The way consumers shop has fundamentally changed—and it’s not just about the move from bricks-and-mortar to online. Increasingly, the battle for customer experience (CX) supremacy isn’t happening on websites, but within native mobile apps. Mobile commerce is no longer just a trend—it’s the preference for millions of consumers. And while both mobile web and apps have a role to play, the numbers are drawing a clear line in the sand: native mobile apps are winning. Native Apps engage and convert at higher rates The more tailored, personalised experience delivers both increased engagement and conversion rates. Data from Glance Group shows that app users typically spend 3.5 times longer engaging with brands and complete purchases 1.5 times more frequently than website visitors . Why? Because apps offer something the mobile web simply can’t: a personalised, easier and faster experience. Speed , simplicity and stickiness Unlike mobile websites, native apps store data locally, making them inherently faster. Actions that require server calls on the web can happen almost instantly within an app. The frameworks underpinning native apps can run much faster than JavaScript-based mobile websites, meaning tasks feel near-instantaneous. For the customer, that translates into fewer delays, fewer taps—and fewer reasons to abandon a purchase. Apps also streamline customer journeys. Saved preferences, stored payment methods, and personalised recommendations remove friction, reducing the effort it takes to convert. Add in the power of push notifications to nudge shoppers back to their abandoned baskets or alert them to flash sales, and the result is a stickier, more compelling path to purchase. The 5G and satellite-enabled future of Mobile CX The technical infrastructure supporting mobile experiences is also evolving rapidly. The rollout of 5G networks has already slashed latency and boosted bandwidth, improving app responsiveness. But the next leap is even more profound: satellite-enabled mobile coverage, like Vodafone’s satellite video calls , is eliminating network dead zones. This means uninterrupted app performance—regardless of geography. Social Commerce and Live Shopping Another powerful shift is happening through the rise of social commerce. Platforms like TikTok and Instagram are rapidly becoming full-fledged shopping ecosystems. Livestream shopping—once a niche format—is now mainstream, with platforms like eBay Live and Whatnot driving billions in revenue. These immersive experiences are optimised for mobile apps, which support real-time video, embedded checkout, and interactive chat far more seamlessly than browsers. It’s a redefinition of what “shopping” means in the mobile-first age. Mobile Payments are redefining the checkout experience Native Apps are also where the latest innovations in payments are playing out. Whether it’s digital wallets, Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) options, or biometric security features like face ID and fingerprint login, checkout within apps is becoming faster, more secure, and more intuitive. This reduces abandonment and boosts trust—especially important as customers become increasingly sensitive to any friction in the final steps of a purchase. So why are online retailers ignoring the risks of Native App CX and performance? Despite the clear business case for mobile apps, many eCommerce brands are still flying blind when it comes to visibility of Native App CX and performance . While website monitoring is standard practice, Native App Monitoring is usually overlooked—leaving retailers exposed to glitches, slow load times, and hidden errors that quickly silently erode trust and conversions. In an era where Native Apps are the preferred storefront, ensuring they perform seamlessly isn’t optional—it’s essential. They carry the weight of your brand experience and often to your most loyal, highest-converting customers. In this context, failing to monitor your app is more than a technical oversight—it’s a commercial risk. As mobile CX becomes the new battleground for eCommerce loyalty and revenue, the ability to proactively monitor, diagnose, and fix issues in real time may be the difference between growth and churn. Start seeing what your customers experience - before it's too late Native App Monitoring Blind spots in Native App CX and performance aren’t just technical issues—they’re business risks. Our real-user monitoring service for Native Apps helps you detect issues before your customers do, so you can protect conversions, loyalty, and brand trust. Discover how thinkTRIBE’s native app monitoring can give you true visibility where it matters most.

