TY  - BOOK
AU  - Koning,Rembrand
AU  - Hasan,Sharique
AU  - Chatterji,Aaron
ED  - National Bureau of Economic Research.
TI  - Experimentation and Startup Performance: Evidence from A/B testing 
T2  - NBER working paper series
PY  - 2019///
CY  - Cambridge, Mass.
PB  - National Bureau of Economic Research
N1  - September 2019; Hardcopy version available to institutional subscribers
N2  - Recent work argues that experimentation is the appropriate framework for entrepreneurial strategy. We investigate this proposition by exploiting the time-varying adoption of A/B testing technology, which has drastically reduced the cost of experimentally testing business ideas. This paper provides the first evidence of how digital experimentation affects the performance of a large sample of high-technology startups using data that tracks their growth, technology use, and product launches. We find that, despite its prominence in the business press, relatively few firms have adopted A/B testing. However, among those that do, we find increased performance on several critical dimensions, including page views and new product features. Furthermore, A/B testing is positively related to tail outcomes, with younger ventures failing faster and older firms being more likely to scale. Firms with experienced managers also derive more benefits from A/B testing. Our results inform the emerging literature on entrepreneurial strategy and how digitization and data-driven decision-making are shaping strategy
UR  - https://www.nber.org/papers/w26278
UR  - http://dx.doi.org/10.3386/w26278
ER  -