Article

11min read

Enrich Tech Teams’ Software Delivery Processes With Feature Flags

Let’s face it, continuous delivery can put a lot of pressure on technical teams. 

Release cycles are short, workloads are heavy, yet the results must perform optimally. 

A small but powerful technique can help tech teams avoid delivery bottlenecks and safely release new features and that’s through feature flags.

Let’s talk more about feature flagging and how a feature management solution for tech teams can help streamline release processes. 

What are feature flags, and why use them?

Feature flags are part of feature management and enable tech teams to manage a feature throughout its entire lifecycle. 

You can use feature flags to separate feature release from code deployment and to turn features on and off at any time. This gives you full control over the release process allowing you to ship features to subsets of users and avoid the risky big bang release. 

Therefore, there are many benefits to using feature flags, among them include the following three key benefits:

  • They are emergency switches. Have you ever seen the red buttons on big machinery labeled “Emergency Stop”? Feature flags are like these buttons for your software. Let’s say a new feature causes damage to your server. The solution: Deactivate the function using its feature flag without having to deploy any code.
  • They help reduce risks. Do you have a new idea for a feature but don’t know whether your users will like it? Use a feature flag to enable the feature only for a defined set of users. But there’s more you can do as feature flags can be used alongside a number of deployment strategies, such as canary deployments, beta programs, and A/B testing. They all help ensure a feature’s quality and performance before releasing it to your user base.
  • They support continuous delivery. Suppose your next release is imminent. Yet, one of the features is still under development. Sure, you could use complex feature branching and make sure they don’t go into production. But it would be a lot easier to only have the main branch, wrap the unfinished feature in a feature flag, disable it and still deliver your new release.

The role of feature flags in the bigger picture of product development

Some tech teams aren’t sure if the time invested in creating and maintaining feature flags is worth it. 

Yet, feature flags reveal their true potential only when you combine them with other techniques. Thanks to progressive rollouts and server-side experimentation, you can ensure that your product meets users’ needs in the right way. 

In the end, they allow tech teams to do their jobs more efficiently. Developers don’t need to worry about unpleasant surprises and the final ramifications of a release. 

Other teams besides development teams can also reap their benefits as feature flags can be used across a number of use cases to suit each teams’ needs.

This is especially the case when you have an advanced feature management solution which gives all teams more control and flexibility over the release process. 

Why is the need for dedicated feature management solutions rising?

More and more people around the world rely on software for their personal and professional lives. 

The increasing demand also means that more software companies jump into existence, and the market is becoming denser. 

You aim to continuously deliver products, updates, and new features to stay relevant and keep up with your niche competition. However, tech teams need reliable workflows and tools to get the desired results in this fast-paced environment.

While many companies did not have organized release processes in place a few years ago, the situation has changed since then. Today, many use continuous development and delivery to respond to rapidly changing consumer demands.

By integrating feature management techniques, you can further optimize these processes. But how can you use feature flags for your purposes? And how can you combine them with experimentation and progressive rollouts?

Yes, you guessed it: invest in a dedicated feature management solution. You have three options depending on your needs and resources: 

1) Build a tool yourself from scratch

2) Create a platform based on adequate open-source projects

3) Use an existing third-party solution

In theory, you could build the platform yourself. But do you want to burden your tech teams with this complicated task? 

You also need to consider whether you have the right expertise and resources available, and you will have to worry about ongoing maintenance. There’s a lot you have to think about, including the points highlighted below when it comes to the build vs buy debate

The next section will look into how opting for an advanced third-party solution can help streamline your teams’ delivery and release processes.

Tackle the challenges of continuous delivery with a feature management platform

The challenges that tech teams have to face on a daily basis are manifold. But what difficulties do these teams meet in their day-to-day work with feature management? And how can a dedicated solution like AB Tasty help them? Let’s find out!

AB Tasty’s flagging functionality eliminates the risks of future releases by separating code deployments from feature releases so you can safely deploy new features anytime to anyone you choose. The platform is packed full of features and was especially built to cater to the needs of both development and product teams. 

Product teams 

Product managers often have great ideas but often, such ideas come with great risk. Feature flags are a great way for product managers and their teams to test out these ideas safely while collecting valuable feedback from real-world users.

In particular, feature flags provide value for product managers in two key ways:

Feature flags & progressive rollouts

You may be familiar with the following situation: Before you release a new feature, you want to test it with QA and a small group of users

Since the tests produce good results, you push the new component into production. Unfortunately, the feature and your server configuration don’t play well together. Your server crashes. As a result, you may break SLA agreements with customers, lose money, and damage your reputation.

