Google Releases API for Website Optimizer: A/B & Multivariate Testing for All
Google Website Optimizer, a powerful tool that allows website owners to split traffic and test the effectiveness and conversion rates for an array of variables, has traditionally required a lot of back-and-forth between any given site and the Website Optimizer interface.
With the release of a new API, announced today, Google is allowing site owners to conduct multivariate and A/B testing from their own platforms. Part of Google Analytics, Google Website Optimizer (GWO) is a free tool that "handles splitting a website's traffic, serving different variations and crunching the numbers to find statistical significance." For site owners, these minute variations can widen conversion funnels and lead to exponentially greater engagement and profit if changes are executed correctly.
For an overview of how GWO and A/B or multivariate testing work, take a look at this Google-produced video explaining the product and the process:
According to a post by Googlers Gary Kačmarčík and Erika Rice Scherpelz, "Creating experiments with Website Optimizer usually involves a lot of back and forth between your website and the Website Optimizer interface. Using the API, you can integrate Website Optimizer into your platform. In short, you can create and launch experiments from whatever tool you use to edit your site."
The GWO API does not provide access to testing results. To see the experiment results, users must visit the experiment report page.
In addition to simplifying the site optimization process, the API might also make it simpler for companies to conduct in-house testing, reducing both the cost and time of optimization. Site owners and others can register for the GWO API webinar, which will take place on October 28th at 10 a.m. PDT. During the webinar, Website Optimizer engineers will walk users through how the API works, and two platforms that have already integrated GWO using the API will demonstrate their products.
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Gotta love Google - I definitely registered for the GWO API webinar. See you there or be square! ;)
You could actually do most of those things before. Using the installation URL for webmasters provided by the creating process, you could download all scripts.
And http://www.gwotricks.com/ has some neat tricks to do dynamic variations from your own page.
But an API is always better, more safe. But I really need to download test results before it's complete.
@2: The API allows you to query/create/edit/delete/launch/pause/stop experiments - where "edit" means add/edit/delete sections & variations in addition to editing basic information like experiment name and notes.
The webmaster install page just had the javascript snippets that you needed to paste onto your website -- that's just a small part of the functionality provided by the API.
Can't wait for the first Wordpress plugin!
Can't wait for the Drupal plugin :).