These days, few people want to spend hours in a brick & mortar store with a shopping list, especially when it’s easy, quick, and convenient to shop online. Online shopping has many advantages, such as convenience, time-saving, easy access to products, and many options. The internet is a great place to research and compare products before purchasing something online and read product reviews from other consumers before deciding on a purchase.
Through online shopping, consumers can save time and can conveniently place an order with a click of a button. There are no crowds to deal with, and no waiting lines at checkout. However, not everyone is aware of the technological complexity that makes it possible for consumers to comfortably shop from their homes while browsing through a website.
At the core of this technological marvel is the ecommerce platform. This platform, and the website it supports, are designed to facilitate business-to-consumer (B2C) commerce. Within an ecommerce platform, there are various aspects, integrations, and functionalities that connect the information to the consumer. To ensure this information is best represented from the business to the customer, quality assurance (QA) comes into play.
Ecommerce Quality Assurance Engineers, like myself, are responsible for identifying and eliminating any defects in a product and calling out any missing pieces. Below, I will outline how QA works in the ecommerce space and why it matters when operating an online business or storefront.
The Technical Aspects of Quality Assurance
In general, consumers are looking for a website with a fast load time, a great user experience, secure payment methods, and ease of use. If consumers arrive at a retail website and the first thing they see are broken images, missing products, or non-functional navigation, they will just leave, which will result in a potential loss of sale.
This is where QA testing comes into play. Ecommerce testing needs to encompass every component of the platform’s functionality, and all of its integrations. Testing helps prevent errors, adds value to the product, and helps guarantee that the web services and applications run flawlessly on a variety of smartphones and computers. In addition, we want to be sure there are no language barriers and certify that the experience is the same across multiple browsers.
Quality Assurance Testing for Retail Sites
Retail websites are highly dynamic in nature and continuously deliver new products, offers, sales, bestsellers, coupons, and more. QA Engineers need to be able to interpret and break down requirements, work effectively with the development team, and ensure that all features are tested thoroughly.
It’s vital to be sure that transactions are completely secure and validated, and that consumers will have a flawless shopping experience without encountering any issues.
So, how does a QA Engineer go about testing all of the above to ensure that the product meets consumer satisfaction? Simply stated, we accomplish this through several stages of quality assurance processes, such as planning, execution, and reporting.
Quality Assurance Process and Testing Strategies
These QA stages are completed through a variety of different types of software testing.
This includes:
- Functional and non-functional testing
- Integration testing
- Exploratory testing
- System testing
- Compatibility testing
- Usability testing
- Security testing
- Acceptance testing
QA Engineers create and maintain test cases and run regression checklists designed to cover all the main pages, including:
- Categories
- Product detail pages
- Product listing pages
- Recommended products
- Filtering options
- Search algorithms and relevant search results
- Shopping cart
- Checkout
- Payments
New Technologies Evolving in Ecomm QA
The global ecommerce industry keeps evolving and taking advantage of new technologies to offer consumers a better online shopping experience. New technologies, such as voice search, Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR), and personalization, are providing cutting-edge shopping experiences.
Testing is constantly evolving to meet these changing business needs, so QA Engineers need to stay in pace with the technological changes and update their skills set.
Protect Your Commerce Site with Quality Assurance Testing from CQL
QA testing plays a vital role in the ecommerce ecosystem. Testing saves money and provides a stable and competitive product. The main purpose of a QA team is to create continuous processes created to help prevent the recurrence of defects, and, as a consequence, improve the quality of future features and products. A functional, attractive, and error-free website is necessary to acquire loyal consumers who will bring you repeat business in the future.
Want to know more about QA testing, or have questions from the experts in quality assurance at CQL? Contact us today and we’ll be ready to answer all of your ecommerce and business needs.
