eCommerce Domain Knowledge for Software Testers
Trade initially was between two entities, buyer and seller, where seller will sell commodities or services required by buyer.
Commodity was basically a raw material cultivated from agriculture or dug out from mining. e.g. seeds, vegetation, grain, livestock, etc. whereas services such as transportation of goods, processing of agricultural cultivations to finished products, self-grooming.
Electronic commerce is buying and selling of goods or services through internet. The products are advertised on e-commerce websites developed by online retailers. These companies have domain expertise in the products and services they offer to buyers.
Various companies like Amazon, Big Bazaar, Flipkart, Snapdeal offer products that are essential to daily needs, from books to mobiles, electronic gadgets to clothing, groceries to kitchen essentials.
Whereas travel portals like MakeMyTrip, ClearTrip, Yatra offers options to help book domestic and international travel by providing options to select airlines and best deals in airfares utilizing API’s provided by various airline websites, arrange bookings in hotels at destination and plan visits and reserve tours during holidays enlightening and memorable trips well in advance from the comforts of their home using desktops and mobile.
Urbanclap, Justdial, Quickr offers various professional services like a free search for products, share sellers for products and services such as personal care, job search, real estate, on-demand handyman services such as electrician, plumbing, carpenter or home revamp services.
Whereas Quickr, OLX, Cashify help meet those who have old and used products who do not need it with those that are in search of such products, that can be purchased at best and affordable resale rates.
eCommerce portals that are categorized as
Business to Business B2B portals that are developed by companies that mass produce products and these products are sold via their online sales portal to businesses that consume their products regularly as their raw materials. B2B sites remove overheads of hiring sales team and regular sales follow-up with consumers for orders, by displaying their regular as well as new products with the pricing or offers directly to consumers.
Business to Consumer B2C portals are targeted for the customers by the manufacturing companies; these companies have their own websites where the target audience is end-users who consume their products. The clients are not regular buyers, they purchase on various occasions such as Thanksgiving day or Boxing Day, companies have to offer various deals to attract customers to purchase their products.
Consumer to Consumer C2C portals such as Quickr, OLX where sellers who wish to dispose off used products that are in good condition such as electronic items, furniture, utility tools can post their offer and buyers who are interested in such items can contact to purchase these items. Various services such as portals like rentals, 99acres, magicbriks allow real estate owners such as apartments, shops, land to either sell or rent their properties online.
eCommerce domain requires understanding the flow of data requests from user registration, cookies saved during first-time users explore the web or mobile portal.
Based on cookies, portal recognizes returning user, search engine keeps in virtual memory the item or services user is finding on the portal, and display on the browser reminding the user to revisit the portal and proceed with purchase of the items from his/her wishlist.
Various advantages eCommerce offers are
- A comprehensive range of options for product with respect to their gender, age, brand, fashion, price range.
- Round-the-clock availability to select and purchase various items of desire and need.
- Payment options from net banking, credit cards, e-wallet, cash on delivery, etc.
- Privacy of personal information and guarantee of secured transactions.
- Refund option in case of return of goods if the user changes his/her mind from purchase.
- Once registered on portal Ease of login, view wish list, the status of the order placed, history of purchases, repeat order from the past purchases, option to save credit card details for quick pay, the intimation of availability of a product in case it is not in stock, in case product is in the wishlist.
- Options to purchase items from the web as well as mobile platforms for the e-commerce web portal.
Domain knowledge for software testers for eCommerce
In order to test software testers should have good understanding of features and functionalities of e-commerce portals. e-commerce portals bring together technologies such as online transaction and processing, electronic data interchange, web services, API testing, supply chain, and inventory management, session and cookies validation, security testing, protocols testing and business and domain understanding, how orders are saved and displayed in a shopping cart, wish list and order status, procurement history, points or offer based on past purchases.
Conclusion
Electronic commerce is buying and selling goods or services through the internet. The products are advertised on e-commerce websites developed by online retailers. Types of eCommerce portals are B2B, B2C, C2C. Some of the features like an exhaustive range of option for product to select from, 24 x7 availability of product to select desired items, options of paying like net banking, credit cards, cash on delivery, a guarantee of secured transactions, refund option in case of return of purchased items, wishlist, order status, quick pay options.
In order to test software, testers should have a good understanding of the features and functionalities of e-commerce portals. To test complex eCommerce portals testers should have good knowledge of online transaction and processing, electronic data interchange, web services, API testing, supply chain, and inventory management, session and cookies validation, security testing, protocols testing, and business and domain understanding.
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