Introduction to Google Optimize

Recently Google has released the BETA version of Google Optimize, which at the moment is an invitation only tool which offers AB testing, website testing & personalisation tools for small and large enterprises to help engage customers and visitors.

Obviously there are some things that need improvement since it is, as it says, the BETA version. But for a BETA version Google sure has shown that they're ahead of the game when it comes to making something that is supposed to be very complicated into a tool that anybody can use with a bit of practice.

Invitation → Setup

Head over to the Google Optimize beta homepage to request an invite. The waiting time could vary. Before you request an invite, please make sure the website you wish to test already has Google Analytics set up. Without this done, Google Optimize will not work. Google Optimize also only works on Chrome, because to use their layout editing tool for A/B and Multivariate tests, you will need their browser extension. Please install this extension. (Looks like this ⤵︎)

Once you have received your invitation, log into Optimize. After you login, you will have an empty 'Accounts' screen.

Let's start our first account! An 'Account' will be the space where you will keep all of your experiments for the websites you wish to test. Your 'experiment' will be either:

• A/B Test
  
• Multivariate Test (MVT); or
  
• Redirect Test
  

So, let's click 'Create Account'

The account name is usually the name of the company which owns the website that you will be testing. Of course it's no problem to name the account to whatever you like. As I said before, an account will hold all of the tests for the website of your choosing, which is the next step after you have acknowledged the terms of service.

The container name will be the website you want to test. For my example, I am going to create a container for 'www.zenfotomatic.com' - Perhaps we can change the layout of the homepage a bit to increase our signups? Let's try that!

Then click create!

Great! We have created our first account, which will contain all the experiments we will conduct. But we still have a little bit of setting up to do... Let's look to the right hand side:

We now have a list of tasks to complete before we can start our experiments. So, let's move onto the next step which is 'Link to Google Analytics'.

To get Google Optimize working, of course we need Google Analytics already set up on the website of our choosing. Google Optimize selects the Google Analytics property to set up according to what permissions you have on the email account you have registered with.

Google Optimise recognises I have permission to access the Google Analytics properties for both the Global and Japan versions of ZenFotomatic. For this example, I'm going to pick the global website. 

Once you have decided, click 'link' and Google will greet you with this pop up before your next step.

You do have the option to skip this step, but without this done you will not be able to conduct any tests. I recommend getting this out of the way as soon as possible, because this is essential for your testing with Google Optimize.

So, let's click on 'Get snippet'...

You will be greeted with two sets of code:
First: Install the snippet into the page(s) you wish to test. Insert the code in bold to where your Google Analytics tracking code is located as explained above.
Second: Page hiding; This removes the risk of the original page appearing on the visitor's browser. (I have tested without the page hiding code, and you are able to see the original website for a moment. I really recommend you add this code.)

Once you're finished, click 'done'.

This step of the process is self-verified, so the step will not be checked with a green tick like our previous steps. But once you start editing your experiment on the Google Optimize extension, you will be notified whether or not the code is missing. If you have installed the code but Google Optimize cannot recognise it, it's a good idea to check if it has been installed properly.

Now that all that's done, let's start creating our first experiment!

If you would like a bit more help, check out my next entry about A/B Testing on Google Optimize⤵︎⤵︎

If not, good luck and happy testing!!

Tari