How to split test your WordPress theme

In this post I am going to tell you about how you can split test your WordPress theme to get better results from your blog – but let me give you some background first on how this post came about.

Background: I was just consulting for a former student of mine. He has a great site called www.crazymikeapps.com – I was looking at his site and my immediate thought was that the black background looks cool, but may actually be hurting his user experience – which has a much bigger impact on all of his efforts on the site. I’ll get into more detail on that later.

***Side note: We talked about a bunch of ways he might be able to improve his site, but this post is about split testing his theme so I will focus on that.

Did you know that visitors will stay on a site longer with a white background more than any other color? In some niches or markets the opposite may be true, but from my experience the clean white look has always done best. There has been a lot of research on this topic and most of it points to white being the winner.

After discussing this with Mike I told him to test it, I recommended he test his current theme versus a new one with a white background.

I referred Mike to the “SES Theme Split Test” plugin. This plugin gives you the ability to split test themes.

With this plugin you can select two different themes and it will automatically rotate the themes which you can then track to see which theme you might be getting a better result with.

You do have to have a Google Analytics account to track the results.

I also recommended he switch to the Thesis Theme for WordPress to improve his page ranking and user experience.

This plugin will give him the ability to split test the new theme and look versus the old one. If the results are what I predict them to be, I think he will see an increase in time on site, a decrease in his bounce rate and his page views should increase.

All of those benefits will also help his page rank which is super important to his end goal of driving more traffic.

After discussing this with him, it motivated me to try a test for myself. If you follow this site and return in a few days, you may end up seeing a different theme. After hanging out with Chris Pearson (The creator of Thesis Themes) a few months ago in Austin – he convinced me that Thesis Themes are the absolute best theme for WordPress in the marketplace.

I won’t get into the specifics of my conversation with Chris – just know Chris is probably the most knowledgeable person I have ever talked to on the subject of page rank and SEO. Everything he said about his theme and the way it’s designed and why Google loves it made absolute sense.

I have been dragging my feet about making the switch to Thesis – but this split test is just the motivation I need to do it.

Hope that helps.

Tagged as: internet marketing, shoemoney, split test, theme, thesis themes, Wordpress

Lasse Bunk

Hi Sean, I have also created a plugin that allows you to A/B and split test your WordPress site's content (posts, pages, and widgets), stylesheets, javascripts, and themes. If you want, I'd be very glad to hear your comments or suggestions, if you want to check it out? It's at: http://lassebunk.dk/plugins/abtest/ Thanks in advance, /Lasse

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Darren Rhodes

I am testing the split thesis theme idea on my low traffic, high bounce website this month. Good tips here Sean. PS would be good if you could join my Skype Chat Group which helps others who are in need of a few good tips.

Scott

We just released a WordPress plugin that is a simpler alternative to Google Optimizer that allows you to run split tests inside of WordPress using shortcodes. Would love additional feedback on it and any suggestions on more advanced features. WP Cash+ Automatic Split Testing WordPress Plugin http://www.wpcashplus.com Thanks! Scott

Christina Lubinsky

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Jay Allen

Great post and great blog. I linked over from your twitter account and wasn't disappointed.

Benjamin Bellville

Sean,being someone new to online marketing and writing I found this to be a very helpful topic.Each day I pick up another nugget of wisdom and as I can clearly see your blog will be a great place to gather these. Personally I was saying to myself when I first hit the home page how much I liked the design you had compared to many others I have seen.As this post is from August I'm assuming the design I'm seeing is the Thesis Theme you have switched to. You put things in simple to understand terms which is always good for someone learning.Much appreciated!

Nicholas Penrake

Hey Sean, valid point about white versus black. The only exception to that rule might be if your site is predomonantly video content, in which case black can work to your advantage as it mimics the experience of being in a dark room watching a movie. Re Thesis, I was about to buy, but then came across reviews of Flexsqueeze and they all trumped Thesis. You might want to check it out...

Mike Haydon

Thanks for the tip on the split tester Sean. Split testing themes has been such a pain that I've never bothered with it. Guess there's no excuse now :)

Matthew Arndt

Hey Sean! I saw you're comment about possibly going to Thesis. You're site is built on a Theme called "Builder". It allows for multiple layouts without having to do any custom coding. For example, I could easily remove the nav bar and have a left navigation if you wanted to split test that... on just 1 page! Let me know if you want me to show you how that works. You can also watch this video to learn more: http://ithemes.com/purchase/builder-theme/ Best, Matt

Sardar Mohkim Khan

Thanks a lot for sharing this mate! appreciate it

Michael Vallez

Sean, Awesome conversation and I have already implemented the white theme. My split test will be without the pluggin since I am well aware of how I have been doing with the darker color. I really value your time and greatly appreciate your SEO/SEM, internet marketing mentoring. thanks again Mike

Tony M

Thesis theme is truly the best theme for Wordpress users. It is so customizable via the custom css file. What adds to the benefit is that you only have to learn how to customize one theme, rather than bang your head trying to figure out all code of free ones.

Thesis is really the only way to go when it comes to themes. You can pretty much make it look like any theme or design you want with custom css file. Plus it is nice to not have to "figure out" every other themes customization and capabilities.

David Weedmark

Great idea Sean. I've done a lot of split testing for ads, banners, logos... but never thought about it for a theme. Theme selection seems so personal to me, almost to be a part of one's personality. But this definitely has got me thinking now. (Yeah, Thesis rocks. Its such a pleasure working with it!)