Note Your Google Website Optimizer Experiments

Google has released a new feature for its Website Optimizer tool, called Experiment Notes. The feature is designed to help users include documentation as part of their testing. For any experiments, users can now add their own annotations.

If you are unfamiliar with Website Optimizer, it's a free tool from Google that webmasters can use to increase conversions by making adjustments to design and text elements to see what works.

"What you put in your note depends on what stage your experiment is in," explains Trevor Claiborne of Google's Website Optimizer team. "If you're still designing your experiment you might include your testing hypothesis or some variations you're considering. As your experiment is running, you might include any external factors that might have an impact on your conversion rate. And as your experiment concludes you might include some thoughts on why variations performed as they did."

"Experiment notes are also great if you have several teams coordinating on a Website Optimizer experiment," says Claiborne. "For example, your IT team might update the note once they've installed the Website Optimizer tags on the test page. Your creative team can then start creating variations in Website Optimizer and update the note."

The Experiment Notes feature can be found on the settings page for any experiment in Google Website Optimizer.