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A few weeks ago I wrote in my Google Optimizer wish list the ability combine Google Analytics and Website Optimizer. I was actually in the process of creating a solution myself when it was brought to my attention that someone just created a solution:

Google Website Optimizer and Google Analytics: A Perfect Marriage

Kudos to Shawn Purtell from ROI Revolution for beating me to this 🙂

I cannot emphasize strongly enough how much this adds to GWO.
Almost every metric available in GA can now be broken down based on what combination the user saw. 

His solution uses the combination as a query parameter. I was originally thinking of using the user defined visitor segmentation for combinations, but after thinking about it, his solution seems better. The only situation I can think of where using user defined segmentation would be better is if you are doing advanced stuff like multi-page tests or full page testing (yes this is possible – more info to come soon).

One small note – when using the solution from ROI Revolution, be sure to call the new GA code after the GWO code. Otherwise you won’t be recording first time visitors to the page.

The official Google Website Optimizer group just changed status from “announcement only” to “general discussion”.

http://groups.google.com/group/websiteoptimizer

If you’re looking for a place to ask questions or share your experiences, it’s a great place to start.

I’ve been using Google Website Optimizer (GWO) extensively since it started beta around November 2006. A couple of weeks ago I wrote a post with some of my ideas on Google Website Optimizer Suggestions. Since then I’ve been doing some testing and research on how to get the most out of GWO. If you’re brand new to the whole concept of split testing or if you’ve never used Google Website Optimizer before, I suggest you first check out their site. For the rest of this posting I’m going to assume you at least viewed their flash tutorial.

First of all, some basic concepts about how GWO works at the technical level.

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UPDATE (May 28th, 2007): It seems some of my suggestions have already been implemented. I based my wish list on the functionality that was available when I started the beta (Nov 2006). I wrote a followup article with some Google Optimzer tips and tricks. Kudos to Google!

As I said in a previous post, we’ve been using Google Website Optimizer (I’ll call it GWO) for a while, and overall I’m pretty impressed.

Still, there are a few comments and suggestions I have to make it even better:

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