Imagine running a retail business without knowing how much you’re paying your wholesaler for goods. Or running a restaurant without looking at the price of your ingredients. Or constructing homes without looking at the price of raw materials… you get the idea.
That lack of transparency would be frightening, but hey, things could still work out, right?
Well, let’s up the difficulty.
Imagine that, on top of not knowing exactly how much you were paying for your inputs, you also didn’t know if you would have consistent and continued access to your wholesaler, your food supplier, or your building materials. That would almost certainly induce high blood pressure, stomach ulcers, and mild insomnia.
In the world of private credit (this is basically business credit for the majority of companies), it’s not only normal but expected that getting and maintaining access to debt capital (one of the key inputs for running any business!) will be opaque, error-prone, and hard to operationalize. In other words, capital uncertainty is the dismal reality in middle-market finance.
Private credit is enormous (add up all the VC dollars spent last year and you’d still be short of the amount of private credit issued over the same period), unavoidable, and broken.
That means credit access–the fuel or primary financial input for most medium-sized businesses–is hard to price, access, report on, and predict.
And yet it doesn’t have to be that way; the data and operational issues of private credit have been solved in other domains (e.g., CRMs for Sales, infrastructure tooling for devs, EMRs for hospitals). What’s missing is a software layer for business finance.
Finley has built the system of record for private credit. We plug into all borrower source systems and automate reporting and analysis for private credit lenders. The result is full transparency into the cost and availability of capital, which gives businesses newfound financial predictability.
We’re a team of builders, designers, finance experts, engineers, and systems thinkers from top companies in finance and technology, and we’re backed by leading investors like Y Combinator, CRV, and Bain Capital Ventures.
We’re two years into our journey, recently raised a $17 million Series A, and already managing over $3 billion in private credit.
It’s still Day 1, though. The challenges we’re taking on will reshape the economy over the next decades, and we’d love to partner with team members who share our passion for innovation and company-building.
Our mission is to radically accelerate the pace of software development for every company in the world. We’re starting with a tool to catch UI bugs in web applications with zero-effort from developers.
How it works: Insert a single line of JavaScript onto your site, and we record thousands of real user sessions. We then replay these sessions on head and base commits of PRs, take screenshots at key points, and diff those screenshots to catch visual regressions before they hit production. We employ novel techniques to eliminate flakes. You can watch a 60-second demo at [meticulous.ai](http://meticulous.ai/).
We are a London-based YC company. Our engineering team previously worked at Dropbox, Opendoor, Palantir and Google, and have previously led 100+ engineer organizations at these companies. We just raised $4m, and are backed by some of the best founders and technical leaders in Silicon Valley, including Guillermo Rauch (founder Vercel, author next.js), Jason Warner (CTO GitHub), Scott Belsky (CPO Adobe), Calvin French-Owen (founder Segment), Jared Friedman (YC partner and former CTO of Scribd) and a bunch of other incredible folks.
Catching visual regressions is just the start. There is an entire category of products to build on top of replay. This ranges from catching exceptions to revealing the performance impact of frontend code.
We want to change the way the world develops software, and influence software approaches for decades to come.
We are seeding a London office and hiring an onsite (few days per week) founding engineer to join our team of four.
You will have autonomy in building out this technology, but here are a few problems you might work on:
– Build a distributed system to concurrently replay thousands of sessions, such that a developer gets a result in seconds.
– Speed up the replay of sessions in a way that retains determinism.
– Derive algorithms to detect sessions that cover differing code paths and edge cases, and ignore sessions that are too similar.
– Help build out a team of world-class, highly collaborative, software engineers.
As founding engineer, you get to shape the company, and build the culture and technology from the ground up.
What we look for:
In a sentence: Technically brilliant, delightful to work with, combined with a self-awareness and strong desire to improve. We also want to make sure everyone is highly supportive of each other; we win as a team.
We’re currently only looking to bring on folks with senior level skill sets and 5+ years of industry experience. You should have strong web fundamentals and a deep love for software engineering. Maybe you enjoy programming books like Clean Code, Designing Data Intensive Applications, Pragmatic Programmer etc. or enjoy hacking on interesting side projects. You value transparency and candid feedback, and are motivated by a strong desire to become the best engineer you can be.
