Running a successful pilot with Appetize: an easy-start guide
Appetize is the best way to run and test mobile apps in any browser. It’s fast, easy, and flexible.
TL;DR? Download an infographic summary of this post here.
But it’s one thing to use Appetize on a personal project or on a small team, and quite another to get organizational buy-in. We know how it is: when projects get bigger, things move slower.
This guide is our answer to that problem. It’s a collection of our years of experience helping enterprises set up pilot projects with Appetize. And we’re sharing it with you – selfishly, if we’re being honest. Because we know that the faster you get Appetize working, the easier it is to expand it beyond just one team – and to make it an integral part of how you build, test and troubleshoot your mobile apps.
So, we’re wasting no more time — here’s how you can successfully stand up an Appetize pilot project in just 4-8 weeks.
Plan
Understand the problem
Ask: What isn’t working with your current approach? If things were working, what would that look like? Once you have a firm grasp of the problem and your use case(s), identify clear metrics that you can use to validate whether or not your pilot is successful.
For call centers working on mobile app support, this could mean tracking customer satisfaction scores, first call resolution, operational costs, and the number of resolved support tickets.
For live previews, the emphasis might be on conversion rates and other user engagement metrics.
To validate your metrics and get useful data on your pilot, choose a representative sample of users. For a call center, you might select a diverse group of call center agents. For a live preview application, identify end-users who regularly interact with the app. Those closest to the use case are well equipped to provide useful and actionable feedback as you progress.
Pick your people
Nothing happens (and nothing will happen) if you don’t get buy-in from the right people. Get all important parties on board to help make your project a success. Here are three key stakeholder groups to include:
Business side (e.g. call center manager) – This person cares a lot about the return on investment. Make sure you’re clear about the business benefits, and if you’re not sure where to start, check out this infographic on how Appetize delivers clear ROI for customer support teams.
Development side (e.g. mobile engineers) – This group cares about easy, fast previews and better ways of showcasing an app to other stakeholders. They want to be able to run end-to-end testing on multiple devices and platforms. If they’re helping with this solution primarily for others (e.g. end users), then the development side wants something that won’t add significant work to their pipeline. They also need to know how much they can automate vs. what needs to be worked on and maintained over time.
End-user side (e.g. clients who would actually be interacting with Appetize on a daily basis) – For end users, it’s often important that the solution is simple, easy to use, fast and responsive.
Build
Build out an experience that works best for your project and goals. Make sure it is comprehensible and accessible for all of your stakeholders.
Appetize.io has many resources available to you to kickstart your building process. Make use of our samples repository to get started. The repository covers a variety of common use cases so you don’t have to start from scratch. Don’t feel like going it alone? Give the Appetize team a call.
Our solution engineers are here to help. We’ll work with you to smooth out your build, from understanding your key issues, to helping build out a custom demo that we fine-tune along the way.
To ensure a streamlined pilot experience, consider any possible changes that need to be made to your app. For example:
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Does your app have Multi-Factor Authentication (MFA)? Can it be turned off or bypassed?
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Would it be better to work within a staging environment? Can you use real data, or could a mock dataset be better from a usability and security perspective?
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Figure out if there are quick actions that end-users need to be able to trigger (e.g. quickly-linking to particular sections in-app via deep-links)
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Do you have specific security requirements? Does your app need to be proxied via your internal network?
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Do you want to automate any user interactions in the application? If so, we recommend adding accessibility identifiers wherever possible to aid you when automating interactions with Appetize. See our touch interactions best practices for more information.
Fail to prepare, prepare to fail. Spend time identifying any potential risks to the pilot within the experience. For example, failure to remove MFA might result in a slower user experience. If possible, determine alternatives or ways to mitigate these risks.
Ensure all security requirements are identified and addressed early in the process. This includes assessing the need for proxying, authentication methods, and data protection measures.
Test and validate
Determine how you want to share your pilot
To validate the pilot with minimal friction, focus on simplifying the onboarding process. For pilots, a non-authenticated experience is ideal to avoid the need for specific user invites – all you have to do is share the launch page link. If authentication is necessary, compile a list of email addresses for all users to be invited to Appetize. For more information on how to invite members to Appetize, see our Invite your team documentation.
If you are making use of a launch page, determine if Appetize should host it or you want to host it internally.
Is having the latest build part of the experience? Set up a continuous integration/continuous delivery pipeline with one of Appetize’s integrations or using our REST API.
If you are doing end-to-end testing, set up a workflow to test nightly and on pull requests. This will help catch any issues and bugs early – before they become bigger problems.
Organize how you gather feedback – and stay consistent
Collect responses in a questionnaire, which will ensure that feedback is consistent and contextualized. Guide your end-users with questions that encourage clear, detailed responses. Don’t wait until the end to ask – make time for check-ins throughout the process and as you’re making adjustments. Collect and validate metrics throughout. Stick to judging the success of your pilot based on the KPIs you identified at the start.
Make sure to iterate quickly on end-user feedback, as well incorporated feedback can change the outcome of the pilot. Remember to schedule weekly check-ins with Appetize to help you make adjustments as needed.
Next steps
Once your pilot is complete, chat with us here at Appetize to figure out your next steps. Coordinate with Appetize to determine how many active devices and minutes would be needed post-pilot. We’ll also help you address any additional accessibility and security requirements, SSO needs, and we’ll help you implement any outlying changes based on end-user feedback.
By understanding your problem, involving the right people, building a tailored experience, and systematically testing and validating your setup, you can achieve significant improvements and get organizational buy-in for launching Appetize in your organization.
Let Appetize help turn your pilot into long-term success. Book some time with us to get started.
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