Is your AI quietly breaking your website? AI is transforming eCommerce — powering everything from personalised product listings and targeted recommendations to AI-generated content and predictive search. It’s helping brands deliver more tailored, responsive, and optimised customer experiences. As one of the leading sectors for AI adoption, eCommerce businesses using AI-driven strategies are seeing an average revenue uplift of 10–12% . But there’s a problem few teams are prepared for: AI brings powerful capabilities — but also technical complexity and integration risks  that can lead to subtle, technical glitches, hard-to-spot errors and unexpected behaviour in your live environment. When these AI tools go wrong, they don’t fail in obvious ways. These AI risks in eCommerce fail quietly — and inconsistently. The invisible problem with AI-powered customer journeys AI enables personalised experiences at scale. That’s a strength — but also a growing risk. These real time, dynamic changes create fragmented user journeys — and with that fragmented failure modes. Whether it’s a missing checkout button, an incorrect product image, broken text, or wrong pricing, it might only affect a subset of users — while working perfectly for everyone else. Traditional QA and synthetic monitoring rarely simulate those edge cases. So your systems stay “green” — while real customers struggle. Why these issues are hard to detect These aren’t the kinds of errors that trigger alerts. They don’t appear on uptime dashboards or crash your servers. Instead, they: Subtly reduce conversion rates Increase checkout abandonment Erode trust and NPS over time They don’t cause dramatic outages — just quiet cracks that weaken CX and conversions. Such as a dynamically priced item that disappears at checkout, a predictive recommendation that leads to a 404 error or an AI-generated product image that fails to load on mobile browsers. Monitor AI risks in eCommerce from the outside in Most teams rely on a combination of internal tools, uptime monitoring, and traditional testing. But these systems don't give full visibility of your CX and often assume a single, consistent version of your site — when in reality, every customer is seeing a version shaped by hundreds of real time variables. Unless your monitoring behaves like a real user — using real browsers and customer contexts — you risk missing the most costly issues. You don’t need to simulate every possible journey — but you do need to monitor the most valuable ones, including: Add-to-cart journeys across key product categories, PDPs, and offer types Checkout flows that include AI-powered steps or upsells Mobile vs desktop journeys When monitoring reflects how actual customers behave 24/7 — you can catch hidden issues before they show up in your NPS or revenue data. The more personal the journey, the more hidden the risk Forrester recently highlighted that AI and operational resilience risks  are now core concerns for enterprise risk management (ERM) programs — a sign that these issues have become business-critical challenges. As AI continues to shape the customer journey, your monitoring and QA approach needs to evolve too. The more tailored your experience becomes, the more specific — and harder to spot — your failures might be. If your monitoring still assumes a one-size-fits-all journey, it may be time to rethink what “realistic” really looks like. What next? If you'd like to explore how true CX visibility through real-user monitoring can help surface AI-related issues, explore our DCX web intelligence monitoring. If you're looking beyond the technical risks of generative AI, Deloitte breaks it down into four key categories  — including data integrity, governance, and unintended outcomes.

The feedback every website owner wants to hear is that their customer’s journeys on their website are smooth, quick and conclude with the customer making a purchase, that’s the dream right?  So what are the nightmares? What do we need to avoid to make our website’s performance be in tip top condition so our customers feel happy and content to browse, share and buy? What are the tools for monitoring website performance? The far too long 3 seconds. It’s a known fact that if a website takes more than three seconds to load, that user will open a new window, find a new site that loads quicker and continue on their journey, buying the product or services they came to your website for, from another. Now, we know that 3 seconds in reality seems like such a short time, but in the ecommerce world of CX, that is 1 second far too long! Sales killer glitches. Another killer for your site is glitches. If a customer is using your site and they come across a button, drop down menu, or link that doesn’t work, for example it goes to the wrong page, you get an error code or absolutely nothing happens…you got it, that customer is disgruntled and gone! Crash, crash, burn. There’s nothing quite as efficient as sealing the deal of a no sale situation than a site that crashes. Whether that’s due to too many people on the site at once, or just a pathway confusion that’s landed your customer’s journey at a messy end, that wasn’t a sale, that’s another lost customer. So how do we prevent our customer journeys coming to unproductive ends? The only way to see what your customers see, is to use tools for monitoring website performance to test and monitor your site for all the issues mentioned above. Running 24/7 customer journeys gives you ongoing visibility of those customer-impacting issues. This allows you to measure and trend performance over time. Customers don’t follow a strict path on their journey through your site, they might hop between all areas, creating a huge web, interlinking different pages and media in hundreds of different ways. By dynamically following real customer journeys, your website’s performance can be measured and understood. Your site is aimed to sell products and services to customers, so it’s pretty vital that their journeys are the ones you recreate and monitor rather than testing statically with predetermined URLs. Monitor what matters to maximise your customer’s experience with Synthetic Monitoring. Here at thinkTRIBE we offer a full set of tools for monitoring website performance to help ensure your website’s performance results in customer sales rather than customer disappearance. Contact us today here at thinkTRIBE to see how we can help your website with dynamic, real time website performance monitoring.

