Get more wins and bigger wins

The most comprehensive conversion optimization and A/B testing training in the world.

This program is for people serious about building skills, and are ready to put in the effort it takes to complete a Minidegree. Outsized results follow extraordinary effort. No quick fixes here.

  • Learn to build and run world-class optimization programs
  • Dramatically improve your skills, become a CXL Institute Certified Optimizer
  • Content you can’t find anywhere else

See plans and pricing   or   Request demo (for teams 5+)

Some of the companies that train their teams at CXL Institute:

Start getting best-in-class results from optimization

  • Improve your skills in conversion optimization, UX, and web analytics
  • Understand what works on websites, and what doesn’t
  • Develop better A/B testing ideas that win more often
  • Connect with and learn from peers around the world
  • Get insights from the pros that will help you grow your business

Introduction video

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Change your results with world-class conversion optimization training

The Conversion Optimization Certification Program by CXL Institute will teach you the methodologies and processes needed to get more wins and bigger wins.

You will develop in-depth knowledge in conversion optimization (driving growth without spending more) and learn processes that you can replicate across any web property.

Access to expert takeaways + guidance can be a game changer when you’re wading through the sea of unreliable and inaccurate information out there.

You shouldn’t be operating without this kind of help.

World class instructors

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Peep Laja

Ton Wesseling

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Manuel da Costa

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Stefania Mereu

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Andre Morys

Claire Vo

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Fred Pike

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Georgi Georgiev

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Joel Klettke

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Yehoshua Coren

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Chris Mercer

Jeff Sauer

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Momoko Price

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Ben Labay

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Candace Ohm

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Talia Wolf

Get updates about the Conversion Optimization Minidegree program

In addition to updates, you will receive the detailed course syllabus PDF.

A program designed to develop true professionals

This in-depth conversion optimization training program will help you become a top conversion optimizer in. The skills you gain will benefit you for years to come. You’ll learn how top conversion rate experts in the world approach conversion optimization.

This program will teach you the methodology, tools, and the mindset needed to become a successful optimizer – and make any website sell.

Learn a systematic, repeatable process

True conversion optimization is not about guesswork or running random tests. It’s a process. It’s what separates wannabes from conversion pros. Amateurs think in terms of tactics, while the pros uncover the real issues by following a proven methodology.

After this program, you’ll be able to systematically identify all the places where a website is leaking money, figure out exactly why, create data-backed hypotheses, run tests for learning, and improve your customer theory.

5 tracks, 100% online.

This program is 100% online. To streamline your learning experience, we’ve organized the program into 5 tracks. Don’t have much time right now? No problem. The program is entirely self-paced, take 12 months if you need to.

You can’t learn this stuff anywhere

Conversion optimization know-how is still not mainstream. Most top practitioners would rather conceal their processes than share with the competition. Blogs out there don’t go deep enough and don’t cover everything.

Also, more and more junk information is popping up. That’s why the best way to learn is from practitioners who’ve been doing this for years and years. We’ve got the best names in the industry to teach you this stuff.

You won’t become a conversion god overnight. Much like an elite university program, this course will set you on the right path to become a master of your trade.

“When I see the CXL Institute Certificate on a job application, it is an immediate stamp of approval. It means that the applicant has been trained by the best in the world, and that he or she learned CRO fundamentals like conversion research, web analytics, UX and testing strategy.”

Michael Aagaard, Senior Optimizer

This minidegree has a frankly ridiculous amount of amazing content. It took a not-insignificant amount of time to get through, but I now have a serious edge in winning more client work.

Nick Partridge, Founder @ Gaura Gauza

CXL Conversion Optimization Certification training program for professionals

This is a comprehensive conversion optimization training program that will give you the skills and know-how to deliver consistent revenue gains on any website you work on.

Take all the courses to unlock the certification test. Pass the test and become a CXL-Certified Optimizer.

What’s inside the CRO Minidegree?

35+ self-paced online courses

The CRO minidegree consists of courses covering the many different aspects of optimization.

Master conversion research

80% of CRO results come from research. You’ll learn all about qualitative and quantitative research – topics like digital analytics, mouse tracking, and user testing.