You will be given the space and time to up-level yourself as an engineer in terms of conferences, reading, or whatever you think will be most valuable. We will also set you up with mentorship, if you desire it, from top engineering leaders (folks running 100-engineer organizations at the world’s leading tech companies).
You’ll get to work alongside some of the best engineers there are, break new ground solving truly novel CS problems and deliver something that transforms how software is built.
If this sounds interesting, please reach out to me at gabe [at] meticulous [dot] ai with “HN” in the subject line and 2-3 sentences about what you find interesting about Meticulous and your resume/LinkedIn/GitHub.
\*tl;dr:\* back-end or full-stack dev. (third hire) at YC Seed-stage API startup in construction.
\*What we’re looking for:\*
– Back-end or full-stack dev. with experience building complex systems quickly.
– Familiarity with cloud infrastructure, multi-tenant systems, and building dev. tools (e.g. APIs).
– Self-motivated, high ownership, low ego; desire to work on a fast-paced, intense, fun team.
– Excited to be our second Eng. hire; passion for building a world-class Eng. culture, on par with Stripe.
\*More about us:\*
– We’re a data-integration API and analytics platform for the $12T construction/real estate industry.
– We’re a team of 5 who worked together for 6 years, first at Graphiq (acq. by Amazon) then at Alexa.
– We just raised $3M from YC, Accel (Facebook, Slack, Cloudera, Segment, etc.), founders of Plaid and Mailbox, and founders/execs at Procore, Autodesk, PlanGrid, Fieldwire, and others.
Businesses spend nearly 115 billion total on advertising across the Meta (formerly Facebook) platforms. Why? It works! And not only that; Meta has great tools that allow you to easily manage and track your business accounts.
Are you struggling to keep up with your Instagram and Facebook marketing?
DMs and comments falling through the cracks?
Do the multiple tabs for all your accounts and features like the Ad Manager drive you nuts?
Then you’re going to fall head over heels with Meta Business Suite, called Facebook Business Suite before Facebook changed its name to Meta.
It’s the platform’s newest creation, designed to iron out the time-sucking road bumps in social media management and make it easier for businesses to manage their Instagram and Facebook profiles.
Below, I’m breaking down everything you need to know about Meta Business Suite. We’ll unpack what it is, everything you can do with the tool, how it can benefit your business and a quick walkthrough on how to set up your account.
What Is Facebook Business Suite (now Meta Business Suite) and How Does It Work?
Meta Business Suite streamlines your Facebook and Instagram accounts into one easy-to-use dashboard.
Through the platform, you can manage all accounts you own or administrate with various tools to make controlling your business’s social media presence much easier.
The best part? It’s free and available on mobile and desktop.
All you need to do is link up your accounts, and you’ll instantly have access to an overview dashboard of your Facebook Pages and Instagram accounts.
You’ll be able to:
create a to-do list of notifications to manage
check insights on your performance and audience growth
create or see recent posts or stories
create or manage recent ads
see content calendar
view content inspiration
communicate with an inbox for Facebook and Instagram DMs and comments
access the Commerce Manager
check Business Suite updates
That’s only the tip of the iceberg.
There’s an entire “more tools” section with 12 other features to play around with, including:
appointments
ad manager
events manager
instant forms
media library
Facebook (Meta) Business Suite vs. Facebook Business Manager
Before Facebook became Meta, they offered both Facebook Business Suite and Facebook Business Manager. Both options are still offered under Meta.
The Business Manager is a backend tool used to share or limit access to your business accounts by assigning one of six different “roles” to those with access to your accounts.
The Business Suite offers front-end management, like merging notifications, scheduling posts, and managing your inbox.
Facebook (Meta) Business Suite allows you to combine and streamline your activity across the Meta social media and messenger platforms.
Leveraging Meta Business Suite Insights
Meta Business Suite makes it easy to track your business accounts and campaigns across the Meta social and messenger platforms.
Ad spend: You can track your ad spend across all Meta platforms. Based on how well you’re performing, you can adjust your spend accordingly. For example, if you’re spending a lot on Instagram ads but see via other insights that the ads aren’t performing well, you can redirect your budget towards the Meta platforms you’re more successful on.
