OTTAWA, April 19th, 2021 –

Spring has sprung! The flowers are blooming, the birds are chirping and, even the cleanliest of eCommerce sites has probably built up some dirt and clutter over the winter. 

No, we’re not talking about those unwanted holiday gifts you’re waiting to regift that are stuffed in that one closet of your house (don’t lie… we all have that one closet) — we’re talking about errors! 

So, get ready to dust every nook and cranny as we take you through our 2021 eCommerce Spring Cleaning Checklist.

Step 1: Start in the basement

Here at Noibu, we recommend the bottom-up approach to spring cleaning, starting with your website’s back-end (its basement) so the hard part’s out of the way first. 

Here, you’ll want to take a look at your site’s code to make sure everything’s running the way it should — that means no duct-tape fixes, folks. We’re looking for any JavaScript errors that might mess with a customer’s checkout or lead to a poor experience on your site.

If your team has a dedicated developer with the time to comb through your code line-by-line, great! If not, we recommend skipping directly to Step 4.

Step 2: Wash the windows and dust the doorframes

Your windows and doors are your home’s connection with the outside world. Just the same, Hypertext Transfer Protocols (HTTP) are your site’s connection with your eCommerce platform.

It’s a classic expression: A speck of dust is harder to see on a window than a box of old bowling trophies in the basement. It isn’t a classic expression? Well, it is now… coined it! Similarly, HTTP errors are harder to spot than JavaScript errors. You might have to get in touch with your server administrator to make sure you’re in the clear.

Or, of course, there’s always Step 4.

Step 3: Mop the floors and wash the walls

Last, you’re going to want to make sure your floors are spotless. If you’re still with us on this (totally normal) metaphor, let’s say the rooms are the pages of your website — the entryway is the homepage; the living room with family photos everywhere is the “About us” page. You get the point.

No, maybe your guest won’t notice the mouldy spot of tomato sauce on the floor you’ve been meaning to clean for months or the unidentified smear on the wall of the kitchen you tried your best to hide with the coffee maker — but they might. And if they do, they might hesitate to come back again in the future.

Take a look at your HTML and CSS to see if you have any broken links, missing page elements or layout issues. Or, you guessed it, skip to Step 4.

Step 4: Scrap this whole list and hire a professional

Look, we’re not gonna lie… We’re pretty partial to Step 4, and not just because we’re the professional we recommend you hire to do your spring cleaning for you.

The reality is, 1) we’re really good at it and 2) you have better things to do with your time than hunt down pesky eCommerce errors (that’s what the Noibots are for).

So, put your feet up, relax and watch as we scrub even the mouldiest errors from your site, potentially saving you thousands in lost revenue.

OTTAWA, April 6th, 2021 –

If you’ve heard of Noibu, you know we help eCommerce teams detect, prioritize and resolve critical, revenue-impacting errors on their websites.

But what you probably don’t know is what exactly is going on behind the curtain… so to speak.

Lucky for you, you found a golden ticket in one of your chocolates over the long weekend! And you know what that means… 

That’s right! You’ve won the most fabulous prize one could wish for: a tour of Noibu’s eCommerce Error Detection Factory — so grab your Grandpa Joe and let’s go!

Our first stop on the tour is the River of Resolved Errors. Every error Noibu detects and resolves on our clients’ websites flows through this river — ten thousand gallons an hour.

Look over there across the river — they’re little robots! But not just any robots… those are Noibots!

Noibots are constantly exploring our clients’ eCommerce websites looking for errors. When they find some, they report back to the factory, telling us which errors are popping up on the different eCommerce platforms used by our clients.

For example, if an Empty Shopping Cart error occurs on multiple sites using Magento, the Noibots will gather as much information about each instance of that error as they can and, once resolved, dump them all into the River of Resolved Errors — which brings us to the next stop on our tour, the QA Canoe.

All aboard! Captained by our Clever, Competent, and Coordinated QA Crew, the QA Canoe is where we gather and sort our resolved errors by the eCommerce platform they were detected on.

