一家网站测试公司的百万美元业务

    网站测试这项工作本身实在没什么魅力，然而，一点点细微差别就可能意味着收入相差数百万美元之巨。

    正因为如此，两位曾经的谷歌（Google）产品经理——丹•赛若克与皮特•库门于四年前创建了网站测试公司Optimizely。而就在两人自立门户前不久，赛若克曾领导巴拉克•奥巴马2008年总统大选的分析工作。Optimizely公司于2010年完成了Y Combinator项目，开始吸引到星巴克（Starbucks）和Salesforce.com这样的客户，还声称Optimizely的增速将超过史上所有的软件即服务公司——这番宣言相当大胆。

    不过，Optimizely的这个目标并不像大家想象的那么遥不可及。

    Optimizely日前宣布，自2010年创建以来，公司年收入的年同比增长率一直保持在三位数。另外，Optimizely还宣布，它在第二轮融资中获得了安德森-霍罗维茨（Andreessen Horowitz）、基准资本（Benchmark Capital）和贝恩资本风险投资公司（Bain Capital Ventures）共计5700万美元的投资。安德森-霍罗维茨公司的斯科特•韦斯将进入Optimizely公司董事会。【Optimizely首轮融资的投资者除了基准资本和贝恩资本之外，还有巴特利风投公司（Battery Ventures）、InterWest Partners、Lowercase Capital以及谷歌创投（Google Ventures）】。Optimizely总共融到了高达8800万美元的资金，这个数字表明，要么是赛若克和库门做出来的东西确实有前途，要么就是硅谷的估值太过乐观。

    “网站测试的商机真的有这么大吗？的确如此。” 赛若克告诉《财富》杂志（Fortune）。“现在有一个转变，企业的决策不再围着老大的观点转，而是越来越多的围着数据转。”

    Optimizely的竞争对手包括 Adobe (ADBE) Target、谷歌Website Optimizer、Visual Website Optimizer以及Monetate 等。确保Optimizely维持领先地位的是它庞大的用户群——至今Optimizely在101个国家拥有7000多位客户，后者都在寻找能帮助自己改善网站设计的数据，以提升网站效率和盈利。赛若克说：“它不仅仅是带来增量的问题，还要提出假说。”Optimizely的做法是，扭转企业高管依靠自身、而非专业服务机构来进行网站测试等技术工作的趋势。

    赛若克说：“绝大多数网站尚都还没有开始使用网站测试服务。网站优化和A/B测试所创造的价值远远高于我们筹得的资金，也远远高于我们产品的成本。我们看到客户的收入攀升。【基于数据的产品决策】将成为主流，不论我们公司是否是最终胜出的那个。”

    Optimizely表示，计划用增加的资金来开发iOS应用，发展旗下的Optiverse社区留言板以及开发者平台。赛若克说：“我坚信人机合一的理念。Optimizely的成功取决于用户的成功。我们为客户做的事事授之以渔。”但赛若克显然还有更宏大的计划。

    赛若克说：“我们希望使世界将数据转化为行动。”赛若克补充道，他希望建立一家百年企业。那么，网站和移动应用还仅仅只是个开端。（财富中文网）

    译者：项航

    There isn't anything inherently glamorous about website testing, but minor differences can mean a difference of millions of dollars in revenue.

    That's why former Google (GOOG) product managers Dan Siroker and Pete Koomen foundedOptimizely four years ago, not long after Siroker led the analytics effort for Barack Obama's 2008 presidential campaign. The young company completed the Y Combinator program in 2010, started picking up clients like Starbucks (SBUX) and Salesforce.com (CRM), and proclaimed that it was "on pace to grow faster than any other SaaS company in history" -- a rather bold statement.

    It's not as far-fetched as you might think.

    The company announced this morning that it has seen triple-digit growth, year over year, in annual revenue since its 2010 launch. To celebrate, it also announced that it had raised $57 million in a Series B funding round from Andreessen Horowitz, Benchmark Capital, and Bain Capital Ventures. Andreessen's Scott Weiss will join its board of directors. (The company's previous round included Benchmark and Bain alongside Battery Ventures, InterWest Partners, Lowercase Capital, and Google Ventures.) That brings the company's total funding to a sizable $88 million, suggesting either that Siroker and Koomen are on to something or that Silicon Valley valuations are, well, optimistic.

    "Is website testing this big [of an opportunity]? The answer is yes," Siroker told Fortune. "It's a shift that's been happening as companies make decisions less around the "hippo" -- highest-paid person's opinion -- and more around data."

    Optimizely competes with Adobe (ADBE) Target, Google Website Optimizer, Visual Website Optimizer, Monetate, and others. Keeping the company at the front of the peloton is its large base of customers -- more than 7,000 in 101 countries to date, all in search of data to help them design their websites in a more efficient (and lucrative) way. "It's not just incremental changes but generating a hypothesis," Siroker said. The company's approach taps into a trend in which business leaders take it upon themselves, rather than look to their technology organization, to perform technical tasks like running website tests.

    "The vast majority of websites are still not doing this," Siroker said. "The value that optimization and A/B testing creates is much much greater than the amount of money we're raising or the cost of our products. We're seeing huge increases in top-line revenue of their business. [The shift to data-based product decisions] is going to happen, whether we're the chosen product or not."

    The company says it plans to use the additional funds to develop its iOS application, its Optiverse community message board, and its developer platform. "I strongly believe this idea of the man-machine merger," Siroker said. "Optimizely is only as successful as the person using it. We teach our customers how to fish." But Siroker clearly has bigger plans.

    "We want to enable the world to turn data into action," he said, adding that he wants to build a company that lasts "maybe 100 years." Websites and mobile applications, then, are just the beginning.