Become a pro at testing

You will learn about proper testing statistics, managing the testing process, and A/B testing strategies that get results.

Learn CRO program management

How to set up a CRO program that scales and gets results: people, tools, processes. Evangelizing CRO internally, and selling it externally.

5 cumulative tracks, total of ~131h of videos & study material – designed to make you better at CRO.

Minidegrees are essentially collections of individual courses, grouped together around a theme. It’s designed to give you advanced level skills in conversion optimization.

1 Foundations

Foundations copywriting goes here, dawg.

Total duration: 0

CRO foundations

CRO foundations

In this land of make believe, dead and dry.

Total Time: 45 minutes

Remember the old marketing adage – “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half” – well, it’s the same with best practices. They work for half the websites, and you don’t know which half your website belongs to.

Blindly copying and implementing “best practices” is stupid – nothing scientific about it. You’re essentially using somebody else’s solution to their problems for your problems.

Best Practices

Best Practices

Show me how you defenseless you really are.

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted;
the trouble is I don’t know which half.”

Tom Wanamaker, marketing pioneer and father of modern advertising

This old marketing adage applies to design best practices: They work for half the websites out there, and you don’t know which half your website belongs to.

Blindly copying and implementing “best practices” is stupid – nothing scientific about it. You’re essentially using somebody else’s solution to their problems for your problems.

Conversion Copywriting

Conversion Copywriting

Total Time: 1 hour 30 min

Copy can make or break your conversions. We sell with words. The exact words you use and the amount of text you use can make a huge difference.

The goal of “regular” text is to inform or entertain. The goal of sales copy is to get people to do something—to sign up, make a purchase, or something similar. Hiring a professional copywriter can be very expensive, which is one of the reasons why this is a valuable skill to have yourself.

Product messaging & salespage copywriting

Product messaging & salespage copywriting

Improve your messaging strategy through customer research and analysis.

Improve your messaging strategy through customer research and analysis.

voice-of-customer research | value propositions | copy design

Intro to Web Psychology

Intro to Web Psychology

Total Time: 2 hours 30 min

People are irrational. People are cute. People are bad. People are good. People are all kinds of things – and science hasn’t figured us out yet.

You can spend years in universities studying human behavior. This course is not aiming to compete with those programs, but will teach you some of the more important concepts that you need to be aware of.

Social Proof

Social Proof

Experienced copywriter and content strategist Joel Klettke instructs how to identify, gather, and display the optimal social proof your customers subconsciously hope to see on your website.

Total Time: 20 minutes

Experienced copywriter and content strategist Joel Klettke instructs how to identify, gather, and display the optimal social proof your customers subconsciously search for on your website.

In this course, you will learn to:

  • Craft compelling case studies
  • Conduct meaningful customer interviews
  • Strategically place social proof on your site
  • Better discern between Action-based & Preference-based
  • Keep your social proof inventive, new, & fresh
Intro to Neuromarketing

Intro to Neuromarketing

Total Time: 2 hours

The marketing industry desperately needs a shift in thinking.

Developing & Testing an Emotional Content Strategy

Developing & Testing an Emotional Content Strategy

Total time: 25 min

In this course, Talia Wolf will outline her original framework that explores the emotional triggers and behavioral principles which shape your customer’s decision making process.

You will learn to test this strategy to secure actionable insights and ultimately get to understand your customers better. She will walk you through the 4 step framework in the context of online dating platforms with a special emphasis on mobile.

Influence and interactive design

Influence and interactive design

Total time: 35 minutes

In this course, Dr. Brian Cugelman presents an original framework synthesizing research on behavioral patterns from a neurochemical and evolutionary psychology background.

This model merges about 10 major practitioner and scientific frameworks and curates concrete tactical design strategies to keep customers repeatedly engaging with your product or service. You’ll learn to identify desired outcomes and achieve each one with a unique design strategy.

