Easy Google Optimizer Plugin for WordPress
This plugin will add the code needed to run Google Web Optimizer testing program on your WordPress blog
Download & Installation
1.) Sign up for and start a new Google Web Optimizer test account.
Setup instructions for this step can be found here
2.) Download the Easy Google Optimizer plugin from our plugin page on WordPress.org
Version 1.0.1 – updated 2/18/10 (if you are having an error unzipping the file during installation try this one)
Tested to work on WP 2.9.2
3.) Then activate this plugin
- Unzip and upload the file into your `/wp-content/plugins/` directory
- Activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu in WordPress
- Follow the setup instructions to setup a Google Web Optimizer test at www.google.com/intl/en/websiteoptimizer/tutorials.html
- Add the tracking code from Google into your test pages from the Easy Google Optimizer admin menu. This can me found in the Manage > Easy Google Optimizer menu item (as of WordPress 2.6 this is now under the Settings menu)
Version History
1.0 – Initial Release – Will automatically add the tracking code needed for your website to use the Google Web Optimizer testing system.
Feedback & Support
Please feel free to leave your comments and feedback. They are very much appreciated.
Neat little tool.
Hi There,
I absolutely LOVE the ease of use of this plugin – but I’m getting an error when i try to validate the scripts in webmaster central.
For some reason the control script on the test page is throwing an error – is there something I can do to patch this in? Could this be because of my indextools tracking script?
Thanks for any insight you can offer.
C
Please try making a new test in the Google system and that should fix your problem.
C,
Glad you got it working by starting a new test. Sounds like it was something within the Google system that was causing the problem. Thanks for the email.
Hi all,
I figured out my issue and we’re using your plugin on most of our wordpress blogs now. Amazing technology and SO easy to use.
Do you anticipate adding functionality to run multiple tests – as in testing 2 completely different sets of pages/posts at the same time?
Thanks for your help!
~Carrie
Hi there,
Seems like a great tool you have there. However I am having problems when I get to “preview the experiment now” option in Google Optimizer. For some reason this only shows the “original” page even though I have added the page ID’s seperated by commas (like: “443, 445, 461″).
Does it matter that I am trying to do this on “pages” and not “posts” in wordpress?
Looking forward to your reply.
No, it should not matter. That option adds the tracking code to those pages for the Google system.
Did your pages verify ok in the Google system? Sounds like not all the pages are defined as variations in your Google account.
Thanks
Hi Carrie,
We are working on a newer system to do multiple tests but we are not ready to release it at this time.
Thanks for your interest
Yes all pages verified. That is why I don’t get it.
Strange, it validated perfect yesterday. I think the problem might be that a page and post doesn’t have an extension like .html -
They end with a ” / ”
Do I need to put something instead of the ” / ” ?
No, the file extension should not make a different as long as the same URL is being used in the Google system in the page variation section. If it verified on the Google system it should be working.
Thank you for your wonderful Google Optimizer plugin! – YOU ROCK!!!
I am having trouble getting this plugin to work. I created a new a/b experiment.
The first issue I notice is:
What is the Google Optimizer account ID? (Item 1 in red)
When I paste following your instructions after I save the code in this box changes to \’UA-bla-3\’ – Could you please give another example of how the code is supposed to look in this field? Do I need to include the “‘” at the beginning and end of account number?
For the original, control, and confirmation pages I use post ids correct?
SpotOn,
The account ID is just the unique letters and numbers for your account. The quote marks are from the original javascript that comes from Google and is not needed.
You are correct about using the Post ID’s
Please let us know if this fixed your problem.
Hi, this looks great… just wondering, is your plugin working with wp2.7?
yes, we have tested the plugin to WP2.7 and it should be working correctly.
I installed the plugin and accualy it works pritty well.
But I only get the control script on the top of the page and not the script for the footer.
What am I doing wrong?
I’m gonna have to check this out tomorrow.
I was all happy finding this plugin from ContentRobot today: http://websiteoptimizer.contentrobot.com/ (which does support multiple tests)
BUT … that one breaks some bracket parsing (shortcode?) so it’s useless to me and doesn’t seem to have been updated since March 2007.
I found your blog on google and read a few of your other posts. I just added you to my Google News Reader. Keep up the good work. Look forward to reading more from you in the future. Feel free to check out my blog on the 36 Best WordPress plugins for 2009.
Hello and thank you for a wonderful plugin!
Google optimizer tool is such an important thing I am surprised more people do not use it.
Cool Plugin! I’m afraid however I’m having some troubles with it. When I put the lines of code in the fields (control and tracking script) and I choose ‘update post’ I get a database Error. This doesn’t happen without the code.
Any Idea how I can resolve this problem?
To be excact, this is the error I’m receiving: Internal Server Error
The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.
Also, I have the checkbox Enable the Google Website Optimizer support for this page/post.
