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[Shopify] A/B testing rewards

Patrick avatar
Written by Patrick
Updated over 2 weeks ago

A/B testing allows you to test different advocate reward or friend offer amounts to see which one works best for your referral or affiliate program.

Note: Reward A/B testing doesn't support campaigns using multiple languages. Testing is only available for English-only campaigns.


A/B testing rewards

Compare reward variations and use metrics to decide which reward performs better for your campaign. You can only A/B test rewards one at a time.

  • For advocate rewards, you can test between:

    • Values for the same reward type. For example, a percentage vs. fixed amount, or a default fixed amount vs. a higher amount.

    • Different reward types such as cash, coupon, custom, and store credit.

    • Different reward structures. For example, a multi-tier vs. a single tier reward.

  • For friend offers, only coupons can be tested:

    • Test coupon reward values against each other. For example, a percentage vs. fixed amount, or a default fixed amount vs. a higher amount.

    • The Nothing reward can't be tested against the coupon friend offer type.

Create a new test

Only the reward type, value and description can be tested and analyzed during A/B testing. All other reward settings remain the same for both variants such as expiry dates, minimum order amounts, and discount combinations.

To create a new reward A/B test:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Campaigns > Select your campaign. In the Promote campaign section, click A/B testing.

    • If you're using an affiliate campaign, go to Other settings > Advanced settings.

  2. Click Create test.

  3. Enter the Test name.

  4. In the Advocate reward or Friend offer section, your current reward setup is displayed as A Control. Go to B Variation to set up a new reward that will be compared against the control reward setup.

  5. Click Start test.

The test runs immediately once saved. You can't edit your campaign's current reward setup while A/B testing.

Manage tests

You can only do one test at a time and must end an active test to start a new one. The A/B testing page contains three tabs. The Active tab contains your live tests, the Ended tab displays a history of tests you completed, and the All tab contains all your active and ended tests.

Note: You can't make changes to your campaign's language settings while you're running an A/B test.

Review and end a test

Tests must be ended manually when enough metrics are available for you to make a decision. To manually end an active reward A/B test:

  1. From your Shopify admin, go to Campaigns > Select your campaign. In the Promote campaign section, click A/B testing.

    • If you're using an affiliate campaign, go to Other settings > Advanced settings.

  2. Find the active test. Click to view and compare the below metrics:

    • First referral revenue - Total revenue from the first purchase referred friends made

    • First referred purchase - Revenue from all the purchases referred friends made

    • Advocate or Affiliate shares - Total number of referral link shares by advocates and affiliates

    • Advocate or Affiliate views - Total view count of pages and emails by advocates and affiliates

    • Advocate or Affiliate share rate - Percentage of unique advocates who shared the referral link

    • Store visits - Number of visits to your store

    • Friend views - Number of friends who visited the friend offer landing page or viewed the friend offer popup

    • Referral store visit rate - Percentage of friends who visited the store after clicking a unique referral link

  3. Once you generate a sufficient and reliable data, click the Review and End test button in the upper-right corner.

  4. A popup appears. Select the new reward setup for the campaign and click End test.

After the test ends, your chosen variant's reward setting is immediately applied to your campaign.

Important: You can't restart or undo ended reward A/B tests.


A/B testing rewards FAQ

Why can't I A/B test my reward? Why is my reward A/B test not working?

There are a couple of reasons why you can't use reward A/B testing:

  • Your campaign is paused or stopped. Learn more

  • Your campaign uses multiple languages

  • You already have a test running. You must end the active A/B test first to start a new one.

  • Your friend offer is set to Nothing


πŸ’¬ Need help? Click the chat widget on the right to start a conversation. Learn more


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