Engagement: Meta (Facebook) Business Suite allows you to see engagement with your organic and boosted content. You can see what content performs best and use that to inform your future strategies and the content you publish on social.
Audience demographics: With Business Suite, you can see data about the users who interact with your profile and content. For example, you can see where they’re from, their other interests, their age, and more. You can use this information to continue creating content that targets your existing users, or adjust your strategies if your content isn’t reaching the right audience.
Everything you can do on desktop, you can also do on mobile. You can monitor your account activity, manage your inbox, and even get audience insights.
How to Use Meta Business Suite
Before you can start streamlining your social media management with Facebook (now Meta) Business Suite, you’ll need to follow a simple setup process.
Step 1: Create a Facebook Business Account
Go to https://business.facebook.com/ and select “Create a Facebook Business Account.” Enter your business account name and select “Next” when you’re done.
Step 2: Fill in Your Contact Information
Enter your full name and business email address. This information won’t be shared with your followers. Facebook will only use it to contact you.
Step 3: Select Your Facebook and Instagram Accounts
The Facebook and Instagram accounts you own are available for you to claim. If you’re managing an account someone else owns, you won’t be able to select it.
In order to select an Instagram account, it needs to be converted to a business or creator account. If you try to select a personal account, Facebook will ask you to switch before continuing the setup process.
Step 4: Add People to Your Business Account
Here, you can select your page admins. Enter their email address and assign each contact as an employee (limited access) or business admin (full access).
If you’re running your accounts solo, you can skip this step.
Step 5: Review Your Business Account
When you’re happy with your selection and who has access to your Business Suite, click on “Confirm.” Facebook will then take you to your dashboard overview, and you can start using all the tools inside the platform.
Tools to Use in Meta Business Suite
Curious about the tools inside Facebook Business Suite? Let’s take a deep dive and look at what you can do with the platform and how it can benefit your business.
Monitor Your Inbox
Are comments one of your biggest time suckers? Do you constantly find yourself hopping between apps on your phone or getting inundated with notifications on your desktop?
With the inbox tool in Business Suite, you can see all your Instagram and Facebook comments in one place.
Pop the kettle on, make some coffee, block out 30-minutes in your calendar and respond to everything at once.
What about direct messages (DMs)? You’ll find that here too.
Got the Facebook chat plugin on your website? You can manage all your messages here as well.
Sick of replying to the same question every single day? Business Suite lets you create automated replies for your frequently asked questions.
How’s that for efficiency?
Explore Insights
There are tons of free and paid tools that show you Facebook and Instagram analytics, but few compare the platform’s built-in option.
With Business Suite, you can see your latest statistics for all your accounts.
Gone are the days of toggling between the different apps or going in and out of individual posts.
On the Insights dashboard, you can see an overview of how your content is performing over a specific time period, and sort your posts by:
reach
likes and reactions
comments
shares
results
cost per result
link clicks
recent content
One of the most interesting features of Insights is the Audience section. It breaks down your current audience for both platforms, and you can see at a glance:
age and gender
towns and cities
top countries
There’s also a potential audience tab. It details your estimated audience size if you run an ad, as well as the top pages liked by your potential audience.
Not liking what you’re seeing? You can create a custom audience by clicking on the “filter” button and refining the results based on:
location
age
gender
interests
language
Create Posts and Stories
Are you using post-creation apps like Later or Planoly? Business Suite sets itself up as a rival by giving you the ability to create your posts and stories in one place and schedule each one out.
That’s not all.
If you go to the Planner section on your dashboard, you’ll see a calendar view of your past and upcoming posts.
Facebook also recommends a timeslot of when your audience is most online. Click on it, and you can start creating a new post or story.
One of my favorite features in the “New Post” box is the hashtag tool. It shows you which hashtags are trending, the number of posts using a tag, and lets you save your favorites for later.
Plus, it shows you hashtag results for each platform and gives you recommendations based on what you’ve already selected.
While in create mode, you can put together your Instagram and Facebook posts at the same time. Switch between the different tabs, and you can see exactly how your post will look on the two platforms.
For Stories, it works the same. Upload up to 10 photos or videos at once and schedule each one out when you’re done.
Create Ads
Don’t want to have another tab open for Facebook Ad Manager? You can keep track of your ad performance and create ads from the Business Suite.