Learn (via design) to:

  • Direct Attention
  • Educate your Customers
  • Evoke Emotion
  • Remove Friction in Decision Making
  • Build Trust & Credibility
Intro to Digital Analytics

Intro to Digital Analytics

Total Time: 18 min

Chris Mercer’s course will provide an easily digestible introduction to the fundamentals of Digital Analytics. Without getting too granular, you’ll get a high-level understanding of how to use Google Analytics to customize your goals and better understand your users’ behavior. The course will explain:

  • What data (and how much of it) you need
  • How to segment data effectively
  • Which goals to set and how
  • How to draw correlations from data to produce useful insights
Google Analytics for beginners

Google Analytics for beginners

Apply the basics of Google Analytics to improve product, marketing, and strategy decisions.

Apply the basics of Google Analytics to improve product, marketing, and strategy decisions.

2 Conversion Research

Conversion Research

Conversion Research

Total Time: 4 hours 20 min

A man comes to a hospital. “I’m sick,” he says. “We’ll fix you right up”, says the doctor – and leads him to an operating room where he performs immediate surgery. The man is cured!

Now that never happens. You need to diagnose the patient before you know how to treat him. Sounds plain obvious, doesn’t it? Not so in the conversion world!

Using analytics to find conversion opportunities

Using analytics to find conversion opportunities

Analytics expert Jeff Sauer explains how to identify conversion opportunities via digital analytics.

In this course, you will learn to:

  • Determine appropriate goals & filters
  • Set conversion goals
  • Better understand your audience
  • Evaluate traffic quality
  • Understand the implications of key metrics such as bounce rate & page value
  • Use segments & secondary dimensions
  • Interpret potential errors in your data
  • Using event tracking
  • Audit your analytics
Google Tag Manager for beginners

Google Tag Manager for beginners

Learn GTM to 10x your effectiveness as a marketer by giving you power and control over your data measurement.

Google Tag Manager is an essential skill of any technical digital marketer or analyst. This course will make you effective at using Google Tag Manager to increase your analytics powers at your company.

If you’re on a small team, you’ll be a hero. If you’re a marketer or an analyst at a larger organization, the value you bring to your role will drastically increase.

Instructor: Chris Mercer

Apply basic GTM knowledge for increased power and control over data measurement.

tracking  |  the data layer  |  tagging

Fast and Rigorous User Personas

Fast and Rigorous User Personas

Total Time: 47 min

This data-driven framework challenges the notion that User Personas must be either incredibly time-consuming to build, or arbitrary and rooted in stereotypes.

In Part 1 of this course, you will learn to:

  • Write survey questions which are relevant, actionable, and unbiased
  • Identify which tool fits your needs for collecting quantitative data
  • Build your survey
  • Recruit respondents
  • Validate your data
  • Organize your responses

In Part 2, you’ll:

  • Simplify your data set via factor analysis
  • Analyze your data set via statistical clustering
  • Build archetypes from your clusters
Heuristic analysis frameworks for conversion optimization audits

Heuristic analysis frameworks for conversion optimization audits

Conducting an analytics audit

Conducting an analytics audit

In this course, Analytics Ninja Yehoshua Coren walks you through an analytics audit to ensure you are collecting sufficient, relevant data which is reporting reliably. You will delve into technical detail on how to identify and correct a number of problems in GA that can drastically skew your data.

Over this two-part course, you will learn:

  • To verify your account setup
  • Correct a number of common code issues
  • Apply filters
  • To find and kill spam
  • Assess jumps and spikes in bounce rate
  • Incorporate audits into your procedure

3 Testing

8 Common Testing Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

8 Common Testing Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

Total Time: 15 min

There are a number of frequently made testing mistakes which will produce lackluster results, inaccurate data, and overall frustration. With the right strategy these mistakes can be easy to identify, quick to correct, and largely preventable.

In this course, you will learn 8 of these missteps including:

  • False positives
  • Failing to optimize for different traffic sources
  • Running a test too long or not long enough
  • Testing too small of elements
  • Many more

Intermediate and beginning optimizers can benefit from this course.

How to Run Tests

How to Run Tests

Total Time: 5 hours 52 min

Testing is a key part of conversion optimization. It’s the only way to validate a hypothesis, to know what’s really working. Until you test something, you’re only guessing.

Testing Strategies

Testing Strategies

Total Time: 54 min

Once you know how to run tests, the next step to A/B testing mastery is to know when to employ which A/B testing strategy.