This is where feature flags can come to the rescue. 

Once you notice the damage, you can disable the malfunctioning feature in seconds – without deploying any code – to avoid any major negative impact. 

However, keep in mind that progressive rollouts can actually prevent this situation from happening in the first place. 

With progressive rollouts, as the name implies, you can progressively release a feature to a specific audience directly from the AB Tasty dashboard by choosing each deployment step and the proportion of traffic allocated to your users.

This way, teams can identify any problems earlier when the feature is still being served to a limited number of users. Then they have the chance to react to this malfunction and avoid application downtime.

Feature flags & experimentation

Let’s imagine another situation. Your customers and stakeholders have a lot of feature requests and feedback on your product. 

But even after you’ve categorized these inputs and boiled them down to a minimum, there are still plenty of different ways to turn them into reality. You’re also not quite sure which solutions will bring the best results. But, you are under pressure to act and have to deliver.

Experimentation helps you master this challenge. 

With experimentation, product teams can compare different variations of features with users to reveal which one has the best positive impact. Afterwards, the better performing variation can be rolled out to the rest of your users.

Thus, experiments are a great way to help product teams to learn and prioritize resources allowing them to focus on what to optimize for the best outcomes.

Feature flags give you more control over the release process by running experiments on developed or modified features with a small subset of live users in order to see whether they’re performing as intended before going for a big bang release.

AB Tasty, in particular, offers server-side experimentation allowing you to run more sophisticated tests and advanced experiment capabilities. You can then conduct safe experiments for your features by setting up user-targeting and KPIs to track putting you on the road to quicker and safer releases.

 

CTOs & IT teams

CTOs want high-performing development teams to continuously deliver high-quality software. They likely have several teams under their wings that they expect to act independently and ensure release quality. 

Modern software contains many feature flags that must be maintained over a long time. But how can CTOs keep track of things? A tool to collaborate with tech teams on release management would help CTOs save time and diminish costly misunderstandings.

Yet, the successful implementation and integration of such a complex tool into the IT landscape can represent a significant hurdle. 

IT teams must have enough resources and expertise. In the long term, they have to spend a lot of time monitoring and maintaining the platform. Apart from that, IT teams already have their hands full with tasks for their company’s digital transformation. 

A dedicated feature management tool brings all teams together on a common platform. 

In this way, you can optimize the release times and minimize risks thanks to more efficient and effective collaboration and feature management. 

Since AB Tasty is a managed SaaS, IT professionals don’t need to spend resources on maintenance. We take care of things for you and develop our server-side solution further so that you can always work with a secure and state-of-the-art solution.

Data teams

For data-driven product development, teams need to access relevant analytics data to check a feature’s performance. 

For example, they need to analyze and assess user behavior in detail after a new feature has been integrated into a product. When testing new features, they need to activate and deactivate them and control what to test when and with whom. 

Unfortunately, it is often impossible to simulate an identical copy of the production environment. This leads to inaccurate results, and lets teams make imprecise data-driven decisions.

With AB Tasty, data teams can comfortably analyze feature performance in a visual dashboard, set goals, and track them with real-time reports. 

This way, they can ensure that the results align with business goals and find new ways to improve the product. 

Finally, feature flags and progressive rollouts eliminate the need for staging servers and prevent inaccurate data. As a result, data teams can fruitfully improve the software by making appropriate data-driven decisions.

Development teams

Software developers should focus on building functionality, not fixing bugs from previous versions, and doing rollbacks.

Working with feature flags can also be very time-consuming, as software engineers shouldn’t lose track of the flags’ status. Moreover, the risk of unnecessary errors creeping into the software increases when working with large teams. As a result, developers may be discouraged from using feature flags due to the time pressure and perhaps no longer use them at all. 

Additionally, bottlenecks in development can affect release times. Poorly structured release processes can also hinder development by preventing engineers from developing new features. 

Finally, if there’s no suitable solution, these issues can affect the duration and regularity of release cycles.

Hence, development teams need a framework that allows them to enforce feature flag best practices, stay in control, and collaborate effectively with team members. 

We understand that feature development and feature releases are two sides of the same coin. As a result, AB Tasty aims to bring teams closer together by collaborating on common matters in a shared tool. 