It’s another time-saver and allows you to see how you’re tracking towards goals.
On the dashboard, you can see:
reach
post engagement
link clicks
page likes
Switch between the different filter views to see your results over the last 90, 60, 30, and 7 days.
Click on the blue “Create Ad” button in the top right-hand corner to create an ad. A pop-up will load and take you through a step-by-step process for setting up a creative that converts.
First, you’ll select your ad goal. You can choose from:
automated ads
get more leads
boost a post
boost an Instagram post
promote a page
get more website visitors
get more messages
Next, start designing your ad creative. You’ll see a live preview as you adjust your text and media.
Turn on automatic adjustments if you want Facebook to tweak your ad for each viewer. For example, the platform might adjust the brightness or show the original aspect ratio if it thinks the ad will perform better.
Scroll down to select your audience or create a new one, placements, and set your campaign budget and duration.
When you’re done, click on “Promote Now” for your ad to go into review.
Create Appointments for Your Business
Remember those extra options I spoke about earlier?
One of the most important features of an online business is the appointments scheduler.
If you’re running a service-based business, take advantage of Facebook’s capabilities and empower your audience to book directly through the platform.
When people don’t need to log onto another site to complete the process, you’re removing an extra step and making it that much easier to close a sale.
The result? A boost in your bottom line!
Inside Business Suite, you can manage your appointments, view requests, and adjust the settings to suit your schedule.
Generate Leads With Instant Forms
Does your business rely heavily on lead gen? Start using Facebook’s Instant Forms.
What are Instant Forms? Think of it as a mini CRM system. When you create an ad and set your objective to find leads, you can create custom forms users can fill out without leaving the platform.
Again, you’re removing the obstacle of trying to get them to go from one website to another. Thus, improving your chances of someone filling out the form and requesting a callback.
With Business Suite, you can manage your forms and set up the CRM system.
When you create a form, Facebook offers different options depending on your lead generation goal.
For example, you can create a “more volume” form (a quick option) or a “higher intent” (adds an extra step for users to review their information before submitting).
Frequently Asked Questions About Meta Business Suite
What is Meta Business Suite (formerly Facebook Business Suite) used for?
The Meta Business Suite is used for managing your Facebook Pages and Instagram accounts in one dashboard. You can reply to comments, create posts, schedule stories, run ads, and more.
How do you qualify for Meta Business Suite?
You need to have a Facebook page. If you have an Instagram account, you’ll need to convert it to a business account if you want to sync it to your Business Suite.
Is Business Suite on Facebook free?
Yes, Business Suite is free on Facebook to set up and use. All you need is a Facebook account and a Facebook Page to get started on the platform.
Is Facebook Business Suite the same as Meta Business Suite?
Yes, Facebook Business Suite is the same as Meta Business Suite. It was renamed “Meta Business Suite” when Facebook rebranded to Meta.
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Conclusion: Meta Business Suite (Formerly Facebook Business Suite)
Meta Business Suite is perfect for creators, personal brands, and businesses to streamline their social media management across Facebook and Instagram.
It gives you everything you need to monitor your growth, stay on top of comments and DMs from your audience, schedule your content, create ads, and so much more.
If you’re only using these two platforms to run your business and you’re using other social media management tools, it’s worthwhile to take a peek inside Business Suite. You might find it’s a more robust tool, and you can nip another business expense from your monthly budget.
What are your thoughts on Meta (Facebook) Business Suite? Are you going to make the switch and use it to manage your Facebook and Instagram accounts?
Did YOU Know That Your Business Credit Score Can Affect the Cost of Your Business Insurance?
A business credit score tends to not be necessary to apply for an insurance policy. But insurers may ask to access your business data after you apply. High credit scores correspond with low premiums and vice versa. That doesn’t mean you should ignore financials in favor of improving your credit score. Rather, if you improve your company’s credit history by paying down debt or working on payables management, then this could help you save money on business insurance premiums.
Get Ready Before You Apply
Getting ready to apply for business insurance is like preparing to apply for financing. You need to know certain details about your business. If you must have certain coverage before signing a lease or contract, understanding the required coverage will also be key before applying. Doing your due diligence beforehand will save you time and maybe even money.
