Redirect & Split URL Testing
Table of contents
In short
With the Redirect function you can redirect incoming users to a specific page. If you use this function in an A/B test, you can perform a "split URL test". For example, you can test your current page against a new version of the page that is accessible via a different URL.
Step-by-Step Tutorial
Create a split URL test with Varify.io
Create Redirect URL in Editor
Create a new variant and click on the "Redirect URL" icon. Then enter the URL to which incoming users should be redirected in the URL input field.
Important Notice:
When entering the URL, be sure to enter the full, absolute URL.
-> “https://www.demoshop.com/new-home" and not "demoshop.com/new-home".
Contact us if you have any questions: https://varify.io/kontakt/
Set up page targeting
After you have created and saved the redirect URL in the visual editor, you can define the settings for the split test in the Varify.io dashboard.
- In Page Targeting, enter the URL on which your experiment should take place. This is the URL from which you want to redirect to the redirect URL. -> Do NOT enter the redirect URL!
- Set the matching type to "Simple Match"
- Set the desired traffic distribution for your variant
- Start the redirect experiment
Example: The screenshot shows the setting that 50% users who come to https://www.demoshop.com/ are now redirected to the URL that was previously entered in the created variant under Redirect URL.
Redirect variant creates an infinite loop
Under certain circumstances, page targeting can create an endless loop for redirected users.
For example, if your redirect URL only contains one additional parameter to the original URL:
Original: https://www.demoshop.com
Redirect: https://www.demoshop.com?page=newlp
This problem can be solved relatively easily. Simply insert the following JavaScript code into the audience targeting field and save the audience targeting.
return !new URLSearchParams(window.location.search).has('va-red');
Evaluation of the split URL test
Like any other experiment, a split URL test can be easily evaluated in Google Analytics 4. You can find the corresponding instructions here: Evaluation of results in GA4
- Create a new exploratory report
- Create a segment for the original variant, i.e. the variant in which users are not redirected. (Experiment ID:Original)
- Then create a segment for the forwarded users. In other words, those who are in the variant. (Experiment ID:Variant ID)