Move over e-commerce; m-commerce is here to stay In a post-pandemic world, it is predicted that as much as 80% of online shopping is now done via mobile devices. According to Statista, by 2025, the number of monthly active smartphone users in the United Kingdom is projected to grow steadily and reach 64.89 million owners. This is an increase of almost 9.7 million new users from the 55.22 million users in 2018. More people than ever have mobile phones, and they are using them in all aspects of their lives, from socialising with friends to banking. We now have the world’s biggest shopping centre in our pockets. Demand is at its highest, but so is the competition. It’s easier than ever to go online and make a purchase, but as a business owner, just how straightforward is it to manage all the demands that booming m-commerce bring? We might have the world at our fingertips, but our patience is shorter than it has ever been. 53% of mobile users will click the back button on a site that takes longer than 3 seconds to load. They’ll go elsewhere. They have that convenience. When that dreaded lag in loading hits, customers’ ease of going back and trying a competitor is just one more challenge facing the online business owner. So what does that mean for your website when the UK doesn’t even break the top ten countries in the world for mobile internet speed? It means you might not be getting the whole picture when it comes to your customers’ journey. And with multiple mobile providers offering a range of speeds and coverage, it’s not always easy to see just how your site measures up. thinkTRIBE use real Android and iOS browsers running on genuine mobile platforms to enable speedy identification and resolution of performance issues before they impact your customers. Not only will you get a realistic report based on the same dynamic choices your customers will make, but video replay breaks the process down and allows you to see errors in the way your customers would. By handing you the power to optimise your m-commerce customer journey, thinkTRIBE can help ensure you won’t run afoul of that 53%.

How to reveal and streamline the resolution of eCommerce errors In today’s competitive eCommerce environment, customer experience is a key differentiator. Ensuring a smooth and efficient shopping journey is essential to prevent lost sales and maintain the trust your customers have in your brand. Every eCommerce website faces Digital Customer Experience (DCX) friction and website errors — often hidden from your view. These are conversion-damaging issues that remain undetected by conventional monitoring and error logs. While you might be unaware of these obstacles, your customers are not, and their experience—and your revenue—can suffer as a result. Friction examples include visible but “Unbuyable Products”, Product Logic Issues, Missing prices, images & sizes, Technical Errors, Checkout and add-to-bag errors plus Intermittent Slowdowns to name a few. These issues aren’t sitewide or consistent, making them difficult to identify, replicate and resolve. They may only affect certain products, categories, or customer journeys, complicating detection and replication. Additionally, addressing these critical issues often falls outside the remit of your tech teams and instead lies with business or product teams. In this blog, we’ll walk you through a six-step, best practise approach to uncover and address critical DCX friction and website errors that lead to lost revenue. By focusing on these issues, you can enhance your customer experience, safeguard your brand, and ultimately boost your conversion rates. Six steps to uncover and resolve critical eCommerce friction and errors 1. Simulate real customer behaviour 24/7 To uncover critical user friction accurately, you need to simulate real customer behaviour around the clock. Virtual Shoppers dynamically navigating through categories, products, product options and checkout processes, detect more issues, faster. 2. Measure with Real Browsers and genuine OS or Native Apps To detect all potential errors, measure DCX using real browsers on actual operating systems. This approach reveals issues that emulated solutions might miss, such as device-specific rendering quirks, third-party interactions, or browser-specific bugs. 3. Gather and share critical DCX insights to unify teams Unify your business and technical teams around a common point of truth, by sharing critical DCX insights. By highlighting customer-impacting friction through easily digestible data and dashboards, you can ensure that all relevant teams are aligned on resolving the most pressing issues. 4. Verify and prioritise errors by replaying customer journeys Record and replay customer journeys to gain a deeper understanding of errors and their impact. This enables you to quickly verify the severity of issues and prioritise fixes that will have the greatest effect on improving customer experience and conversions. 5. Replicate errors with detailed steps and product data leading to the issue Use video replays combined with dynamic data details and steps leading to an error to replicate it easily. This approach helps you pinpoint the underlying causes, speeding up resolution. 