Part of due diligence is looking for an agent. Make sure you work with an agent who understands your business needs and the best options for you. Then the process can go much more smoothly. It is best practices to find an agent specializing in your industry. Their expert advice can be helpful in the process.
Your Credit Could Affect What You Pay for General Liability Insurance
Data your insurer uses revolves around correlation. Poor credit tends to mean a higher risk. Insurance is all about probability, and the data shows a higher chance of frequent claims and overdue payments, when insurers cover someone with bad credit.
What If You Don’t Have Business Credit Yet?
Having no business credit score won’t prevent you from buying general liability insurance. And it won’t keep you from getting a decent premium. But a good business credit score might get you solid discounts. So, it makes sense to start building PAYDEX and other business credit scores.
Are Your Business Insurance Premiums Affected by What’s in Your Business Credit Reports?
Many business owners have no idea their insurance rate is affected by their credit report. But let’s consider personal credit for a moment. And, since Experian business scores (in part) come from personal credit scores, it does apply to your business credit.
Statistics show that people with high personal credit scores file fewer claims than those with low credit scores, and those with higher scores are less likely to have traffic accidents and traffic violations. Additionally, history in a credit report can show if a business or an individual will pay insurance premiums on time or at all. For that reason, federal law lets insurance companies look at items from your credit report. Carriers do not have to tell you they are using your credit report.
How Insurers Use Your Business Insurance Credit Score
Rates are based on a narrow set of information in your credit report. Carriers can only use those specific types of information; this information together is your insurance credit score. The insurance credit score does not include your FICO score.
The score does include items like the pattern of monthly bill payments, collection activity, total number of outstanding loans, and total number of credit cards. Under the law, your rates cannot increase if you do not have enough credit history to calculate a credit score. If you want to see what your personal insurance credit score is, you can buy a copy of the report from True Credit, a division of Transunion.
It’s smart to review your insurance credit report and make certain everything in it is correct. It is important that you do this to get the best rate you can find.
Using Insurance Credit Scores for Business Insurance
Only some items on your business credit report are considered when you apply for business insurance. The insurance credit score only considers areas of your credit report which apply to the insurance industry. It is against the law to deny an insurance policy based on a lack of credit history.
Average time in which your company pays its monthly bills
Collection activity, if any; and
Length of credit history
Items that insurance companies CANNOT use when checking an insurance credit report include:
Amount of credit available
Number of credit inquiries in your company’s credit file
Type of credit history or not enough credit history to develop a score
Types or issuers of credit cards and debit cards your business carries
Does it Matter So Much if You Don’t Think You Need a Lot of Insurance?
It matters because you can’t get by with no business insurance! Every small business owner needs certain insurance policies to protect them in case the worst happens.
Differing industries will have different degrees of risk. Examine your risks and put together a business insurance plan based on that information. Shop around and find the right carrier for your small business. There are nine basic types of business insurance every small business may need to protect a business.
#9. General Liability Insurance
Every business needs general liability insurance. It will cover:
third-party bodily injury
third-party property damage
advertising injury (accusations of libel, slander, copyright infringement, etc.)
The type of your business, its size, assets, and corporate structure will determine the amount of coverage you need. But this policy won’t cover motor vehicles.
#8. Commercial Property Insurance
If you have a physical address, you should carry commercial property insurance to cover losses of business or personal property. This type of policy usually covers damage to the structure and inventory or property within it from damage from storms, fire, theft, or vandalism. Dovetailing with commercial property insurance, it might also make sense to look at a business owners’ policy (BOP) depending on the size and assets of your business.
Insurance companies will sometimes offer a BOP to small and medium-sized businesses. A BOP policy will usually combine general liability, property insurance, and business interruption coverage. You can often add riders to such a policy. It can be more affordable to bundle the coverage you already need.
#7. Business Interruption Insurance
If property sustains damages, you may not be able to keep your business open during repairs. Hence business interruption insurance can help cover financial losses. It can cover your employee payroll, taxes, operating expenses, debt repayment, and sometimes the cost of a temporary location. Many business owners used business interruption insurance during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic when they had to close their doors.
