Beta testing with customer insights communities. The Zalando method for true customer centricity with demonstrable success.

In this video, Dan Balica and Kevin Stine from the Zalando research team impressively show you how the company carries out beta testing on a large scale within the Zalando Voices Community with the aim of developing a new version of Zalando that is effective and directly marketable to bring out.

Beta Testing: Zalando Voices Community

Zalando is known for its unconditional customer focus. The company ensures a smooth customer journey with consistently positive customer experiences and always gives its customers a voice. The Zalando Voices Community now includes 20.000 of the company's customers. Here, the Zalando research team regularly carries out market research studies, both qualitative and quantitative, such as beta tests. By using a community, Zalando was able to reduce the costs of qualitative market research by an impressive 50%. For Zalando's research team, one thing is clear: with a committed community in which the members have a high level of customer loyalty, it is very easy to generate in-depth insights with a high impact, with the data obtained in turn benefiting the company's customers.

Video: Beta testing with communities

In the following video, Dan Balica and Kevin Stine from the Zalando research team show how the company carries out beta testing on a large scale, what response rates they achieve and how the insights gained from beta testing are used. And they talk about what community members think of the extensive beta testing. First of all: the response among community participants has been consistently positive. Loyal customers who strongly identify with a brand want that brand to be perceived positively and strengthened.

Now watch the video about beta testing with the Zalando Voice Community.

Results of beta testing at Zalando

By using the community, Zalando gives customers a voice. The goal is a consistently positive customer experience along the customer journey. It is important to emphasize that particular attention is paid to recruiting participants based on real behavior, mentalities and demographic data. This approach makes it possible to further develop a product, individual product features or the brand in a real but controlled environment. Like the feedback button in the example. The results of the beta testing show that the feedback button was highly accepted and led to high participation rates in surveys. A large number of bugs are reported and general feedback is also returned. Customers also tell us what they want next. This has the positive side effect that internal teams at Zalando are also encouraged and motivated to experiment with the data from Zalando Voices and other data sources and develop new ideas.

What is a beta test?

Beta testing gives real users the opportunity to use a product in a real, but controlled, production environment. In order to uncover bugs, poor usability or other problems before a product is released. Beta testing is the final round of testing before the final release of a product. Beta testers are therefore real users and carry out beta testing in a production environment that is identical to real conditions and is not carried out in an artificial laboratory or stage environment.

The purpose and goal of beta testing

Beta testing is the best way to identify bugs and usability issues before a product is finally released. Many problems can be identified through internal tests. But you can't really simulate how real consumers use a product.

Beta testing is the last opportunity to test a product in an actual production environment, rather than a laboratory setting, before its impending launch. In addition to finding bugs, beta testing provides an opportunity to test hypotheses regarding users' use of new features and ensure that the product meets needs and expectations. Beta testing is not typically used to introduce new features. However, they can provide insight into what immediate actions are needed to fully meet users' needs.

Beta testing also offers the opportunity to examine and analyse user behavior to verify that users are interacting with the product as expected or showing unexpected usage patterns. By collecting this information prior to general launch, content for user training, product onboarding, user manuals and user assistance, and documentation can be customized to ensure a smoother user experience.

Open and closed beta testing

Beta testing can be either open or closed. An open beta test allows anyone to use the product and usually indicates that the product is in beta. A closed beta test is limited to a specific group of people, which can be current customers, users or paid test subjects. Beta tests either run for a certain period of time or until no new errors are reported.

How is a beta test carried out?

There are different ways and approaches in which beta testing can be carried out, but in general there are five different basic stages that are used in practice.

Step 1: Planning

Determine in advance exactly the goals you want to pursue with the beta test. In the previous paragraph we listed some goals that you can pursue with a beta test. Planning exactly how to conduct a beta test will help you plan the number of participants to participate in the beta test and the length of time required to achieve the goals.

Step 2: Recruit participants for the beta test

Ideally, any number of people can participate in a beta test. However, due to budget constraints, the project must set a minimum and maximum limit on the number of participating beta testers. Beta testers are usually recruited from an existing customer base, as Zalando does within its Voices community. Loyal customers are usually very happy to accept an invitation to a beta test because it is an honor for them to participate in the development of their favorite brand or product. But there is also the possibility of finding beta testers through advertisements on the Internet or through agencies.

Step 3: Preparing the beta test

In this phase, the test subjects are explained about the product, what it is used for, what you can do with it and what the benefits are, how to use it and what the individual functions are. If necessary, user manuals are issued that beta testers should read before the actual start of the beta test.

Step 4: Conduct the beta test

The bugs identified and reported by the beta testers are documented and fixed as part of the bug management process. Feedback and suggestions from beta testers are collected and evaluated based on their direct experience with the product.

Step 5: End of beta testing and launch

As soon as the defined goal of the beta test has been achieved and all functionalities can be used properly, no more errors occur and the completion criteria for the beta test have been met, it is decided to end the beta test phase. The product is launched on the market.

1:1 live online presentation:
Carry out a beta test with QuestionPro's Customer Insights Community

We would be happy to show you in a 1:1 live online demo how you can use QuestionPro's community framework to generate qualitative and quantitative insights quickly, easily and cost-effectively and with a high impact and how you can use it for your beta test community -Recruit participants.

Make an individual appointment now.

Try software for market research and experience management now for 10 days free of charge!

Do you have any questions about the content of this blog? Simply contact us via contact form. We look forward to a dialogue with you! You too can test QuestionPro for 10 days free of charge and without risk in depth!

SHARE THIS ARTICLE

KEYWORDS OF THIS BLOG POST

Zalando | Community | Beta test