How crowd testing works

Crowd testing is a form of testing that relies on crowd platform to manage testers and testing projects. This method enables testing to be carried out by multiple testers from different locations. Thus it is more fast, accurate and cost-effective than traditional lab-based testing approaches.

How crowd testing works

Scenarios in which crowd testing is useful

Crowd testing is apt for user-centric apps that is used by a diverse crowd. It is particularly useful in scenarios where you want to test the application on multiple devices, with many testers from different locations.

As it is more fast and cost effective, it is a boon for clients who want to meet their release deadlines faster & also for those who do not have the QA resources to execute testing. It is also helpful in case of testing apps that are in the early stages of development. The fresh insights given by crowd testers can development team identify and fix defects in time before releasing the app to the public.

The Crowd testing community

The strength of a crowd testing platform lies in its diverse testing community. A crowd sourced testing community consists of many testers from all over the world, with diverse backgrounds, domain knowledge and expertise. This provides clients the opportunity to test their application in diverse test environments that are realistic.

Apart from allowing you to see how your app works in real life conditions, crowd testing platforms enable you to scale your QA efforts as per needs. All this without the hassles of hiring full time QA specialists and without any major investment in devices and tools.

Crowd sourced testing companies thus connect the clients who have specific testing needs with testers who match their requirement. It’s a win-win situation for both the clients and the testers.

The way crowd testing works

1) Requirement Analysis

Every app is unique. The testing requirement for an app depends on the business goals of the company. The first step in crowd testing is to analyze the requirements of the client and the testing project. A testing plan in line with the product’s quality goals is prepared. This testing plan serves as the basis for fixing the price, assigning the crowd testers and finalizing other aspects like number of test cycles etc.

Usually a dedicated project manager will be assigned by the crowd testing company for creating and managing the test strategy. By understanding the app, its environment and its quality goals, the plan and deliverables are set by the project manager.

2) Project Launch

Once the project is initiated, crowd testers who match the requirement in terms of demographics and domain knowledge are assigned for testing. The test environment covering the configurations mentioned is set up.

3) Project Execution

Crowd testers execute the project by testing the app on different devices from different locations. The crowd sourced testing experts will help uncover all the issues in your app.

4) Monitoring & Evaluation

Clients can monitor the bug logging and testing coverage. The bugs logged by the crowd testers is evaluated either by crowd validators or designated experts from the crowd testing company.

5) Project Completion

All the bug reports, test summary and recommendations are shared with the client once the test cycles are executed. Many platforms have added bug tracking features that makes it easy for development teams to not only find the bugs but also to fix them. The crowd testers assigned to the project are also rated as per the quality of bugs they log. This ensures that the top testers who log the most difficult bugs are paid the most, creating a reward based system that encourages testers to perform well.

Crowd testing thus lets you test your app on real devices by real users, giving you accurate insights on how well your app works. It can add value in addition to traditional testing methods to give you greater coverage and a fresh insight on your app quality.

How Crowd testing at 99tests works?

99tests will help you bring order to your crowd sourced testing efforts. Getting started is easy and hassle free. You can watch the below video to get acquainted with the 99tests crowd testing platform:

1) Register & create test cases:

• To get started, register as client and create test cycles as per your requirement.
• Not sure how? You will be assigned a dedicated project manager who will help plan, prioritize and execute your test cycles. We will take care of everything from allotting the crowd testers to the project to handling the integration of our tools with your work flow.

2) Pay for performance that matters:

• Execute test cycles as per your App quality goal & requirement.
• Choose App testing strategy suited to your product’s stage of development.
• Gain from intelligent machine learned algorithms & data driven recommendations.
• Control the number of test cycles & test coverage for testing.

3) Build a world class QA team in a click:

• Assemble your team of global testers from over 150 countries.
• Target your testing to match your requirement, location wise and domain expertise wise.
• Crowd testers allotted to the project will execute your test cycles & find critical bugs in time.
• These high quality, valid bugs filtered by our algorithm and validation team will be sent to you in the bug reports.
• You can even assign your team members to fix the bugs found.

4) Gain insights to make Apps awesome:

• Verify bugs fixed.
• Gain useful feedback from testing experts for improving your app.
• Benchmark your app against industry standards
• Get expert support in analyzing test data and gaining actionable inputs to beat the competition.

Currently, 99tests offers crowd testing services for localization, usability, functional, security & automation testing. Click here to learn more: https://99tests.com/crowd-testing

Interested in learning more about 99tests crowd sourced testing services? We’d love to give more insights. Click here to schedule a call:

https://99tests.com/contact-us