6. Swiftly resolve issues with easy access to granular data Provide your tech team with the evidence needed to resolve errors swiftly. Enable drill down into granular component-level data to diagnose issues, understand root causes, and implement fixes as quickly as possible. Real-world DCX insights with “Digital Secret Shopper Technology” To effectively uncover and eliminate DCX friction and website errors, it’s essential to interact with your site as real customers do—using real browsers and operating systems around the clock. ThinkTribe’s DCX Intelligence Service utilises Digital Secret Shopper Technology to simulate user behaviour, gather critical data on customer experience, and report on issues 24/7. Beyond simply identifying problems, thinkTribe helps you understand their impact through video replays of customer journeys, enabling easy verification and prioritization of errors. With access to detailed data, your tech team can swiftly diagnose and resolve issues, improving your overall customer experience and optimising Conversions. Extend Your Team with Proactive Support Managing DCX friction might seem overwhelming, but with the right tools and proactive support, you can be up and running with a solution like thinkTRIBE’s DCX Intelligence Service within just two weeks. This managed service helps you stay ahead of potential issues, ensuring your customers enjoy a seamless shopping experience every time. For more detail on the Six Steps to reveal and resolve eCommerce friction and website errors download the complete guide here #digitalexperience #DXfriction #DXmonitoring

Smarter Monitoring, Happier Customers In the world of SaaS, keeping customers happy means ensuring your software runs smoothly—at every step, every time. That’s exactly why leading provider of business software, The Access Group, relies on thinkTRIBE to ensure seamless SaaS performance and customer satisfaction. Nowhere is this more vital than in their Care Division, where software reliability directly impacts lives. The Challenges Managing CX at scale Understanding Real-World User Experience:  Highly customisable solutions made it difficult to assess true customer impact. Slow Incident Resolution:  Troubleshooting consumed valuable developer time, delaying fixes and reducing efficiency. Measuring CX Post-Release:  While backend changes were trackable, their effect on end-user experience was harder to gauge. The thinkTRIBE Solution thinkTRIBE’s DCX Intelligence Monitoring Service transformed The Access Group’s approach to CX management: 24/7 Real-User Journeys:  Simulating customer interactions provides an accurate CX benchmark. Fully Managed SaaS Monitoring:  Handling scripting, code maintenance, and proactive support frees up developer time. Multi-Tenant Environment Monitoring:  Highlights infrastructure-wide performance issues before they escalate. Seamless Integration:  Works across architectures and integrates with platforms like PagerDuty for incident response. When issues arise, thinkTRIBE’s Video Replay and Wallboard provide instant visibility, helping teams quickly verify, diagnose, and resolve problems. The Results 1. True CX Visibility & Data-Driven Improvements thinkTRIBE soon became a key tool in The Access Group’s CX strategy, providing an accurate, real-world view of performance. As Ovidiu Julean, Director of Products & Engineering – Care, explains: "thinkTRIBE is the final validation point—if it’s down for thinkTRIBE, it’s down for our customers. It’s the source of truth, accurately reflecting real-user experience." 2. Faster Issue Resolution & Happier Customers Early Warning System:  Detects slowdowns before they escalate into errors. Quick Diagnosis:  Identifies issues, providing video replay and evidence for faster resolution. Clear insight into customer-reported issues  to determine if external factors are at play. "Faster issue resolution leads to happier customers. My goal is to minimise engineering time spent diagnosing problems so we can fix them quickly." 3. Enhanced Developer Productivity With thinkTRIBE, engineers spend less time troubleshooting and more time building new features: "We’ve dramatically improved CX—customer journeys are faster, and performance metrics are greener. Monitoring helps us resolve issues faster." 4. Driving Retention & Protecting Revenue thinkTRIBE enables The Access Group to deliver seamless experiences, improving customer satisfaction and retention, ultimately protecting gross revenue retention (GRR). "thinkTRIBE provides the closest insight into real-user experience. The managed service model is a huge value-add, saving our team time while improving CX." Conclusion By integrating thinkTRIBE’s proactive CX and performance monitoring service, The Access Group has accelerated issue resolution, boosted developer efficiency, and enhanced SaaS CX. The result? More satisfied customers, streamlined operations, and long-term business success. Read the full case study here or 'earn more about how our DCX Intelligence Service can help maximise your SaaS CX .

