Google - Testing using Offermatica won't harm SEO

Updated: Check out Is It Cloaking on searchengineland.com.

One question we get asked at Offermatica is whether conducting tests (A/B, multivariate, and other) will affect SEO ranking.  Our response has always been:

1. We do not alter the underlying HTML that is spidered, and Google has assured us that this is not forbidden provided that the underlying HTML is a legitimate page viewed by a portion of the visitors.
2. Google used Offermatica to test its own AdWords interface in September of 2005, and supported our mbox implementation on their own properties.

I was very comforted today to see this response from the GWA group:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Website Optimizer Beta Advisor <WOBetaAdvisor@google.com>
Date: Mar 21, 2007 10:43 AM
Subject: [Website Optimizer] Does Website Optimizer affect my organic search rankings?
To: Google Website Optimizer Beta <websiteoptimizer@googlegroups.com >

We've recently noticed some confusion about whether Website Optimizer
affects organic search rankings, so we wanted to take a moment to
clear things up.

Website Optimizer is designed to keep your original content visible in
the HTML source code of your page at all times. As a result, your
original content is visible to crawlers, which means there should be
no major impact on search engine ranking.  However, if you implement
changes to your content after using Website Optimizer, they'll have
the same effects as any content changes that you would typically make
to your website.

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I trust this will settle the issue.  The GWA mechanism and the Offermatica mbox operate the same way.

note: I am not subscribed to the Google Website Optimizer beta.