In ecommerce, Managed Hosting is a building block, not a solution
With U.S. ecommerce sales in 2022 exceeding $1 trillion, it is safe to say that ecommerce is continuing to grow at a rapid rate. Competition is fierce, and user experience demands are increasing. To remain relevant online, brands need to adapt quickly. The days of infrastructure, application, security, and analytics technologies working in silos are outdated. One of the main culprits of a legacy and growth-impeding philosophy is the concept of “Managed Hosting”.
Legacy managed hosting involves a managed hosting provider offering ongoing services like server setup and configuration, server maintenance and support, security monitoring and management, backup and disaster recovery services, and network and infrastructure management. In ecommerce, most providers have included elements of expertise around specific applications like Magento Open Source, Adobe Commerce, WooCommerce, Drupal, and others. So the value proposition becomes managed hosting with a sprinkle of industry expertise and application-aware support agents. The problem with only focusing on this finite set of responsibilities is it completely ignores the important data analysis of user engagement and behavior that are needed to optimize the design of the infrastructure in the first place, as well as accommodate changes in user behavior over time.
Intelligent CloudOps enters the chat…
To set a baseline, fundamentally, CloudOps is a set of processes and tools that help businesses manage their cloud infrastructure more effectively. It should include everything from provisioning and deploying resources in the cloud, to monitoring and troubleshooting issues that arise. It still sounds a lot like managed hosting, and leaves much to be desired when it comes to the challenges of delivering an elegant digital experience. That is until the introduction of observability as a key ingredient of uncovering the missing data points – critical analytics and insights needed to bridge the gap in the correlation of user interaction to the application execution environment design.
An Intelligent CloudOps strategy uses data path observability, user analytics, and other data to influence cloud design, implementation, performance, and security management. Adopting an Intelligent CloudOps approach to application delivery backed by actionable insights effectively bridges the UX/infrastructure design correlation gap that’s crucial to data-driven success in ecommerce. By introducing a set of smart processes and modern tools that help businesses manage their cloud infrastructure, a brand can more effectively manage infrastructure and application delivery, and can do so with measurable data on how the tech stack performance influences conversions.
In our next blog we look at data path observability – what it is, what it can reveal in terms of user data, and how it impacts your business.
Webscale would love to help you get started on your Intelligent CloudOps journey. For a free, no-pressure conversation about your current tech stack, and an assessment of your storefront and where you could be losing money, reach out to us via the form at the bottom of the page.