Statistics fundamentals for testing

Statistics fundamentals for testing

Total time: 25 min

If you don’t know basic statistics then you can’t properly evaluate test results or even case studies of A/B testing. This course is an overview of the statistical concepts that every digital marketer and certainly every CRO should know.

This course will cover:

  • Sampling – Populations, Parameters, & Statistics
  • Mean, Variance, and Confidence intervals
  • What statistical significance (p-value)is and isn’t
  • Statistical Power
  • Sample size and how to calculate it
  • Regression To The Mean & Sampling Error
  • and 4 Statistics Traps to Look Out For
A/B testing mastery

A/B testing mastery

All courses need an excerpt. This should be a required field on publish. Using above the more tag is not reliable and trashy.

Understand testing approaches that work (and pitfalls that don’t) to get more wins and insights from optimization efforts.

running experiments | customer base studies | prioritization

Statistics for A/B testing

Statistics for A/B testing

Understand statistical hypothesis testing to execute efficient A/B tests and correctly interpret results.

Recommended reading:

significance and confidence intervals | sample size and statistical power | various types of tests

4 Optimization strategies

Optimizing for B2B

Optimizing for B2B

Total Time: 20 min

How should a long-term sales cycle ideally inform our content and structure? Should your website be an informational brochure or an exhibition of engaging content? Should we dazzle leads with our website or immediately connect them to a sales person?

In this video course, Marketing expert Bill Leake will teach you to:

  • Establish optimization goals custom to your sales engine
  • Find a balance between lead quality, quantity, and cost
  • Optimize your calls-to-action, content, and information architecture
  • Supplement your sales team and track attribution
Customer value optimization

Customer value optimization

Total time: 18 min

Too many websites pour all of their time, money, and energy into acquiring leads. But without a dependable strategy to convert this traffic to paying customers, all this effort would be in vain.
In this video course, Justin Rondeau introduces Digital Marketer’s Customer Value Optimization Model. This is an original 5-step framework which has been consistently proven to convert prospects across a range of industries, from e-commerce to b2b.

Intro to Landing Page Optimization

Intro to Landing Page Optimization

Total Time: 1 hour 26 minutes

Landing page optimization is an important sub-set of conversion optimization. It’s like conversion optimization in the sense that it’s about using data to improve the landing page for higher conversions. The difference is that we’re typically dealing with a single page (or a single funnel) as opposed to a whole website.

Form optimization

Form optimization

Open Congrats

Design high-performing forms that increase conversions and decrease cart abandonment.

desktop and mobile form design | user interaction | form copy

Personalization

Personalization

Total Time (Videos): 1 hour 27 min

Personalization is about creating a tailored approach to each user – as best as we can. The end goal is to make the user experience highly relevant and personal. The higher the relevancy, the better user engagement and conversion rates.

Watch this high-level explanation of personalization:

Creating a segmentation strategy

Creating a segmentation strategy

Total time: 18 min

There are so many different angles from which to interpret your data that choosing a starting point can be very daunting. The process doesn’t need to be overwhelmingly complex, however. In this course you will walk through a concrete case study of an e-commerce segmentation project, so you can see the first step of personalization in practice.

You’ll also:

  • Get a glimpse of available tools
  • Learn some popular ways to segment your data, and in which situations they apply
  • Walk through a segmentation project examining data from an e-commerce site
  • Analyze, visualize, and interpret this data
  • Brainstorm applications for these insights (from drip campaigns to retention)

5 Conversion Optimization Program Management

How to Design, Roll Out, & Scale an Optimization Program

How to Design, Roll Out, & Scale an Optimization Program

Total Time: 20 minutes

The are a number of variables which play a pivotal role in getting your CRO program off the ground successfully. In this course, you’ll gain industry-specific insights into hiring models, tracking success, and scaling locally and globally.