Elevate eCommerce CX & boost Black Friday conversions Black Friday is just around the corner, and with the peak sales period now stretching over a longer period, many deals are set to go live as early as October. Black Friday, Cyber Monday and the Holiday Season present huge opportunities for eCommerce businesses but failing to prepare adequately can result in lost revenue and long-term damage to your brand’s reputation. The good news is that it’s not too late – by testing now and focusing on delivering optimal Digital CX around the clock, there’s still time to boost conversion rates and prevent lost revenue during this peak holiday period. Seven-Step Plan for Holiday Peak Season Success Follow these steps to eliminate DCX friction and website errors, and maximise online revenue this peak holiday period. 1. Integrate Load Testing Early The earlier you incorporate Load Testing into your holiday season planning process, the better. Many businesses mistakenly leave load testing as a last-minute task, but a more proactive approach ensures you can resolve issues without last-minute pressure. Retesting after fixes is essential for success. 2. Define Realistic Testing Targets Before diving into testing, define what success looks like based on real-world customer experiences. Understand how users interact with your site and build your tests around that knowledge. Use data from past performance to develop realistic test models that simulate actual customer journeys, from landing pages to promotions and checkout – including realistic mixes of journeys and drop-off ratios. 3. Measure Current Capacity Assess your site’s current capacity to handle traffic. Look at how your site performed in previous peak periods, including journey delivery times and error rates. If you plan to launch a stripped-down version of your site for Black Friday, Load Test that version in isolation to understand its performance limits. 4. Test Often We recommend Load Testing months ahead of peak season and using the results to establish a baseline and to identify areas for improvement. Regular testing, with increased frequency leading up to the final code lockdown, will help you make incremental changes and verify improvements. 5. Lockdown Code on Time Start your code lockdown at least six weeks before peak to ensure stability. This timeline allows you to implement final changes, such as Black Friday sections and deal codes, before freezing the code. Consider reducing non-essential functionality to optimise performance and ensure a smooth experience for mobile users. 6. Retest After Code Freeze Two to four weeks before peak season, retest your live system to ensure the final environment is performing as expected. Testing in a staging environment is not enough; real-world performance on the live system is critical for success. 7. Focus on ongoing Customer Experience 24/7 After all the preparation, ensure that your customers continue experiencing a seamless journey from landing page to checkout. Gathering Digital CX Intelligence for key journeys 24/7— especially on mobile — will help you catch any issues before they impact users. Test your site using real-world scenarios to avoid unexpected problems with real browsers and on genuine OS. With this plan in place, you can confidently approach the holiday season, ensuring your eCommerce store is ready to deliver an exceptional Digital Customer Experience, prevent lost revenue and safeguard your brand. Free up staff resources with an extension to your team In reality you probably don’t have the resources, time or capacity to plan, prepare and test for seasonal peaks. A fully-managed service offers the benefits of experienced test experts acting as an extension of your technical team. This expands your resource, time, experience and not to mention test capacity – as and when you require it – and frees up internal teams to focus on business objectives. For a more detailed guide on the seven step process download our eBook here. #digitalexperience #DXfriction #DXmonitoring

We live in a world where the majority of us have a mobile phone almost permanently glued to our hand! We use our mobile phones for pretty much every part of our lives; photos, organising our time, emails, appointments, accessing the internet for checking in with friends and family, researching, booking, watching, listening…the list is never ending!  So it comes as no surprise that in 2022 the UK has seen over 70% of online retail traffic come from mobile users, making them your most immediate customers.  With such a high demand for mobile compatible sites, it’s never been more important to ensure your site is mobile ready…because these customers take no prisoners! It’s time for CX Mobile Monitoring! The 3 second rule – this is the estimated time mobile users will take to lose interest in your site. If products, sharing, adding to basket, or payment pages take longer than 3 seconds to load, they’re off to another site, and you’ve lost your sale and your customer.  By engaging with mobile monitoring, you can test your site’s ability to cope with an array of customer journeys, discover any loading issues and highlight glitches before your mobile customers experience them. Mobile users are your most immediate customers as sites and apps are so easily and readily accessed. Delivering a flawless and seamless experience is paramount to ensure your site is a success on every mobile device, no matter how many people are visiting or what action they are trying to perform.  Can you really afford to lose out on the 70% of online shopping by mobile users by not performing mobile monitoring and testing to ensure your site provides the best mobile CX? If you need help testing your site or app with mobile monitoring, why not get in touch with us here at thinkTRIBE .

