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Significance of Performance Testing in Ecommerce

Bhavani
October 7, 2014 |

Performance of Ecommerce websites is very crucial for the success of the business. Imagine a scenario when a customer is purchasing a product through an Ecommerce portal, then all of sudden the website gets stuck.  The customer may abandon the website and go elsewhere to make the purchase.

Why is web performance important?

  • 57% of online shoppers wait for less than 3 seconds before abandoning the site.
  • A second delay is equivalent to 7% loss in conversions.
  • 11% loss in page views.
  • 16% decrease in customer satisfaction.

To improve the web performance, take a look at the following video which explains the intricacies involved in creating a high performance website.

Once the parameters to create a high performing website are in place, a thorough testing is conducted to identify the bottlenecks and scalability of the application.

Processes followed in performance testing are:

  1. Identifying the critical business scenarios.
  2. Finding out the maximum number of concurrent users in peak usage time.
  3. Setting up the test environment based on the findings of #1 & #2.
  4. Write and parameterize the scripts for the identified scenarios. Parameterization is important to replicate the real user’s actions with the simulated virtual users. We need to parameterize the static values for example cookies etc.
  5. Start executing the scripts with minimum number of users and increase the users step by step & keep the result as a baseline.
  6. Monitor the application’s performance in the application logs, database and identify the problem areas. Prepare the test reports and share with the stakeholders of the project.
  7. After fixes/ optimization of the application and hardware issues if any, perform the load testing again to give conformity of the fixes, compare and analyze the test results with the baseline values. 

Recommended Read: Ecommerce Automation Testing

Pictorial representation of Performance Testing Process at DCKAP:

Ecommerce Performance Testing

Let us look at one of our customer stories, where we successfully optimized the performance of the Ecommerce site for PDC, a major American Healthcare solutions provider.

To evaluate the performance of the Ecommerce site, an initial load testing procedure was conducted. This testing process provided valuable insights on the bottlenecks in the current website. Once these issues were resolved, the response time decreased from 7 to 3 seconds, which is a massive improvement with respect to user experience.

The problems that an Ecommerce website face can be from hardware systems, software issues, network connectivity hitches and many more. Hence, evaluating the performance of an Ecommerce website on a regular basis helps companies to keep them on top of the user experience metrics.

DCKAP is an End to End Magento Ecommerce solutions provider specializing in Quality Assurance of websites powered by Magento. You can reach us at info@dckap.com (or) 1-877-872-3252 (US) (or) +44(0) 144 250 6383(UK)

Bhavani

Bhavani is Certified Software Test Manager and Six Sigma Green Belt. Passionate about testing eCommerce sites. Learning and implementing the latest automation tools. Mentoring.

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