#6. Workers’ Compensation Insurance
If you hire employees to work in your business, you’re legally required in most states to get workers’ compensation insurance. Workers’ comp protects you and your employees if they’re injured or become ill at work. It can cover an employees’ medical expenses and lost wages while recuperating. If an employee agrees to accept workers’ compensation as part of their hiring package, they often waive the right to sue you for an incident at work.
#5. Commercial Auto Insurance
If you use a vehicle for business purposes, then you need commercial auto insurance. Because if you get in an accident while doing business-related work, your personal car insurance may not cover it. Some insurers will require separate policies for dump trucks and semis.
#4. Product Liability Insurance
If you manufacture or sell any type of product, you can be held liable if that product injures someone, damages their property, or makes them sick. Product liability insurance can help cover associated medical costs, replacement of the purchased product, and even legal fees and settlement costs if your business is sued. Distributors and sellers can be the subject of product liability lawsuits, so, they should consider this form of coverage.
#3. Cyber Liability Insurance
If your business is the subject of a data breach and customer information was accessed or stolen, cyber liability insurance can:
Notify anyone impacted by the breach
Give them credit monitoring
Cover the costs of informing the public (if necessary)
Some insurers call this data breach insurance. Anyone who stores customer information electronically should get it, as your general liability policy won’t cover this.
#2. Professional Liability Insurance
If you run a business where you offer professional advice or are responsible for completing projects—such as a doctor, lawyer, or architect—you need to carry professional liability insurance. It’s also called errors and omissions insurance. This policy can protect you and your business if you’re accused of negligence (or were negligent), missed deadlines, undelivered services, or breach of nondisclosure/copyright insurance. Doctors and other professionals often must carry a specialized type of professional liability—malpractice insurance. But even plumbers, realtors, and event planners can use professional liability coverage.
#1. Commercial Umbrella Insurance
At times, it can be more affordable for a small business to purchase an umbrella policy, instead of increasing the limits of an underlying policy. An umbrella policy may also cover business risks that an underlying policy excludes. Hence, if the policy limits of your general liability policy are exhausted, umbrella insurance can step in to cover whatever remains. But umbrella policies can’t and won’t cover everything.
Does a Home-Based Business Need Insurance?
You may be wondering if any of this can apply to you. You may not have a physical business location. But your homeowners’ insurance will only cover some of any damage to business property. And most if not all the other insurance policies apply, too.
Other Types of Insurance to Consider
A small business may do well to consider key person insurance. With key person insurance, if there’s one person—this could be you—key to the operation of your business, the business won’t grind to a screeching halt if that key person were out for a long time (say, with Covid). This coverage can help cover any associated monetary losses for a certain time until your business replaces this person, or they return to work.
Two other types of consider are commercial crime insurance, and equipment breakdown coverage. Crime insurance can protect your business if you’re robbed (even by an employee). It can help cover financial losses other types of insurance may not. Equipment breakdown covers damage to or the loss of your A/C systems, boilers, furnaces, and computers and other electronics, if damaged by power surges or they break down.
If you’ve got employees, then you may be thinking about offering employee benefits. Often, depending on the size of your business, you must provide disability insurance, health insurance, and other insurance, like life insurance, to help protect your employees. But with good business credit, you may be able to save on all these types of insurance.
Finally, Pay Attention to Your Policy
It’s best practices to take time to revisit your policy, especially if you change parts of your business and need new coverage. Experts say you should search every three years or so for a new policy. This is to make sure you’re not only staying current on your coverage but getting the best rate.
Business Insurance and Business Credit: Takeaways
The strength of business credit scores like PAYDEX can affect the price of your policies. Insurance carriers tend to look at open debts and collections, and how quickly your business pays its bills. Paying on time and keeping accounts out of collections can help both your business credit scores and what you’ll pay for premiums—for any type of business insurance.
Software engineer with a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science and over ten years of experience in several technologies and programming languages. There are two fields where I mainly act: (1) DevOps; from database administration and data modeling to back-end programming or front-end design all the way to orchestrated deployment with latest tech and (2) Standalone software; involves embedded development in restrict environments, blockchain applications mostly related to Parity’s Substrate and plain command-line interfaces.
