Archive for the ‘google website optimizer’ Category

  • Google Website Optimizer: Now with A/B Testing

    By: Chris Goward
    Date: September 5th, 2007

    As the Google Analytics Blog announced this morning, Website Optimizer just got an update.

    The A/B testing Wizard is the most significant advance. Now, it’s possible to easily test dramatic landing page variations without worrying about the restrictions on the types of code that can be within multivariate variables.

    Perfect timing for a client A/B/n test we’ll be launching shortly. Thanks Google!

    Posted in: google website optimizer

  • Google Website Optimizer’s 30-Minute Cookie Restriction

    By: Chris Goward
    Date: September 4th, 2007

    I’m a big fan of Google Website Optimizer and we’ve found that most of our clients, not surprisingly, are enjoying the free price (and when I say “most”, it doesn’t mean that some don’t like the free price, just that they want to do more advanced testing that’s more practical with higher priced alternatives).

    One issue I have, though, is with the 30-minute, single session cookie restriction. This rule means that Google Website Optimizer will only count a conversion if it occurs within 30 minutes and within the same session of viewing the test page.

    So, if you visited my test page and saw one of 48 variable combinations, for example, and then 30 minutes later returned to the site to complete the transaction, you have a 98% probability (48/49, including the control) of seeing a different page combination. The problem is that the last combination is the only one that gets credited for the conversion, which shouldn’t necessarily be so.

    This seems to be artificially oriented toward immediate impulse actions and may skew results.

    I’ve passed this feedback on to Tom Leung (Google Website Optimizer Product Manager), and hope that they’ll be able to incorporate a change in the next Optimizer version, which I’m eagerly awaiting, I should add!

    Ideally, we should be able to easily set our own rules for the timespan and persistence of the cookie based on the clients’ particular business rules and product purchase cycle.

    Edit: Google has now changed Google Website Optimizer to use a 2-year cookie after we successfully persuaded them to allow us to test it for them in a private feature beta.

    Posted in: google website optimizer
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