Once the QA Crew spots the same error on the same platform enough times, they’ll work to find it on as many eCommerce websites as possible.

Next stop: Outreach Beach! Once the QA Canoe makes port at Outreach Beach, the QA Crew reports the error groups they found to our Business Development team. Finally, our BD Representatives look to get in contact with the eCommerce teams we’ve identified error groups on to inform them about the issue.

So there you have it! If you didn’t fall into the River of Resolved Errors or get seasick on the QA Canoe, you’ve made it to the end of the tour, which means you’ve earned a free eCommerce checkup!

BOOK YOURS NOW

OTTAWA, March 22nd, 2021 –

It’s that time of year again, folks — the time when eCommerce fans around the world come together (virtually) to witness the spectacle of slip ups that is the Error Extravaganza tournament. 

The contest pits error against error in a fierce competition to separate the pretenders from the contenders and ultimately, crown an Error Extravaganza champion.

The analysts at Noibu Sports Network know that — just like the fans of any hypothetical college sports tournament that happens in the month of March — EE fans love to build a bracket, so we wrote this blog post to help you build yours!

But before we dive into our picks for this year’s tournament, let’s check in with our panel of analysts to find out what they’ll be watching for this year.

Philip Kijek — Noibu Sports Network analyst

“The key thing to remember when you’re building your bracket this year is that not all errors impact a user’s checkout experience equally. 

A benign error, like a broken link on an old media release, can be annoying for a user but isn’t likely to stop them from buying that new pair of shoes they really need. A user-impacting error, on the other hand, has the potential to stop a user’s session dead in its tracks.”

Riley Kerr — Error Extravaganza bracket expert

“I’m expecting to see some serious user-impact from the Broken Paypal Extension this year. I wouldn’t be surprised if it blocks a good number of checkouts by the end of the tournament and — bold prediction here — maybe even upsets Rage Clicking the Checkout Button.”

Connor Boland — Noibu Sports Network anchor

“You know, I just don’t see FAQ 12 Won’t Open being able to disrupt many checkouts in this tournament. Who even goes to the FAQ page anyways? As much as I’d love to know if I’m earning double or triple Aeroplan miles, I just don’t see that preventing me from checking out.”

We asked the panel to give us their list of the top five pretenders and contenders in this year’s Error Extravaganza tournament. Here’s what they came up with:

The Pretenders

These are the errors our analysts expect to have the least impact on user experience, meaning they’ll likely result in the fewest abandoned carts.

1. Broken Link on ‘About Us’ Page
2. Photos on ‘Careers’ Page Not Loading
3. Twitter Link Doesn’t Work
4. Instagram Logo Doesn’t Appear
5. Reviews Not Loading

The Contenders

According to our analysts, these are the errors you should be picking on your bracket. They’re the ones most likely to negatively impact the user’s experience.

1. ‘Checkout Now’ Button Not Working
2. PayPal Extension Broken 
3. Shopping Cart Appears Empty
4. Shipping Information Not Accepted
5. Product Can’t Be Added to Cart

Sydney Smith — Fan of errors and winner of the “Be a Noibu Sports Anchor” contest

“Remember when Coupon Code Not Accepted blocked that one user’s checkout last year? That was ELECTRIC! I was all, ‘Get that garbage outta here!’ ”

OTTAWA, March 9th, 2021 –

Have you ever sprained an ankle or broken a wrist? 

If you have, you probably went to the hospital or a doctor’s office right away to get it looked at. You’d be pretty silly not to, right?

Well, any doctor you don’t find in the basement of an abandoned Blockbuster will probably tell you to stay off that ankle for a while. Or they might say, “Maybe next time you should practice your karate chops with styrofoam first and work your way up to bricks.”

Solid advice either way. 

The point is: when you’re hurt, you consult the professionals. And the same should be true for your eCommerce website.

No, thankfully your website can’t get injured but it can have errors — the sprained ankles of the internet…or something.

