Book Review:”Always be testing”

Over the Thanksgiving weekend rather than shopping I thought I would read about Multivariate Testing so I picked up ‘Always be Testing, The complete guide to Google Website Optimizer’.  It is one of the first books published on Google’s product and written by the fine people at FutureNow Inc who were among the pioneers of multivariate testing.  In its 337 pages of optimization goodness the book provides more than 250 testing ideas for your ecommerce website.  The book starts off going over fairly basic concepts but you won’t make it through the last portion without an adequate understanding of scripts and math.  They do explain quite well how to implement Google Website Optimizer on a wordpress blog.  

The book analyzes dives into the marketing side of ecommerce and analyzes the buying process and the steps to a purchasing decision.  

‘Always be testing‘ reminds SEOs/web designers that when people buy, they basically go through a very linear process:

1. Problem recognition.
2. Information search.
3. Evaluation of alternatives.
4. Purchase decision.
5. Purchase completion.
6. Was the problem solved?

This is an often forgotten process that many don’t implement in their ecommerce designs.  The idea of being a resource to evaluate alternatives scares many websites however when I see a product / benefit / competitor matrix I often move forward with my purchase with confidence.