer surveys may have shown some of this information, these tend to be completed by those who are vocal, with strong opinions either way. And tend to highlight ideas of what might work. Whereas experimentation captures data from all users, measures actions and outcomes and gives you a holistic insight into your entire audience. It puts your customers’ actions at the heart of the business.

Experimentation is accessible to everyone
A key goal of Episerver’s acquisition of Optimizely was the desire to democratise experimentation, making it accessible to everyone. This needs to also be coupled with a change in attitude, a willingness to be open to failure, to constantly learn and evolve – this all becomes possible through experimentation.

By setting experimentation alongside how we create our digital experiences and being able to test at every point in that customer journey, doubling down on the power of data – is how we get to that 9% increase in revenue.

So… do you dare to experiment? Do you want to grow your revenue by 9%?

Then get in touch with us and we can support you through the process…