To do this, they have access to all essential feature management tools by default. So there’s no need to invest manpower in building a solution themselves. We also make things easier for them by providing a visual dashboard for creating and managing feature flags with simple clicks – no code deployments required.

And since we have developed our server-side tool for developers, we offer them everything they need to work with the tool including:

  • Easy-to-use SDKs 
  • Comprehensive documentation 
  • API references 
  • Other useful developer resources like this blog

QA & release teams

Without proper workflows, tech teams struggle to conduct controlled releases and experiments. DevOps spend a lot of time managing staging servers and keeping their configurations similar to production. Nevertheless, there’s a higher risk that tests run on staging servers will yield inaccurate results that lead to incorrect conclusions.

Yet, QA specialists and DevOps teams rely on A/B tests, canary releases, and beta programs to ensure that they deploy high-quality features securely. Often they don’t know about the current status or the use of a feature flag in the code either. Especially if they don’t have access to an overview of existing feature flags. As a result, it gets trickier to keep track of ongoing tests and deployments, and who can see which features at what times.

We designed our feature flagging platform to meet today’s demands for fast and continuous delivery. Our solution enables tech teams to collaborate in one place, monitor issues, and control each deployment in a visual dashboard. Release teams can thus keep full control over deployments and take full advantage of progressive rollouts.

Additionally, DevOps teams can focus on more important things than managing staging servers. That’s because AB Tasty eliminates the need to use these environments in the first place. Using feature flags in production, QA can always see how a feature works in its real-world environment and get accurate test results to work with.

The power of feature flags is at your fingertips

Feature flags are an integral part of modern product development, including experimentation and progressive rollouts. This simple technique is vital if you want to provide stable, high-quality functionality to your users.

Using a feature management solution, your tech teams can use a single tool to streamline workflows and communication. Regardless of a team’s tasks or focus, our feature management service has everything it takes to deliver the right features in the right way.

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Article

13min read

10 Examples of Successful E-commerce Product Pages

The conversion rate on e-commerce homepages is around 2-2.5% on average, according to a study from Adobe Business, while the conversion rate for visitors who land directly on a product page is around 7%.

Can you see the difference between these two types of pages?

Product pages are one of the most essential pages to continually optimize if you want to focus on boosting your e-commerce conversions.

In this article, we will be touching on what a successful e-commerce page looks like, five elements to focus on while optimizing your pages, and ten examples of effective product pages in action.

Let’s dive in.

What does a successful e-commerce product page look like?

Across all industries, the average user spends less than 54 seconds on any given page, according to a digital report from Contentsquare.

You have less than one minute to create a memorable experience and clearly display your information. For product pages, it’s clear to see why they need to be captivating.

The truth is that every second matters in the conversion journey.

So in order to capture your visitors’ attention, you’ll have to capitalize on five elements. Perfecting these elements will require testing and patience.

Want to get started on A/B testing for your product pages? AB Tasty is a great example of an A/B testing tool that allows you to quickly set up tests with low code implementation of front-end or UX changes on your web pages, gather insights via an ROI dashboard, and determine which route will increase your revenue.

The 5 mandatory elements of an effective e-commerce product page.

1. Eye-catching, engaging visuals

It’s no secret that our brains love visuals since they process images much easier and faster than text. Images give us more context.

In fact, visuals are so deeply entrenched in our decision-making mechanisms that they should be a priority for any e-commerce website.

In order to provide your visitors with some eye-catching visuals for your products, here are a few tips:

  • Humanize the product

People love to envision themselves wearing or using a product. It gives them an idea of whether or not the product is a good fit for them. Thus, it’s important to remember to humanize the product to allow visitors to see themselves as potential customers.

Ecommerce Product Page

  • Use whitespace

Whitespace has many uses in graphic design, but most importantly, it helps the eye focus on what matters the most.

Adding whitespace strategically around your picture will help reduce noise and increase clarity when it comes to showcasing a complex product.

Less can be more.

Ecommerce Product Page Design Whitespace

  • Only use HD

It goes without saying that high-definition visuals are incredibly important.

Your potential customers should be able to fall in love with your product on any screen resolution. Give them your best!

  • Allow for zoom-in and zoom-out features

Many people are interested in details, especially when it comes to complex or expensive products.

Whether they’re looking for a closer glance at that little button on the side of the jacket, the texture, or the matte finish – allow your potential customers to zoom in and out on your products.

  • Add videos

More engaging than photos, videos also help you tell your customers a story.

Videos can help depict why your product is superior and what they get for $200. With that being said, video-making can be costly and time-consuming, so focus your efforts on your best-sellers.