Hi Edward,
Our system just uses the bulitin system calls to store our plugin options. So if your WordPress install is working there shouldn’t be an issue using this plugin. Internal Server Errors are usually caused by some sort of misconfiguration on the server but without more details about it we can’t really offer you a better solution.
I’m happy to say the problem is solved, it was a problem on my server (so I’m told). So thanx for your plugin, it’s a really great tool!
Thanks a lot for this great plugin. Unfortunately I’m having some problems getting the pages validated by Google Optimizer. Google Optimizer gives me a “Tracking script not detected on … page” for all pages???
I’m using your plugin on my WordPress blog, version 2.7 (http://www.ppc-maverick.com/free-ppc-tool/).
Here is what I’m doing:
* I create an A/B experiment on Google Optimizer.
* I copy/paste the account ID and test ID into the Easy Google Optimizer Plugin form on my blog.
* I provide the page id’s for the 3 pages that are involved in the test
* I click the update button on easy google optimizer (this should automatically insert the scripts in the 3 pages).
* Finally, I click “validate pages” on google optimizer and that’s when I get the error mentioned above.
When I check the page source on the original page, the following scripts have been inserted:
1: In the section at ~ line number 15:
function utmx_section(){}function utmx(){}(function(){var k=’1356310311′,d=document,l=d.location,c=d.cookie;function f(n){if(c){var i=c.indexOf(n+’=');if(i>-1){var j=c.indexOf(‘;’,i);return c.substring(i+n.length+1,j<0?c.length:j)}}}var x=f(‘__utmx’),xx=f(‘__utmxx’),h=l.hash;d.write(”)})();
utmx(“url”,’A/B’);
This script is equal to the one on the Google Optimizer page
2: And the following script just before the tag:
gaJsHost = ((“https:” == document.location.protocol) ? “https://ssl.” : “http://www.”);
document.write(unescape(“%3Cscript src=’” + gaJsHost + “google-analytics.com/ga.js’ type=’text/javascript’%3E%3C/script%3E”));
try {
var pageTracker = _gat._getTracker(“MY-ACCOUNT-ID-2″);
pageTracker._trackPageview();
} catch(err) {}
This script differs slightly from the one proposed by Google (at the end of my account id, the number 2 is appended instead of 1 ???):
if(typeof(_gat)!=’object’)document.write(”)
try {
var pageTracker=_gat._getTracker(“MY-ACCOUNT-ID-1″);
pageTracker._trackPageview(“/xxx/test”);
}catch(err){}
Could it be, that Google Optimizer made any recent changes and the plugin no longer works with it (see the differences in the script above)?
Thanks a lot for your help.
Robert
Thanks:) Looking forward to seeing this roll… You may have saved me spending hours with this guys convulated version…
Hello again – all looked good yesterday. I have a Pay Per Click campaign set up and clicking on the same advert produced the desired variant pages. However, its not happening today, I created a new ‘optimizer experiment’ to double check, but its a no go.
It works like a dream in Optimizer and all variant pages in ‘preview’ are as they should be but is it going to work with my PPC campaign? Is there a test I can perform to check all is well?
Sorry for the drip drip drip of questions, but can you only run one A/B test at a time, is there a multi testing experiment option? I have about 4 different categories to test. Thanks for all this much appreciated.
Hi Liverpool,
1.) The system is independent of the PPC ads. The GO tests are preformed and tracked on your site alone. The PPC ads only drive traffic to the site and are tracked separately in your Adwords account.
If the pages validated properly in the GO setup area then everything should be working correctly.
If you have viewed your site the system setups a tracking cookie to make sure you are always served the same version of the site when you return. I can only recommend you try deleting your cookies and cache and retry it.
2.) In the free version of the plugin we’ve made available it will only run one GO test per site at a time. It does have the option to choose between and A/B and Multi-variant test in the settings menu.
Thanks for the quick response. You mention one test available in the free version – can we buy a plugin for mutli versions? Can you give me a link.
Thanks again
@PPC mutli testing. Please contact us for a quote.
Hi, great and simply plugin. But is it possible to set somewhere time (as a conversion goal)? I do not want to track goal page, but my conversion will be 30 sec on page. Thank you for your help…
I have put in a split test on 2 pages and identified the conversion page and the google code does not get inserted into the conversion page
Just installed and Google is able to recognize all my pages. Thanks.
Suggestion- You may need to check your download files and do some clean up. People using the downloadable zip may get an error if they try to upload directly this file from WP interface. Just a heads-up…
I get an ‘unvalid header’ error when I try to activate the plugin. Any chance this plug in will be updated sometime soon?
Hi Joel,
We have updated the file. It was a problem with the ZIP compression on the MAC. Sorry about the hassle. You should be able to upload the file directly into WP now.
I get an ‘unvalid header’ error as well. If I upload directly this is the message:
Downloading install package from http://downloads.wordpress.org/plugin/easy-google-optimizer.1.0.zip.
Unpacking the package.
Incompatible archive PCLZIP_ERR_BAD_FORMAT (-10) : Invalid archive structure
I am doing anything wrong?