For any football club, unveiling a new kit marks a significant milestone in the calendar. But amidst the excitement of the launch, how can you ensure that visitors can seamlessly checkout with their coveted new gear? At ThinkTribe, we’re lucky enough to work with some of the Premier League’s most prominent clubs, offering uniquely realistic load testing and dedicated client support to ensure flawless customer experience, even during peak times. Delivering a fast and error-free checkout experience is vital, especially during high-profile events like kit launches. So, how can you elevate your CX when it matters most? To ensure your site can handle high volumes of traffic and concurrent user transactions, accurate customer experience insights under real-world conditions are essential. Here are our top three tips to ensure you’ll be ready to handle the influx of eager fans without a hitch. 1) Prioritise preparation with sufficient time Based on our experience it’s more effective to implement a comprehensive load testing program as part of a planned process in the run up to kit launch. While it may not always be feasible, at the very least aim to conduct load testing prior to code lockdown, allowing enough time to implement, test and fix any issues. It’s important to allow margin for retesting to ensure fixes have worked and evaluate their impact on CX. We recommend testing key journeys at least four weeks ahead of kit launch to evaluate performance of the final system on the live environment. It’s often more costly to make changes at the last minute. 2) Base testing on realistic traffic profiles For the most accurate results, it’s crucial to base your testing on the most realistic traffic profiles . If you’re working with a load testing provider, they should analyse your web analytics and examine historical marketing data to ensure traffic profiles accurately reflect real-world scenarios. 3) Monitor CX around the clock Even minor changes to your site can impact customer experience. To prevent abandonment and ensure a seamless checkout process, continuously monitor key checkout journeys before and during the kit launch. Identifying and resolving issues before they impact your customers is key. If you’re ready to elevate your online customer experience during kit launch find out how thinkTribe can help support your goals. For a more comprehensive guide to maximising online sales at kit launch, download our eBook ‘Preparing your website for kit kaunch success’ . #kitlaunch #peakpreparation

Are you overlooking the hidden obstacles impacting digital experience (DX) and leading to lost sales? Beneath the surface of your digital platform lies a wealth of hidden DX friction, stealthily disrupting your customers’ online journeys. While these obstacles may remain hidden from your view, they have a tangible effect on your conversions. And while they elude conventional monitoring tools and error logs, their impact is keenly felt by your customers, leading to abandonment and lost sales We share our experience of the primary causes of concealed digital CX friction, so you can begin to tackle them and safeguard your bottom line. Understanding Business Logic Challenges Business logic issues serve as a primary source of hidden DX friction, creating frustration and hindering the checkout process for customers. These issues often arise from mishandled product information management (PIM), including complexities in product options, combinations, and stock management. Addressing these issues typically falls within the domain of business teams, so your tech teams are unable to rectify them. Conventional error detection methods fail to identify these issues, leaving customers to navigate through obstacles such as missing prices or unresponsive add-to-cart buttons. The result? Missed sales opportunities and dissatisfied customers. Navigating Intermittent Slowdowns Intermittent slowdowns steadily chip away at conversions and contribute to abandonment rates, yet they often go unnoticed within your online store. These slowdowns stem from complex interactions between underlying technological components and various plugins and tools. Their sporadic nature makes them difficult to pinpoint, manifesting in specific areas of your website, products or baskets or at specific times. Customers encounter these slowdowns while browsing or making purchases, having a direct impact on abandonment. However, traditional monitoring tools may not detect these issues, leaving businesses to grapple with an invisible challenge. Addressing Technical Errors Technical glitches pose a significant barrier to seamless checkout experiences, frustrating customers and eroding trust in your brand. Technical errors can result from bugs in your software or platform, compatibility conflicts, or issues with third-party tools and plugins. These errors manifest as unresponsive buttons, obscured checkout pathways, or confusing error messages. From bugs in your software or platform and compatibility conflicts to issues with third-party tools and plugins, technical errors arise from the complexity of your digital