Learn tips, techiques and trends for launching great digital experiences that delight your users in our free guide.

Learn how to ensure your digital properties work everywhere, every time and for everyone in our top rated guide.

You only get once chance to make a first impression and a good impression of your product is key to keeping customers engaged and happy. Gain access to six steps that will help your organization launch an intuitive app with the support of crowdsourced usability testing in our free eBook.

There’s no denying the effect digital has on the retail industry. $.56 of every $1 spent in physical stores is influenced by digital. What’s more, three of the world’s top five retailers are internetfirst: Amazon, Alibaba, and JD.com. According to PricewaterhouseCoopers’ Total Retail 2017 report, 56% of global shoppers use Amazon. Of these, 28% say they shop less often at retail stores because of Amazon. 18% say they shop less on other retailers’ e-commerce sites because of Amazon. And 10% say they shop exclusively on Amazon. Retailers need to find a way to compete in this changing retail landscape. These five global trends can provide some guidance on where retail is headed and how brands can thrive in this new era of retail.

obile Payments have emerged as a catalyst for transactions across all markets. In underdeveloped markets, mobile payment technology is enabling businesses to sell products and services to consumers that had previously been out of reach. In developed markets, it has made the process of purchasing products and services even simpler. PayPal, one of the most popular digital payment solutions on the market, facilitated $66 billion in payment volume throughout 2015, and now has 188 million active registered user accounts across the US. Furthermore, Statista projects that mobile payments will account for more than $210 billion in transactions by 2019. Mobile payment technology is a step forward in the process of connecting businesses to the people they are serving. However, some merchants will find themselves miles behind their competitors by the time the transition to mobile payments is complete. The reason? A failure to implement the correct mobile payment strategy. An ever-increasing numbe

APPLAUSE CASE STUDY ACCELLION THE INCREASING IMPORTANCE AND COMPLEXITY OF DIGITAL EXPERIENCES Maintaining a strong digital presence is critical as digital experiences are now the front door for your brand. Websites, mobile apps, and connected devices are all different ways for you to connect with your customers on a deeper level, and foster a stronger relationship of trust and loyalty. While you now have a wide-open avenue to reach customers more effectively, you also need to account for a whole new level of complexity, especially in the mobile space. Millions of people can download the same mobile app and have entirely unique experiences. This is a result of how fragmented the digital world has become. ScientiaMobile counted 45,000 different device profiles on the market today, and estimates that this rate of fragmentation will only increase heading into the future. On top of this variability is the wide range on contexts in which your customers can be relying on your mobile app to wo

study by UPS and comScore found that 53% of shoppers who don’t use retailers’ mobile apps state it’s because they like using the website better. These shoppers see no benefit from installing these apps, as they provide an inferior experience with no added benefits. Looking at the Apple and Google Play App Stores, a large amount of retailers have apps with very few reviews, and some don’t even have a mobile app. Another problem is the performance of retail apps. 61% consumers expect an app to load in under 4 seconds according to research by Dynatrace. In its study, only one retailer made it under that threshold. And that is just purely opening the app. What is the experience once consumers get past that point?

At the center of every shopping experience is the payment process. The way that brands connect their products and services to their customers, and in turn receive their payments, is the foundation upon which shopping is built. Digital payments, both online and in-store, are transforming that foundation. 80% of Americans are now shopping through online channels on at least a monthly basis, and digital payments have become a primary stream of revenue for brands across all channels1. While offering digital payment options has the potential to simplify life for customers and increase conversion rates, they are creating an additional layer of complexity that is challenging to keep up with. Between the expanding number of digital payment technologies, the increasing number of devices payments can be completed on, and the continuous blurring of digital and physical buying experiences, it is critical to ensure payments will be successful for every person on every device and in every location.

Startups with digital products are not commonly known to pursue small dreams. Once the basic idea of the product is designed and the industry niche has been identified, leadership is already thinking hard about where and to how many markets the product should be rolled out. The mission is critical: the product must clearly create added value for the user in the local market while reflecting the needs of their local community. The challenge is making those changes in each market without losing sight of the basic idea of the product. The success story of German ecommerce startup Yalwa - The Local Internet Company details three best practices on how young startups can realize the dream of a localized, and thus globally-positioned, digital product.

In the midst of an overwhelming amount of disruption taking place in the retail banking industry, a clear path to success has emerged. Banks that want to continue to gain and retain loyal customers must make it easier to bank with them. According to a survey that included 760 different banks and credit unions, the most important priority for 2017 and beyond is the removal of friction from the customer journey.1 To clarify, today’s customer journey includes both the customer experience at local branch locations as well as their experience while interacting with websites, mobile apps, smart watches, and anything else that is connected to the Internet. The battleground for customers has shifted to the digital world, and retail banks must adapt quickly as crafty Fintech startups and tech giants like Amazon, Apple, and Google continue to push the limits of what is possible with technology. If digital channels aren’t approached correctly, they can add complexity to the customer experience in

The goal of usability testing, simply put, is to make sure that a user can complete the tasks they are expected to complete. Usability testing doesn’t test whether or not the functions of the application, website or connected device work correctly, but rather that a user intuitively understands how to perform these tasks — and how easy or difficult it was to do so. With usability testing, “close enough” won’t cut it. A product may have a superior architecture, a great set of features, good performance, scalability and a number of other positive attributes. However, all of this effort is wasted if the user experience is inadequate. An application, website or connected device that is not user-friendly is just as bad as a buggy version and can lead to diminished revenue, product abandonment or a total failure. An application with poor usability can also negatively affect a brand

Consumers expect a seamless, high-quality experience in today’s mature app economy. They want brands to keep up with new technologies like geo-fencing and personalization, as well as the latest ecosystems like voice assistants and connected cars. With this high bar for quality, QA organizations often struggle to keep up with: 1. Rapid Release Schedules 2. Personalization 3. New Technologies (Voice, AI) 4. Geo-Awareness and Localization 5. Device Fragmentation 6. Unexpected Customer Use Cases The cost of failure is high in QA. Time, money, and customer loyalty are all at risk when digital experiences don’t meet users’ high expectations.