For a large e-commerce company in Australia, we investigated whether replacing pipes (|) with dashes (-) in the title tags of category pages would affect organic performance. A small adjustment with surprising results.

With SplitSignal, we set up an A/B test where we replaced pipes (|) with dashes (-) in the title tags of 400 category pages. Although the choice between dashes or pipes often seems visual or stylistic, the technical side also plays a role: title tags are measured in pixels. By replacing pipes with dashes, you may be able to fit more relevant words within the visible space in search results. We wanted to test whether this subtle change actually affects user behavior and visibility on Google. Small details, big effect—especially when it comes to click-through rate and organic reach.

The orange line in the image shows that the organic traffic to the tested pages performed better than the predicted control group (blue line). This confirms that the change was positive. After 21 days, we saw a 9% increase in clicks, demonstrating that even small adjustments can have a significant impact on your performance. However, there was no major change in impressions or rankings, suggesting that the change mainly improved readability and appeal to the target audience.