An astounding average of 56% of web traffic worldwide comes from mobile devices.

Mobile optimization has shifted from just an idea to a top priority. It’s essential to make sure that your product images and descriptions are responsive on all mobile devices.

2. A unique, awesome product description

A study led by Shotfarm showed that “detailed descriptions” ranked first in the top 3 factors that influence a customer’s decision to buy, higher than “reviews” (in the 2nd position) and “price” (in the 3rd position).

Simply put, your product descriptions should focus on their unique value proposition, i.e. their main benefit.

As you already know, an average visitor doesn’t spend too long on one page, so it’s important to be impactful.

As Neil Patel puts it, you have to sell benefits, not just features. This means that you have to emphasize the result, not the product.

Clearly, buyers are expecting to gain something from your product, and it’s your task to convince them that they will.

Let’s look at an example from Innocent:

In their product descriptions, Innocent emphasizes the few elements that make their smoothies “great” and “healthy.”

Ecommerce Product DescriptionIn the image above, you can see that they even highlighted in green that their smoothie is, “a source of vitamins C, B2, B3 and B6 which can help reduce tiredness and fatigue…”

3. Viral social proof

Social proof comes in many forms: reviews, customer testimonials, videos, ratings, etc.

It doesn’t matter what type of social proof you use, as long as it’s relevant to your audience.

Reviews and classic star ratings typically work well for most e-commerce websites as long as they are real and genuine, as most internet buyers are able to spot fake reviews.

4. Addictive product suggestions

Product suggestions are a great way to increase the average order value, cross-sell, upsell, and allow users to explore your products.

Therefore, it’s extremely important to display additional products on your product pages in case your visitors want to see something else.

Otherwise, you may land unqualified visitors on your product pages without giving them the opportunity to discover other products that would fit their needs.

In the image below, you can see that Pandora does a great job of suggesting related products for its customers. The outline is clear and evocative.

Related products on ecommerce product page

Jewelry maker Pandora does a great job at suggesting related products for its customers. The outline is clear and evocative.

5. Resourceful guidance & help

Can you guess the number one source of frustration for online buyers?

Not being able to touch or interact with the product.

To help overcome this lack of physical touch in an online buyer journey, your website should display clear information about:

  • Size guides
  • Specific materials
  • Refund policy
  • Shipping fees
  • Prices and VAT

Knowing this stumbling block for many online shoppers, it’s recommended for e-commerce brands to implement a live chat feature, or at least a very detailed Q&A, to help increase conversion rates and decrease abandon cart rates.

Now that you’ve been through the best practices of e-commerce product pages, it’s time to get inspiration by browsing our selection of effective e-commerce product pages.

Note: we’ll cover examples from various industries so that you, as a leader or marketer, can find inspiration for your field.

Let’s dive into our top picks for inspiring successful e-commerce product pages.

10 of the most successful e-commerce product pages

1. Apple – Technology Industry

When it comes to technology, Apple is a world-class example of best practices for e-commerce product pages.

apple product page

What we love:

  • Clean and refined design
  • The use of whitespace and large pictures
  • Lovely CSS animations
  • Good emphasis on benefits as you scroll down (not pictured above)

2. Transavia – Travel Industry

Transavia is a Dutch low-cost airline that is a subsidiary of the Air France-KLM group.

Their website showcases a lot of best practices to be applied to travel and airline companies.

While they’re many websites on the market, Transavia does a great job of converting visitors into travelers. Their website uses clever paths and UX design to lead you through your buyers’ journey.

E-travel product page

What we love:

  • Engaging “3 parts” structure for clarity’s sake
  • Simple visual brand identity (green and blue)
  • Smart information hierarchy
  • User-friendly simplified search engine
  • TripAdvisor’s reviews integration

3. Bonnegueule – Fashion / Retail

BonneGueule is a French company specializing in men’s fashion.

While the company is still fairly young, it has rapidly grown into a 1M+ visitors/month e-commerce website, thanks to its amazing content marketing strategy and jaw-dropping e-commerce product pages.

Simply put, they use extremely long product pages where they cleverly use storytelling techniques, photos, and videos to justify the hefty price at which they sell their products.

Fashion Ecommerce Product Page Fashion Ecommerce Product Page 2What we love:

  • They display in-store availability
  • The clever size guide
  • The use of “context” photos
  • Amazing storytelling and videos

4. Peak Design – Fashion / Travel Accessories

Peak Design is an American e-commerce company that has successfully raised over $14M since 2011 thanks to its clever bags, pouches and travel kits made famous on Kickstarter.

