Long term user sampling is similar to short term sampling with one important difference: with long term sampling, the test groups you set up persist from one scenario to the next, so you can compare the behavior of different groups of visitors across many scenarios and over a long period of time.
To set up this type of sampling, you create a scenario that assigns site visitors to one of several test groups. The scenario sets the test group assignment as a property in each visitor’s profile. The following image shows how the scenario might look:
On the specified date, the scenario changes a property called Test Group in each visitor’s profile to either GroupA, GroupB, or GroupC. (Note that this property does not ship with the ATG platform. Your database administrator must add a similar property to your profile repository if you want to perform long term user sampling.)
Each registered visitor now belongs to one of the three test groups. You can use these groups to test any aspect of a scenario or your Web site design that you choose, either by setting up a scenario specifically to perform user sampling, or by inserting test elements into other scenarios. In addition, because these test groups are simply profile properties set to specific values, you can use them in targeters as well as in scenarios.