infrastructure. These errors manifest as unresponsive buttons, obscured checkout pathways, or confusing error messages. Such errors disrupt various aspects of your online store, impacting customer journeys and undermining confidence in your platform. Their sporadic occurrence makes them challenging to detect and address effectively. Revealing and Resolving Hidden DX Friction Addressing digital friction requires a shift in DX visibility and monitoring strategies, one that adopts a customer-centric approach and prioritises real-world interactions , on real browsers and using genuine operating systems. Only by interacting with your website as real customers do, and performing the same actions, can you identify and overcome the obstacles leading to abandonment and lost sales. In the dynamic world of digital commerce, the pursuit of frictionless customer experience is ongoing. Are you ready to take steps to mitigate hidden CX friction and reduce abandonment? To learn more about the hidden causes of friction and how to tackle them, read our eBook ‘Uncovering the hidden causes of digital CX friction’. #customerexperience #cxfriction #cxmonitoring

In the fast-paced world of online beauty retail, embracing innovation has always been essential. Technologies like Virtual Reality and AI-driven personalization have fuelled growth, offering immersive experiences and building brand loyalty. While innovation promises enhanced DX and higher conversion rates, increasing the complexity of your digital infrastructure can inadvertently disrupt the digital customer experience, leading to lost sales and brand damage. How technological innovation can undermine Digital Experience (DX) Unbuyable products, unexpected slowdowns, missing prices and images, and checkout errors—each innovation and its interaction with other functionality can introduce friction and drive customers away. Many of these issues are intermittent or occur under specific circumstances, making them difficult to detect. And despite the built-in tools and plugins offered by many digital commerce platforms, smooth implementation isn’t guaranteed, and frictionless DX can remain elusive. Key challenges for online beauty retailers We take a look at some key challenges in beauty digital commerce that could increase DX risk. 1. Immersive, Personalised Experiences Use of AI-driven hyper-personalization and AR/VR provides tailored and immersive experiences. However integration of these tools, compatibility conflicts and interaction with third-parties can exacerbate DX friction, resulting in unbuyable products and unexpected slowdowns. 2. Social Selling & Influencer Partnerships Leveraging social influence and brand communities helps reach new audiences, but integrating third-party or built-in influencer and social selling apps can introduce DX friction including checkout errors and technical glitches. 3. Customer Loyalty programs & subscriptions Implementing loyalty programs and product recommendations involves analysing past purchases and predictive modelling. DX risk comes from configuring these tools and managing product options, combinations, and promotions. Business logic issues can lead to missing product information and stock management problems leading to unbuyable products. 4. Incorporating Social Awareness Addressing socially conscious purchasing including clean beauty, environmental impact, and diversity is critical for beauty buyers. However, showcasing user-generated content and recommended products to support these values introduces new risks to DX. 5. Streamlining the checkout process Providing multiple payment and checkout options have all been shown to increase conversions. Implementation of these options adds a layer of complexity, which, if left unchecked, can result in technical glitches and checkout errors such as obscured checkout pathways and unresponsive buttons. With so many priorities and limited staff resources, how can you address DX friction that could be hurting your conversions? Embrace innovation but remain vigilant DX obstacles remain undetected by conventional tools and error logs and arise unexpectedly – on specific products, baskets or at particular times – making them difficult to detect and address. Real-world DX monitoring is key to identifying and resolving issues before they impact your customers. Performing the same tasks on the same real browsers, native apps, and operating systems as your customers, 24/7, reveals barriers to conversion on your site. And you can save time getting to the bottom of root causes with hard evidence across teams, video replay of issues and fast drill-down to granular data. Plus a service-based solution frees up valuable staff resources to focus on developing your store in line with business objectives. Online beauty retailers must embrace innovation but need to remain vigilant, by monitoring DX 24/7 to ensure a frictionless shopping experience, reduce abandonment, and protect their brand. Learn more about the DX friction that may be hidden from your view and how it impacts conversion rates in our eBook ‘The hidden causes of DX friction’.