On the open-source side of things, I regularly contribute to several projects, helping and communicating with other developers. Take a look at the available coding portfolio in my GitHub profile at https://github.com/c410-f3r where my public collaborations in the last fours years are more focused on the Rust Programming Language ecosystem.
Over 40 certified courses have been completed and eight professional certifications that covers a wide range of area were obtained from different organizations, e.g., Google (Cloud) and the Blockchain Training Alliance. Learning is very important to keep up with both old and new technologies, my newest certification is the Linux Foundation Certified System Administrator (LFCS) and more certifications will be earned over time.
To finish, IT in general is like a living organism that is constantly changing, that is why I am always looking forward for a new challenge to increase knowledge. For example, my proudest project is a constrained NP-problem solver compiled to WASM (https://c410-f3r.github.io/mop-playground) where I spent years reading scientific articles to write efficient data-structures and algorithms.
A/B testing is a fantastic method for figuring out the best online promotional and marketing strategies for your business. It can be used to test everything from website copy to sales emails to search ads. While it can be time-consuming, the advantages of A/B testing are enough to offset the additional time it takes.
Well-planned tests can make a huge difference in the effectiveness of your marketing efforts. Narrowing down the most effective elements of a promotion and then combining them, can create a far more effective marketing plan.
What is A/B Testing and Why Does it Matter?
A/B testing is a marketing strategy that pits two different versions of a website, ad, email, popup, or landing page against each other to see which is most effective.
For example, you might test two different popups to see which drives more webinar sign-ups or two different Google Ads to see which drives more purchases.
On my own site, I spent time A/B testing my popup to find out what encouraged users to engage with my brand.
Over time, we found offering a free website analysis (which provides tons of value) was the most effective way to establish expertise and show visitors the value we offer.
Why is A/B Testing Important?
Accurate A/B tests can make a huge difference to your bottom line. By using controlled tests and gathering empirical data, you can figure out exactly which marketing strategies work best for your company and your product.
When you figure that one variation might work two, three, or even four times better than another, the idea that you would run promotions without testing starts to seem a bit ludicrous.
When done consistentyly, testing can improve your bottom line substantially. If you know what works and what doesn’t (and have evidence to back it up) it’s easier to make decisions and craft more effective marketing strategies.
Here are a few other benefits to running regular tests on your website and marketing materials:
Helps You Better Understand Your Target Audience: When you see what types of emails, headlines, and other features your audience responds to, you can better understand who your audience is and what they want.
Higher Conversion Rates: A/B testing is the single most effective way to increase conversion rates. Knowing what works and what doesn’t gives you actionable data that can help you streamline the conversion process.
Stay On Top of Changing Trends: It’s hard to predict what type of content, images, or other features people will respond to. Testing regularly helps you stay ahead of changing consumer behavior.
Reduce Bounce Rates: When site visitors see content they like, they stay on your site longer. Testing to find the type of content and marketing materials your users like will help you create a better site — and one that users want to stay on.
How Do You Plan an A/B Test?
The first thing to do when planning an A/B test is to figure out what you want to test. Are you running an on-site test, or an off-site test? If you’re running an on-site test, you’ll want to think of all the sales-related pieces of your website, and then figure out which elements to test.
For example, you might test:
headlines
calls to action text
calls to action location
pop up
featured images
copy
the number of fields in a form
With off-site tests, you’re probably testing either an ad or a sales email. Testing ad copy to see which ad drives more conversions can help you focus your advertising efforts. Once you know your ad is converting as well as possible, it’s easier to justify spending more money on it.
The same goes for emails. If you send out two versions to your list (randomly selecting which half gets which email), and then track which one converts better, you can send only that version the next time.
Once you know what you’ll test, make a list of all the variables you’ll test. For example, if you’ve decided to test your call to action, you might test:
the location
the exact text used
the button color or surrounding space
It’s a process, and it’s common for multiple A/B tests to be carried out prior to making a final decision or final change.
Before you start testing, make sure you have a clear idea of the results you’re looking for. You should already know your baseline result, which is the results you’re currently getting. You want to test option A and B against each other, but you also want to know that whichever one does better in the test is also doing better than your current results.
Alternatively, you can use A as your control (leaving whatever you’re currently using) and then use something new for B.
