Turn your Store into a Lab

A little while back, we had a beautiful Google Website Optimizer (GWO) wizard all ready to launch. It was a work of art. An example of how tools can be made simple. A model of technological expertise. And then, Google killed-off the Google Website Optimizer API needed by our little gem of a tool. Well – no matter: there are many ways to skin a Google… Ladies and gents, we present to you today… (Drum roll, please) The new. The improve. The better. Google Website Optimizer Wizard 2!

This new version takes the form of a Chrome browser extension, and it basically simplifies (and we do mean simplify… a lot!) the set-up of a GWO experiment right there in GWO’s own interface. So all you need to do is install the extension in your Chrome browser, then scurry on over to GWO’s website, and start creating experiments – you’ll see the difference, promise!

Now, simplifying the interface is just one of the wonderful thing the extension can do for you. By having your GWO experiments managed by Monitus.net, you probably won’t have to publish your store anymore, to start or stop an experiment. Provided you test items that are already on your store, and that they are identifiable, (you should always, always, use “id” attributes in your HTML – but that’s another post) you can start, pause, stop experiments right there, live, without ever going back to the Store Editor!

But wait! That’s not all! If you keep on reading right now, we’ll throw in a few experiment templates to get you inspired and start testing stuff on your store! We’re that generous.

Website testing is of incredible value, but GWO’s interface was a bit frustrating to work with. And for a Yahoo! store, it was a bit of a pain to set things up on the store, republish, etc… No more, with our Wizard extension. So you have no more excuses: start testing stuff on that store!

And also, before we leave…

But you know us – we always love to show off, so we’re throwing in a few other things in this new version – admittedly not as big as the piece de resistance, but still… We have added a few changes to our other cool-tool PersonaQuest: (PQ)

• Keyword data: you can now insert the keyword that brought the visitor to your site (if any) into PQ HTML snippets… Sweet candy…
• Snippet insertion mode: in the good old days (like, yesterday) you could only replace the whole content of a targeted div with the PQ snippet. But now, you can either append the snippet to the existing div’s content, prepend the snippet, or replace it completely.
• Goal page: it is now possible to pick any page as the goal page for a PQ persona – you are no longer restricted to the confirmation page as the goal page.