In the dynamic world of football eCommerce, digital transformation is revolutionising the way fans interact with their favourite clubs. Today, fans seek engagement beyond the 90-minute matches, craving year-round, seamless Digital Experiences. At thinkTRIBE, we work with Premier League football clubs, providing unparalleled DCX Intelligence. We uncover DCX friction and lost sales and deliver the most accurate DCX insights prior to peak and before and after new feature integrations. From kit launches to online ticket sales and entering new global markets – how can you ensure seamless Digital Customer Experience (DCX) and optimise football eCommerce? Enhancing eCommerce profitability through superior Digital CX With ticketing now primarily digital and online merchandise and kit sales becoming a cornerstone of the industry, football clubs must deliver fast, seamless DCX across online stores to enhance profitability. Complex business logic behind ticketing options, membership and loyalty programmes plus kit customisation are a few aspects of Football eCommerce that can introduce DCX friction. Managing exclusive periods, priority points and purchase windows can result in errors such as missing ticket options, missing or incorrect pricing and promotion errors that you may not even be aware of. Football clubs face several challenges with their websites and mobile applications, all posing significant risks to DCX: Coping with traffic peaks Managing inventory and complex loyalty programmes Servicing an increasingly international audience Delivering online kit customisation options Bringing eCommerce in-house Visibility and accountability of third-parties such as autoscaling and payment providers Managing Traffic Peaks planned and unexpected Compared with many industries, we see Football Club peaks are much higher compared to baseline traffic, often resulting in scalability issues – even with autoscaling solutions in place! Managing traffic peaks is challenging, whether anticipated for kit launches, hype drops and streaming of pre-season games or unexpected due to tournament finals, major championship wins, or new signings. For peace of mind that critical routes fans take across your site will manage high volumes of traffic and concurrent user transactions, when it matters most, you need the most accurate Digital CX insights under real-world conditions. Mitigating the risk following site redesign or new features Site redesigns and new features, from kit customisation to new payment functionality, pose a risk to Digital CX and your bottom line. Full Visibility of any Digital CX issues that may be introduced following site changes is essential. Simulating real users interacting with your site at capacity and around the clock, helps uncover user friction swiftly, allowing you to fix issues before they impact your fans and your conversions. The Future of Football eCommerce Optimising Digital CX across new international markets Expansion into international markets has opened up new revenue streams for Football Clubs. However, global retail success requires a seamless international customer experience equivalent to that at home. 24/7 Visibility of all customer-impacting friction is crucial, regardless of country, region or language – including issues arising from multi-currency pricing, CDNs to caching and global transactions. Bringing Football eCommerce in-house The growth of football commerce presents an opportunity for clubs to channel their brands into global eCommerce platforms. Traditionally Football eCommerce operations have been outsourced, but this comes at a financial cost and at the risk of impacting loyalty, by relying on third parties to manage fans’ experience. Whether bringing your eCommerce operation in-house, entering new global markets or adding new functionality such as advanced kit customisation how can you mitigate the risks to Digital CX, your sales and ultimately your brand? Real-world DCX Intelligence mitigates risks to DCX, profit and brand Realistic Load Testing Services are critical for the most accurate DCX insights and to safeguard your brand, during peak periods, site changes or when bringing eCommerce operations in-house. Ongoing 24/7 DCX Visibility is vital to uncover friction and ensure you maintain seamless DCX, maximising conversions around the clock. At thinkTRIBE, we help Premier League Clubs achieve online retail success by helping them deliver superior Digital Customer Experiences. Enabling them to optimise DCX, reduce abandonment and protect brands. By partnering with thinkTRIBE, Football Clubs can not only meet but exceed fan expectations both at peak and 24/7. Let us help you transform your DCX and provide the world-class, fan-centred experience your supporters deserve. Learn more about thinkTRIBE or download our eBook Preparing for Kit Launch Success .