audience strategy
Split Testing
Testing two content or CTA variations simultaneously to find which earns more affiliate clicks.
What is Split Testing?
Split testing (A/B testing) in affiliate marketing is the practice of running two or more variations of content, calls to action, link placements, or page elements simultaneously to determine which version produces a higher affiliate click-through rate or conversion rate.
Split Testing In Practice
Split testing is the only way to distinguish content changes that genuinely increase commission income from those that feel like improvements but do not. Without testing, every CTA or placement change is a hypothesis; with testing against live traffic, the hypothesis becomes data. For affiliate content sites, split testing is most impactful at three points: the CTA button text ('View Program' vs 'Start Your Free Trial'), the position of the primary affiliate link (above the pricing section vs the conclusion), and the article's meta title in search results (which determines click-through rate before the visitor even arrives). Simple on-page tests can produce actionable data with as few as 500 sessions, because affiliate link click rate is observable in real time without waiting for downstream commissions to clear.
Example of Split Testing
An affiliate tests two CTA button variants on their SpreadSimple review. Version A: 'Visit SpreadSimple.' Version B: 'Try SpreadSimple Free.' After 1,200 sessions split evenly, Version A produces 4.1% CTR; Version B produces 6.8% — a 66% improvement from a single word change. Applied site-wide to all reviews with a free-trial CTA, the improvement compounds across the entire affiliate portfolio. The same traffic, the same content, the same program — different CTA language better matched what readers were looking for.
Related Tools & Services
- SpreadSimple Affiliate Program — Example used to illustrate CTA split test impact on affiliate link click rate
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