Braun Household (crowd) tests e-commerce ahead of release

Braun Household, focus on user experience for new e-commerce site

As part of a strategic project aimed at strengthening the online platforms of the group, De' Longhi - owner of the perpetual licence for the Braun brand in the small household appliances segment - has paid particular attention to the user experience: thanks to crowdtesting by UNGUESS (formerly AppQuality), it has been able to ensure that the software and all the functions work correctly, on PCs and mobile devices, with any browser in use.

This is why the De' Longhi Group turned to UNGUESS, an Italian company specialised in crowdtesting, bug funding and UX optimisation, for the development of its new e-commerce platforms. The work of the testers made it possible to refine, before the "public opening", the development of the e-commerce of Braun Household, the historic brand of small kitchen appliances for which the Italian multinational acquired the perpetual licence in the small household appliances segment from P&G in 2012, and will continue on the other platforms during the release phase.

In fact, thanks to a community of profiled testers, a network of UX researchers and a proven methodology, UNGUESS is able to analyse an e-commerce portal (but also apps and showcase websites, even if still under construction), reporting bugs and usability frictions that cause malfunctions and could negatively affect the user experience.

We discussed the topic with Filippo Fusaro, e-commerce project manager at De' Longhi.  

How important is e-commerce for the De' Longhi Group today?

We are in the middle of a digital reorganisation of the company, strongly desired by the top management. A very large project, within which the first new e-commerce platform to see on the scene is the Braun Household one. In fact, in this period the De' Longhi Group is focusing its energies on reorganising the entire machine that manages e-commerce.

What role did crowdtesting play?

UNGUESS was involved in the UAT phase for us, i.e. the User Acceptance Test, the phase where we go to validate the Braun Household eCommerce platform to assess that there are no major bugs. In particular, we tested the functionality and compatibility of the interface on different systems and browsers, to ensure that the software and all the requirements worked as they were supposed to.

We divided this phase into two parts: one internal, with a team that is still carrying out tests on various company functions, and one external, with UNGUESS, which came into play when we decided to test the cross-browser section and the functionality on smartphones, tablets and PCs. UNGUESS was chosen because of its extreme flexibility and ability to organise groups of testers at very short notice. In addition, it guarantees extremely precise and high-quality reporting, which is certainly useful in the final phase of the platform's development

More specifically, how did UNGUESS intervene in this development process?

UNGUESS is supporting us in the creation of the new e-commerce platforms, which has been going on for over 18 months now, in what we could call its "final phase". In fact, the software and the platform are almost finished and we needed an "outside eye" that would allow us to identify any problems.

We provided a "testing manual" to allow their testers to understand what and where we wanted to test. Once UNGUESS has identified the right team for our requirements, they run multi-device and multi-browser tests for a few days at a time to identify bugs, glitches and compatibility issues with an operating ecosystem rather than a browser. In addition, their team evaluates the website through the eyes of the client, with a view outside of those who are developing and have designed the platform

How have the test results influenced the platform development process?

As I was saying, in this first phase UNGUESS was used to test the Braun Household website in its international version, i.e. in English. The working group, made up of a few dozen of testers, identified 133 potential problems, some of which were already known, while others had not been identified by our internal group. For example, problems of missing content or translation errors were identified, which had escaped during the loading and review phase and which would have had a negative impact in terms of user experience.How would you rate your experience with UNGUESS?

How do you rate the experience you had with UNGUESS?

From a personal and professional point of view, it was definitely a positive experience. They manage to do the work that would have involved a lot of internal resources in a very short time, while ensuring high quality standards. In addition, they offer a transversality and versatility that are useful for carrying out cross-browser and cross-platform tests that we could not carry out internally otherwise.

The same tests will then be carried out on the other e-commerce platforms of the Group, which are in the conversion phase. At a later stage, we will most likely carry out tests with them to evaluate the user experience of the portal, in order to receive information that can improve the customer journey and, consequently, the conversion rate.