Testing, Testing: B2B A/B Tests Come to the TV Screen

4 Min Read

When it comes to testing, a performance marketer’s work is never done. If you’re a search marketer, you are probably already an A/B testing wiz, which will make the addition of a Connected TV strategy even easier. The same way you aim to refine your message in your paid search channels, constantly testing to drive the most conversions, you can now test your video creatives thanks to Connected TV advertising platforms. 

A/B testing is just one of the things to consider as you expand your performance marketing channels. Want to learn more? Be sure to join Hooman Javidan-Nejad, MNTN’s Director of Performance Marketing for the upcoming webinar with Ascent, 7 Best Practices: The Search Marketer’s Guide to Connected TV.

Search Marketers Know the Importance of A/B Testing

B2B marketers are no stranger to paid search campaigns. Search marketing makes it easy to test variations of copy to determine what drives the best results. You may be testing ad copy, landing pages, or bid strategies, but your campaigns are never stagnant. Paid search is a great way to capture demand as a user self-identifies. But with a self-identified audience comes competition. To win these impressions, it takes a lot of practice and testing to find the best strategy. 

We know the importance of testing firsthand. As B2B marketers, we put our own platform to the test, and asked our Chief Creative Officer, Ryan Reynolds, for some help. You can read more about the test here, but let’s just say the results came as a big surprise. Without running an A/B test and only running the creative we expected to do the best, this campaign would have left conversions on the table and prevented us from maximizing our ad spend. 

Testing is Now Available on the TV Screen 

If you’re surprised to learn that testing is available on the TV screen, you are not alone. Traditional linear TV did not allow for this type of creative control and many people have the common misconception that this is still not a creative possibility. We’ll let Chris Innes, our Chief Operating Officer, explain further: “Testing is critical for this to be a performance channel. Testing continually improves over time and it’s the core of what a performance marketer does. The challenge is that this technology hasn’t existed before—performance marketers previously couldn’t test with TV. But now a performance marketer on CTV can do everything they could do on another channel. And when you think about testing, the outcome is learning the return on ad spend and what’s really driving business dollars. At MNTN, we see advertisers testing audiences against each other, using third-party audience testing, and relying on A/B testing for creative. Very simply, this hasn’t been possible on linear but it’s possible today with CTV.”

When making the move to Connected TV, be sure to select a platform that allows you to get the most from your testing. You should be able to do a true A/B test, meaning that you can run two slightly different creatives, weighted equally. Your selected platform should also have an easy-to-use dashboard so you see the results of your test in real-time. 

Make the Most of A/B Testing on the TV 

With your search marketing background, we know you probably love a good test. We’ve compiled a list of tips for the best results when testing your CTV creative. You can also take a deeper dive here. 

1. Keep it focused: There are a lot of variables that can be adjusted as you start to experiment with video assets. Whether it’s call-to-action copy or the background color, it’s tempting to get in there and play around. However, it’s essential to only change one small aspect of the ad so you can properly measure the effect. Any good experiment only has one variable.
2. Set your expectations: Don’t approach testing without a plan. In the same way you have your rhyme and reason for your paid search tests, be sure to do the same for CTV. Identify what you are testing and what you expect the outcome to be. Then, give it time to collect enough data to give you a true picture of the results.
3. Patience is key: It may be tempting to turn off a campaign or update the creative if the data isn’t showing a clear winner right away. However, it can take time to reach statistical significance so it’s important to give your campaigns time to perform.
4. Reporting makes the difference: A/B testing is all about the numbers so select an ad platform that will allow you to easily compare your key marketing metrics. MNTN’s reporting dashboard, for example, allows you to filter by metrics so you get a detailed look at the testing results. 

CTV advertising offers a lot of the same capabilities as paid search, but allows you to reach your target audience on the biggest screen in the house and generate new demand, rather than just capturing existing demand. Want to learn even more? Be sure to join Hooman at the Ascent Webinar outlining 7 best practices for making the jump to CTV.