Is it advisable to use meta refresh for Google Website Optimiser?

[heatherrobinson]

We'd like to track conversions using Google's Website Optimiser, but the conversion page is hosted on a different sub domain so Google won't allow us to use this as the conversion page.

The plan was then to add a blank page on the original domain that contains Google tracking code and a meta refresh to the page on the sub domain. We would then block this page in the robots file so Google doesn't try to index the page with the meta refresh.

Does anyone see any harm that may come of this? Or any other way around the issue?

Thanks in advance

[AdoptionHelp]

I've never tried this so my answer is just speculation, but I can't see any reason why that would be a problem from a technical perspective. From the users perspective it may be a little jarring to be whisked around , but you can soften that with a friendly message on the page, or an animation of an hourglass or something.

If you do give this a try please let me know if it works.

[adrianvender1]

As Ryan mentioned, this would be a workable option.  I've seen 1 second be sufficient time for the _utm.gif hits to complete communication with the GA/GWO servers. Another option would be to track the conversion upon click of the link or form submission, but rather than get to the details of that I'd say just stick with your meta refresh option

[heatherrobinson]

Thanks for your replies. I've set the experiment going with the meta refresh and Google was able to validate the script on each page. I'll let you know if it works reporting wise.

[heatherrobinson]

Just an update on this, The experiement has run its course and the meta refresh didn't seem to give Google any issues with tracking conversions on either version of our land page, so I would say it has been a success.