In this course, you will learn to:

  • Identify what type of business model to implement
  • Find talent that’s right for your business needs
  • The key business metrics to track in order to measure program growth
  • How to communicate your program’s value in terms of dollars
  • Make big wins early on
Evangelizing for Optimization in Enterprise

Evangelizing for Optimization in Enterprise

Total time: 19 minutes

Establishing and growing a CRO program within a large enterprise organization with pre-established modes of operation is a job in itself. Garnering support and spreading education to countless different departments takes a great deal of planning apart from the energy required to operate the program itself. Fortunately this can be accomplished by correcting common misconceptions about CRO, assuming the burden of proof, and extending educational activities and resources to other departments.

In this course, you’ll learn to:

  • Carve out headspace for CRO by encouraging change & challenging the status-quo
  • Extend educational activities and outreach programs to build interest for CRO
  • Campaign for a budget for resources and technology
  • Correct misconceptions about CRO in other parts of your company
  • Clearly communicate test results to executives
Building your optimization technology stack

Building your optimization technology stack

Total time: 17 min

Growing a CRO team from nascency to a position of vitality in an enterprise environment can happen as quickly or as slowly as the team lets it. One of the most effective ways to catapult this growth is by constructing a thorough and articulate plan for investing in technology. Having a vision and knowing what to expect at each stage of your program’s growth is crucial.

In this course, you will learn:

  • What kinds of tools to invest in (or not invest in)
  • How to collaboratively campaign for budget
  • To get the most out of the tools you already have
  • How to write resourceful, compelling business plans
  • How much budget to spend on people vs technology
  • Rules of thumb for measuring success (over time and case-by-case)
  • A picture of what a CRO program’s technology stack should be at the crawl, walk, and run stage.
Optimize your optimization program

Optimize your optimization program

Total time: 18 min

Exclusively looking at recent test results is not enough to gauge the efficacy of your overall testing program. In this course you will take a holistic look at your testing program so you can ultimately track and improve its efficiency. This course presents an original methodology which incorporates hard metrics to measure both the quantity and quality of your tests over time.

You will learn to:

  • Track inputs rather than just outputs
  • Measure test quantity via testing velocity, testing capacity, and testing coverage
  • Measure test quality via win rate and expected value
  • Strategies to motivate improvement in these areas
  • Synthesize these metrics to determine a program that fits for your company
Managing and Selling CRO Projects

Managing and Selling CRO Projects

Total Time: 3 hours

Effective conversion optimization can only take place when a) somebody authorizes / budgets for it to happen, and b) when CRO projects are managed well.

Building & scaling an optimization program in your company

Building & scaling an optimization program in your company

Scale your optimization program for greater ROI and buy-in.

hiring an optimization team | scalable optimization processes | prioritization

6 CXL Certificate Exam

Final exam – CXL Conversion Optimization Certificate

Complete every course listed above (Tracks 2-5) to unlock the test.

You can re-take the test once in a 24-hour period.

How long will it take me to complete this Minidegree?

This is entirely up to you – it’s how many hours per week you can put in. If you have 2-4 hrs / week available for learning, it might take you around 6 months. If you can do 10-15 hrs / week, you can knock it out in 3 months.

Show off your new skills: Get a certificate of completion

Complete all courses and pass the final test to become a CXL Certified Optimizer. Our certification will help you accelerate your marketing career and/or land better clients.

CXL Institute is an authorized LinkedIn education provider

You can add your education, certificates, badges – everything you learned and earned at CXL Institute into the Education section of your profile.

How to find CXL Institute on LinkedIn

“I’m shocked. Dude, wow. Seriously. This is insanely good. I thought I knew a fair few things before but am genuinely shocked at the quality of the new material and reinforced to see the items I already knew mentioned as important and covered. This is an exceptionally good service you’ve created.”

Chris Redshaw

The CRO Minidegree was great.

I previously took the CRO certification from Digital Marketer, and holy crap was I not prepared for how little I knew about CRO before enrolling in CXL Institute’s CRO Minidegree.

I thought I learned a lot, but when I saw what CXL Institute offered vs what they had… it was clear to me that what I thought was a pretty decent course was really something that just covered the tip of what your program touched on.

Bill Angelos, Owner @ Zero Point Media LLC

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Click here for pitch deck, swipe files, and tips.

Enroll to CXL Institute now:

Some of the companies that train their teams at CXL Institute: