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Google Optimize now free for everyone

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Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#11
post #9

"Optimizing" UI for session length and clicks is the same thing as finding the local maxima of bad, right?

Not necessarily - if I have a website that is trying to offer information to people about something, then it's better for everyone if it's more navigable/undersatandable, which session length / clicks might be a proxy for. That said, it certainly can be.

If your users find what they need right away, session times will go down.

Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#12

"Optimizing" UI for session length and clicks is the same thing as finding the local maxima of bad, right?

The effects of this are easiest to see with online recipes; the highest ranking recipes are all thousand word ramblings with a recipe tacked on at the end. Google sees you spent more time on the site (i.e. wasted scrolling) and thinks you were more 'engaged.'

Wow, I hadn't made that connection! I just kept wondering why all recipe sites had devolved into fiendishly consistent kind of stupid.

Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#13

"Optimizing" UI for session length and clicks is the same thing as finding the local maxima of bad, right?

I guess it is up to you to define your metric to be measured and to be optimized. To define the right metric and targets is not easy and probably is business-specific, i.e., is not the same for every business.

Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#15
post #11
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not necessarily - if I have a website that is trying to offer information to people about something, then it's better for everyone if it's more navigable/undersatandable, which session length / clicks might be a proxy for. That said, it certainly can be.

If your users find what they need right away, session times will go down.

And perhaps total and unique visits will increase as they share it with others. At least, I wish it were that way.

Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#18
post #14
post #5

I just hope they won't kill Experiments in Google Analytics.

Why? This is a straight up upgrade over content experiments.

I don't remember exactly. I've tried a couple of times without success. I like the way you can setup two pages and do your regular dev. process with the GA experiments. Like if you want to something server side, you can't as it's only JS on the client side with Google Optimize. So you can only A/B cosmetic. Or maybe I missed something.

Re: Google Optimize now free for everyone

#20
Does anyone have a rule of thumb on when A/B testing becomes important for startups?

We have a few thousand visitors a month and are starting to convert, but my guess is A/B testing language and buttons would be premature optimization for us. Just curious at what point that's no longer the case.

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