Tests need to be run simultaneously to account for any variations in timing. You can’t test one variation today and the other one tomorrow, because you can’t factor in any variables that might have changed between today and tomorrow. Instead, you need to split the traffic seeing your variations at the same time.
Here’s an A/B testing checklist to review before running your first test:
Decide what you want to test.
Create two versions of the same ad, landing page, etc.
Decide how long your test will run (I suggest at least two weeks, but it may be longer or slightly shorter depending on your traffic and industry)
Chose a testing tool to help you run your test. (More on that later.)
Launch!
After two or so weeks, take a look at the results. Which version won?
Rinse, and repeat. A/B testing is most effective when done continually.
What to Use A/B Testing to Test
You can test virtually anything in your marketing materials or on your website: headlines, calls to action, body copy, images, etc. If you can change it, you can test it.
That doesn’t mean you should spend months testing every little thing. Instead, focus on changes most likely to have a big impact on traffic and conversions.
On your website, this likely includes:
the headline
your call to action
any graphic you use in direct correlation to your sales efforts
In an email, you might test the title, images, links, CTAs, or segmenting options. In a paid ad, especially a text ad (like a search ad), you have fewer things to change, and so you might test the main headline, the offer, or targeting.
Testing different offers is also important. Just make sure that each person is always offered the same promotion. For example, if a free gift is offered to group A, and a discount is offered to group B, then you want to make sure that group A always contains the same visitors, as does group B.
You can also test the full path of conversion. For example, you might test newsletter A with landing page A, and newsletter B with landing page B. Later, you may want to test newsletter A with landing page B, and vice versa.
This can give you a better idea of what is working, especially if you’re getting mixed results or if the results are very close. Here are a few other tests you can run.
How Much Time Does A/B Testing Take?
A/B testing is not an overnight project. Depending on the amount of traffic you get, you might want to run tests for anywhere from a few days to a couple of weeks. Remember, you only want to run one test at a time for the most accurate results.
Running a test for an insufficient amount of time can skew the results, as you don’t get a large enough group of visitors to be statistically accurate. Running a test for too long can also give skewed results, though, since there are more variables you can’t control over a longer period.
Make sure that you stay abreast of anything that might affect your test results, so that you can account for statistical anomalies in your results. When in doubt, run the test again.
Considering the impact A/B testing can have on your bottom line, it’s worth taking a few weeks to properly conduct tests. Test one variable at a time, and give each test sufficient time to run.
Can I Test More Than One Thing At a Time?
There are two approaches to this question. Say you just want to test your headline, but you have three possible variations. In that case, running a single test and splitting your visitors (or recipients in the case of an email) into three groups instead of two is reasonable, and would likely still be considered an A/B test.
This is more efficient than running three separate tests (A vs. B, B vs. C, and A vs. C). You may want to give your test an extra couple of days to run, so you have enough results to see what actually works.
Testing more than one thing at a time, such as headlines and calls to action, is called a multi-variate test, and is more complicated to run. There are plenty of resources out there for multi-variate testing, but we won’t be covering that when talking about A/B testing.
A/B Testing FAQs
What is A/B Testing and Why Does It Matter?
A/B testing is a marketing strategy that pits two different versions of a website, ad, email, popup, or landing page against each other to see which is most effective. It’s one of the most effective ways to increase conversion rates.
How Do You Plan an A/B Test?
Decide what to test, create two versions, decide on how long to run the test, choose a tool, then see what works!
What to Use A/B Testing to Test
Any part of a paid ad, website, or marketing material including (but not limited to) pop-ups, emails, landing pages, and featured images.
How Much Time Does A/B Testing Take?
Most tests should be run for at least two weeks, but A/B testing should be continual.
Can I Test More Than One Thing At A Time?
Yes, in some cases. In general, it is best to stick to two versions of the same asset.
What A/B Testing Tools Should I Use?
Google’s Optimize is a free, powerful A/B testing tool. Your email platform, landing page tools, or website plugins may also offer this feature. For paid tools, consider Optimizely.
Conclusion
A/B testing is a marketer’s best friend. It allows you to see, for example, what ads drive the most conversions, what offers your audience responds to, or what blog headlines drive the most traffic.
There are a variety of tools you can use to get started, including Google Optimize (which is free!) and Optimizely.
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