There was a problem with the ZIP archive if you try and upload the plugin via the plugins menu since it was created on a MAC. Please try the 1.0.1 version above. I will try to get this updated on the WP site shortly.
It works thanks!
I am getting “Page sections — Detected: 0 / Errors found: 1″ , anyone has a solution ?
It sounds like you might have a cached page or no wp_footer() installed in your theme footer. Those would be the 2 things I check first.
Right now I’m stuck trying to complete a multivariate test.
I’m stuck on the step where you add the section code scripts.
I think I’m using Google Website Optimizer for WordPress?
My problem is I’m stupid about css and php.
Plus, unless I’m screwing it up, and I probably am
the header.php file (where you add the section script to change the header)
does not actually contain the heading?
Which is unnerving because you are trying to make a change
when the thing you’re trying to change (the header) isn’t actually there.
Here’s my question, does your plugin Easy Google Optimizer Plugin for
WordPress require we fiddle with the css and php?
Or are we allowed to stay on more familiar ground?
Thank You,
Jerry
Hi Jerry, There should be no need to change any PHP or CSS for the optimizer plugin. Just add the plugin then following the direction on the setup page and you will be doing the tests you want very quickly.
I’ve been enjoying using this plug-in for the last year — excellent work! One thing I’m trying to do now is add in some images with WordPress caption boxes around them. I thought I had done this before with this plugin, but when I now add that variation, the bracketed “caption_id” text is exposed and a proper WP caption effect isn’t created. Is there a way to have the shortcodes properly passed along to WordPress with this plugin?
(I see that for another plugin, someone came up with a workaround: http://www.damongudaitis.com/wordpress/shortcode-google-website-optimizer-plugin.html Could that somehow help here?)
Any help you could offer would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
Thank you for this plugin. It’s a great tool for people who need to do market testing and are not as knowledgeable about programming and html.
I have a problem though. I already set up the google web optimizer account and filled out all the required information from the plugin on each of the experiment and conversion pages (A/B testing). Still, I am not seeing any results (all zeros) on all the web optimizer experiment reports I’m running. I have arthemia wordpress blog theme on my site; timeforlifenow com. What should I look into to start getting numbers in the experiment reports? The experiments have been running for almost 4 weeks now. I appreciate all your feedback on this because I’m stuck.
Hi, I’d love to help you but you are not using the plugin we provide.
You are currently using Google Website Optimizer for WordPress by Filippo Toso
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/google-website-optimizer-for-wordpress/
This is the one we have developed
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/easy-google-optimizer/
I get “You do not have sufficient permissions to access this page” after i fill all the fields and click on “update settings” button, any idea ?
- Using WP 2.9.2
- Doesn’t have this problem with any other plug-ins i use
This is most likely a permissions issue on the plugin file. You can try manually setting the permissions to 755 on both the folder and file inside to see if that helps. Or you can delete the plugin folder and start over and try using the plugin uploader tool to see if that helps.
Hi Admin,
I changed permission on “easy-google-optimizer” directory and all files inside to 755 but it didn’t help (i even tried changing all permissions to 777 and it still didn’t work)
This is the url where i get the error:
http://www.domain-name.com/wp-admin/options-general.php?page=easy-google-optimizer.php?page=easy-google-optimizer.php
also removed and re-installed but still doesn’t work.
+ using hebrew version of WP , could that create any problem
It may be a conflict with another plugin. Have you tried disabling all of your other plugins?
The system has only been localized for English but that should not be causing your permissions problem.
Sorry I can’t be of any more help without access to your system but we do not have the resources to trouble shoot each installation the plugin is on for free.
Hello,
My goal is the user clicking an outbound link. Is there a way I can do that within your plugin?
Thanks for your time,
Mike
Hi Mike,
The plugin just installs the code to track the pages. To track an outbound link you will need to add the pagetracker to the link with Javascript.
Or for goal pages
Will this plugin work well with the new version of WordPress?
We tested it on our demo system and everything appears to be working correctly. Please let us know if you have any problems.
Thanks for sharing the great plugin with us.
We are trying to copy in the javascript but the original page will not validate, the variation 1 and goal confirmation pages validate just fine. We have tried updating the javascript directly and using the Easy Google Optimizer plugin for WordPress.
We even tried to copy in the sample bike page code and it will not validate for the original. It validates just fine for the variation 1 page.
We’d really like to be able to use this tool, please help.
Grant
Hi,
Trying to use your plugin, but either it or WP are inserting /*<![CDATA[*/ in front on the control code, which is not validating. The other scripts are fine and aren't being affected. Not sure if this one is different because it's in the header?
First couple of lines below:
/*<![CDATA[*/function utmx_section(){}function utmx(){}(function(){var
Hi Everyone,
Just started using this plugin because another like it was redirecting.
After installing the code on the two pages and the conversion page, the ‘original’ page redirects to the variation page when I try to view it. Anyone know why that why be happening and how I can fix it?
Thanks!
Ken