django-gwo v0.4 documentation
A/B tests two or more entirely different pages. Google Website Optimizer does this by redirecting the user to different URLs. In many web frameworks, where the URLs are dynamically routed, this is just not practical.
Typically multivariate testing relies on two static URLs: a static URL for testing and a static URL for the conversion.
Dynamic websites – websites with constantly changing content like blogs and news sites – can’t use this procedure because one URL isn’t really representative of the site. Every page which uses the underlying template is.
Even static URLs won’t work if you have dynamic content on them. For example, if your home page has the most recent blog entries, you can’t test what makes more people go to any entry.
With Google Website Optimizer, there are ways to work around the typical testing workflow. It is trickier in that you still can’t test truly dynamic data, but you can test the static stuff around the dynamic data. First you have to understand how GWO tracks users, combinations and conversions.
Since GWO uses a JavaScript function to signal a conversion, we are going to use the onclick methods on <a> tags to quickly register the conversion before sending the user on their way.