When a visitor encounters an error on your site, they’re likely to abandon their cart and might think twice about coming back to shop in the future.

With Noibu’s checkout audit, you can find out if your site is producing errors and get an estimate of how much it’s costing you in revenue. We like to think of it as your site’s regular health check-up. 

It’s a simple procedure—we just plug a snippet of code into your site’s header, which allows us to track any errors it produces. 

After about 10 days, we’ll let you know how many times visitors to your site encountered errors and how much those errors cost you in revenue. We’ll also include videos of the errors and their projected impact on your sales for the year.

And remember, Noibu is headquartered in Canada so your website’s checkup is free!

Look, if you walk on that sprained ankle or keep choppin’ those bricks, you’re only going to make things worse. Just like errors, injuries compound the longer they’re left unresolved. 

A broken link here, a bad gateway there? No biggie. But put ‘em together and you’ve got yourself a pretty subpar user experience. 

Here are some (not so) fun facts about eCommerce errors:

• 90% of errors go unreported by customers.
• 5-10% of annual revenue on eCommerce sites is lost to errors.
• 70-80% of errors cannot be solved by developers due to a lack of information.

You’ve worked hard to make sure your website does what it’s designed to do — drive visitors to your checkout page — and with a clean bill of health, it’ll do just that.

Book your free checkout audit and give your site the world-class treatment it deserves.

Doctor Noibu will see you now.

OTTAWA, March 3rd, 2021 –

What better way to explain what we do at Noibu than with a short, 38-second video! Enjoy!

OTTAWA, February 17th, 2021 –

Think about the last time you shopped online. What did you buy?

If you encountered an error, your answer to that question might be, “nothing.” You wouldn’t be alone.

Over half of mobile internet users have encountered a website that froze, crashed or received errors, all of which cause frustration for the user and add time to their session on your site. 

To make matters worse, 40% of visitors will abandon your site if it takes more than three seconds for a page to load.

But not to worry. Noibu detects and resolves errors in real-time before they cause delays and cost you thousands in lost revenue. 

In this post, we’ll talk about some of the errors Noibu detects and how we help you resolve them.

Broadly, eCommerce errors fall into one of two categories: JavaScript or HTTP. JavaScript errors happen when there’s an issue with your site’s code or a third-party app that interacts with your site. HTTP, or server-side errors, occur when there’s an issue with your eCommerce or payment platform.

Still with us? Good. Let’s get into the nitty-gritty.

JavaScript errors

Typos—we all maek ‘em. In an email, a typo is a minor mistake that you likely don’t give a second thought to once you hit “send.” But in your eCommerce site’s code, a typo can be the difference between a sale and an abandoned cart. Left uncorrected, that error can result in dozens of lost sales a day. Luckily, Noibu can pinpoint these first-party JavaScript errors using a stack trace, telling you the exact line and function string of the error so you can fix it.

Noibu also detects third-party JavaScript errors—hiccups that occur between your site and a third-party app that interacts with your site’s code. Some common apps that can cause third-party JavaScript errors are customer support apps, like ZenDesk, payment apps, like PayPal and Square, and marketing apps, like HubSpot. When your site returns one of these errors, we’ll provide a shareable link with all necessary data to send to the third-party app’s support team.

HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) errors

This is where things get a little trickier. Whereas JavaScript errors can usually be fixed by taking a peek at your code, HTTP errors are the result of a problem with your eCommerce platform’s server. When Noibu detects an HTTP error, we capture as much data as possible, including the user’s device, the error code message, the time of the error, and what URL the user clicked last. This information can then be compared to the store’s server logs or the data can be provided to the server administrator to identify the issue. There are lots of reasons why a visitor might come across an HTTP error on your site. Most of the time, these errors are easy to resolve but some might need a deeper look. Let’s take a look at some of the most common HTTP errors.

No matter what errors are impacting your checkout process, Noibu can help you detect and resolve them so your customers can have a flawless experience on your site.