These days you have all sorts of trust badges available to put on your websites. Some are SSL badges, some are good business practices badges and some are even carbon neutral certification badges. But do these badges have any effect?

A Visual Website Optimizer user, Karsten Lund (a conversion specialist from Optimeria.com), recently carried out a six-month long A/B test to determine whether an E-mark badge (certifies ethical conduct of Danish businesses) impacts conversion rate. He wrote a detailed case study in Danish and we recommend you to read it here (if you understand the language). For those who prefer to read the case study in English, read this post instead.

What was tested?

Karsten tested the presence of E-mark (the eye-like icon in the image above) on an eCommerce store House of Kids. 50% visitors saw this badge and 50% didn’t. The test started producing great results right from the start but our team consulted Karsten to run the test longer so that he can be really sure about the significance of the results.

What was the result?

Yes, you read it right, a 32% increase in conversions with the E-mark badge. And Karsten ran the test long enough to make sure result was statistically significant.

Interesting nuggets

• Karsten observed that if the security badge requires a user to click, it actually decreases conversions because s/he is taken away from the website and is not able to complete the purchase. So, the 32% increase in conversions if of non-clickable badge.
• Karsten observes in the case study that Visual Website Optimizer is much, much better and easier than Google Website Optimizer. And, no, we didn’t pay him for saying this A lot of other users agree with him, though.

Grain of Salt

Even though this particular result has been fantastic, you shouldn’t adopt trust badges on your website without testing them first. Different types of websites/badges combinations may have different results. Elsewhere on Internet, some report an increase in sales, some report a decrease in sales. So, the best strategy is to test it first and then only implement it on your website.

Related posts:

1. Using A/B Split testing to refine your startup’s positioning: 90% increase in conversion rate
2. Do human photos on a landing page increase sales and conversions?
3. How to increase newsletter signups by 28%? Ask users to ‘watch a video’ or ‘get instant access’
4. Surprise, surprise! Having no secure icon on a page increased conversions by 400%
5. Easiest way to track conversions across multiple domains (using third party cookies)

Tags: ab testing, case study, danish, Multivariate Testing, security, split testing, trust badges, vwo
Posted in A/B Split Testing, Case Studies, News on May 19th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

1 Comment »

1. [...] because in our case studies, we have seen both cases:Trust badge increases conversion rate by 32% http://visualwebsiteoptimizer.co…Removal of security badge increased conversions by 400% http://visualwebsiteoptimizer.co…In [...]

   Pingback by Do trust marks like ScanAlert or security marks have a scientifically-proven effect website conversion? - Quora — January 5, 2011 @ 12:56 pm

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