Log in or create a free Rosenverse account to watch this video.
Log in Create free account100s of community videos are available to free members. Conference talks are generally available to Gold members.
Summary
Experimentation can be intimidating to non-data science folk. But Erin wants to get everyone excited about A/B testing. In this talk, Erin shares the Conversion Design process. It centers A/B testing as a way to gather high-quality evidence to make highly informed decisions to improve your digital product. She also introduces the Good Experimental Design toolkit. These easy-to-follow templates usher teams through the logic needed to design trustworthy experiments that you can learn from.
Key Insights
-
•
Conversion design combines design, science, and business to intentionally create measurable improvements, not just arbitrary changes.
-
•
Ronald Fisher’s 1919 work exposed how poor experimental design led to decades of unreliable scientific data.
-
•
Conversion originates from the Latin word meaning to transform or change, which is broader than just sales or profit.
-
•
Traditional linear product development processes miss the complex, iterative nature of real-world systems.
-
•
Systems thinking offers a more accurate way to understand and manage design experiments within interconnected environments.
-
•
A rigorous conversion design process includes seven phases: understand, hypothesize, prioritize, create, test, analyze, and decide.
-
•
Experiments grounded in well-documented hypotheses based on research have higher success rates than guesses.
-
•
Randomized 50/50 AB testing is the gold standard for isolating the true effect of design changes by evenly distributing confounds.
-
•
Experimentation buckets—product foundations, content/motivation, accessibility/usability, and bug fixes—help prioritize work effectively.
-
•
Ethical considerations and guardrail metrics are crucial to ensure changes benefit all stakeholders sustainably and without manipulation.
Notable Quotes
"Conversion means change, not just sales or profit."
"Design is the rendering of intent — bringing ideas into form that solve the problem."
"Decades worth of agricultural experimental data was garbage because of poor experimental design."
"Most product teams stay on the bottom rungs of evidence, relying on opinions or observational data instead of randomized trials."
"You can never purely test an idea, only the implementation of the idea."
"Randomization is magic — it evenly distributes confounds so the observed effect is caused by your change."
"Not all changes create value; some do nothing or even make things worse."
"You have to think critically about how a change impacts all stakeholders, not just the main business metric."
"Ethics evolve faster than laws; just because something is legal doesn’t make it ethical."
"If an experiment I design made the front page news tomorrow, how would I feel about it?"
Or choose a question:
More Videos
"Ambiguity is considered a problematic in design, but ambiguity can be a feature."
Lori Muszynski Peter MerholzKeeping Design Weird
October 2, 2023
"Accessible foundations are built by involving voices of people with disabilities from ideation to prototyping to launch."
Sam ProulxOnline Shopping: Designing an Accessible Experience
March 28, 2023
"When I first got to Citrix, people didn’t even know we had a design team."
Julie BaherCulture Change—My Journey
May 14, 2015
"Employees that have a work best friend have a 50% drop in turnover risk and are 300% more likely to say they love their companies."
Kat VellosOpener: The Other L Word
January 8, 2024
"Enterprise operations is a ripe context for service design because it involves many people, processes, and tools across silos."
Ed MullenDesigning the Unseen: Enabling Institutions to Build Public Trust
November 16, 2022
"Guardrail metrics help catch unintended consequences like increased customer service calls despite higher conversions."
Erin WeigelUX Lessons from running more than 1,200 A/B Tests
July 10, 2024
"To reclaim our value, we must regain our agency and renew our passion as researchers."
Eduardo OrtizTheme 3 Intro
March 13, 2025
"Starting with one line of business and showing success creates a trickle effect for broader organizational adoption."
Amy EvansHow to Create Change
September 25, 2024
"You will have full copies of everything that you experienced today and all the questions."
Bria Alexander Louis RosenfeldOpening Remarks Day 2
March 26, 2024
