Create a metric in Optimizely with the metric builder

The natural-language metrics builder in Optimizely Experimentation and Optimizely Personalization lets you define and add metrics to your experiments and campaigns. It asks you to define a small set of parameters that tell Optimizely how to measure and report the results. These parameters include the following:

Use the metrics builder to create your metrics directly in your experiment. First, select your metric type, then fill out the rest of the builder with your information.

The metrics builder UI varies slightly between regular and ratio metrics. See the following sections for examples.

Regular metrics include the following types: Click Event Metric, Custom Event Metric, Overall Revenue, and Page Event Metric.

If Filter this metric on event properties is selected, the following display:

The winning direction parameter (Increase or Decrease) defines the desired outcome for the metric in your experiment or campaign. This direction indicates whether an increase or decrease in the metric value is preferable.

By setting the winning direction, you guide Optimizely in evaluating and reporting the success of your experiments based on the desired changes in your metrics.

The metrics builder has different types of metrics templates, also called numerators. You should select your metric's numerator based on the specific questions you want your experiment to answer.

For ratio metrics, numerators can include unique conversions (unique count), total conversions (total count), total revenue, or the total value of the event you have selected.

For more details on each metric type, see Types of metrics and when to use them.

The metrics builder's denominators are the rate at which your metric measures its numerator. For example, you could measure unique conversions per session or total revenue per conversion.

Because of the inherent differences between metric types and the differences between Optimizely campaigns and experiments, not every denominator works with every numerator.

For ratio metrics, the choices for the denominator are total count (total conversions) or unique count (unique conversions) of a second event. 

Optimizely's Stats Engine uses false discovery rate control to reduce your chance of making an incorrect business decision or implementing a false positive among conclusive results. To learn how Stats Engine prioritizes primary metrics, secondary metrics, and monitoring goals, see Optimizely's Stats Engine approach to metrics and goals.

Event properties can be added to your event during creation. When you send Optimizely events, you can add additional information about the product or action performed. This lets you track and view additional information on the Optimizely Experimentation Results page. 

The event property's condition indicates how the value is evaluated. Depending on the event property's type, the following are the different possible conditions:

You define what value the property event should or should not evaluate to count as a metric. 

Optimizely Web Experimentation and Optimizely Personalization offer several pre-built metrics and a flexible numerator called total value. If you are unsure which metric to choose, see Types of metrics and when to use them.

To learn how to edit your metrics when you build them, see Edit a metricEdit a metric.