Notice how clear and detailed their photos are, enhanced by the use of white space and a clear color code on the product page (black/red combo).

Peak Design Online Product PageTravel Accessories Product Page

What we love:

  • A clear and clever layout
  • Generous photo gallery
  • In-depth, 6-minute-long product video
  • The emphasis put on benefits

What could be improved:

  • Large text paragraphs
  • Unclear information hierarchy

5. Luxyhair – Beauty

Luxyhair is an e-commerce website specializing in hair extensions – and it nails it.

The team cleverly uses a 3-step funnel prior to landing on their product page: First, you’ll start by choosing your collection, then your hair thickness, and finally your hair color.

This 3-step mechanism is a brilliant way to increase conversions by offering just the right product for any visitor.

Beauty Ecommerce Product Page

What we love:

  • Seamlessly integrated product pictures
  • Useful information about shipping/return policy
  • Effective use of product video
  • Smooth integration of additional content (tutorials)
  • Complete FAQ
  • Amazon-like customer reviews and Q&A
  • Live-chat

6. Made.com – Home / Furniture

Made.com is a British home furniture e-commerce website renowned for its bold designs and web-to-store experience.

At first glance, you can tell that their visuals flawlessly blend with the product page. They’ve also added context-related pictures so that you can immerse yourself in the product.

Made.com: Furniture Ecommerce Product Page

What we love:

  • Clear shipping/return policy
  • Stunning visuals
  • Size comparison
  • Smart product video
  • Pictures from customers

What could be improved:

  • Adding instructions for product maintenance

7. Birchbox – Beauty / Makeup

This famous, subscription-based French-American website sells monthly beauty boxes delivered to your home with personalized products based on your preferences inside.

Birchbox Online Product Page

What we love:

  • Simple and clean visuals
  • Attractive layout and colors
  • Free gift offered with subscription
  • Complete FAQ
  • Instagram integration: good social proof

8. Asos – Fashion / Apparel

Asos is a UK-based company that also operates in the US and in Europe.

Their pledge to provide affordable designs and fashion helped them reach significant market shares in the fashion industry in several countries.

They opted for a rather simple but neat outline that successfully conveys their brand image.

Online Fashion Product Page

What we love:

  • Distinctive, stary green call-to-action
  • Sober yet effective design
  • Plenty of context photos and a video
  • Product recommendations
  • Information about shipping & returns
  • Size guide

What could be improved:

  • Adding customer reviews on their product pages

9. Salesforce – Software, CRM, Business Solutions

We couldn’t end this article without mentioning at least one notable business solutions provider.

Salesforce is undoubtedly one of the most commonly used, famous CRM and sales management tools.

Their small business solutions product page quickly emphasizes the benefits over the features, such as: “Drive faster sales and simpler service with Salesforce Essentials.”

They also display actual results for their customers so as to convince them, even more, to subscribe: “+26% more deals, +32% happier customers.”

Software & CRM Solution - Product Page

What we love:

  • Catchy, original designs
  • Real emphasis on actual benefits
  • Free trial
  • Video demo
  • Clear, straightforward pricing plans
  • Online chat + phone assistance
  • Genuine customer testimonials

10. Airbnb – Travel / Hotel / Accommodation

Airbnb remains a masterclass of UX design and product page efficiency from which a lot of travel or tourism-related websites can seek inspiration.

First of all, they kept an insanely simple and efficient page layout that makes it really intuitive to browse.

Then, notice how they’ve put the photo gallery at the top of the page? Airbnb knows that photos are the most important aspect of any travel website: visitors need to envision themselves swimming in that paradisiac pool.

Finally, Airbnb successfully mastered the art of utilizing customer reviews: they are deeply integrated into each product page (except when there are no reviews, of course…) so that their role as social proof is maximized: people just love to read reviews.

AirBnB Product Page

What we love:

  • Clear design, good information hierarchy
  • Flashy call-to-action
  • Seamless integration of travelers’ reviews
  • Convenient map at the bottom of the page
  • Similar listings to jump from one house to the other

Conclusion

After reading through this article, you see why e-commerce product pages are such a big deal. What works well in one industry may not have the same success rate in others. Due to this, it’s essential to know your customers and test different UX designs to see what gives you optimal results.

Optimizing these types of pages to suit your customers’ needs better is the best way to increase your conversions.