Applause vs. UserTesting

Overview
ProductRatingMost Used ByProduct SummaryStarting Price
Applause
Score 9.0 out of 10
N/A
Applause headquartered in Framingham in Massachusetts offers application testing services.N/A
UserTesting
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
UserTesting helps UX researchers, designers, product teams, and marketers gather actionable insights through research, testing, and feedback. With a network of real people ready to share their perspectives, UserTesting enables organizations to make customer-first decisions at scale.N/A
Pricing
ApplauseUserTesting
Editions & Modules
No answers on this topic
No answers on this topic
Offerings
Pricing Offerings
ApplauseUserTesting
Free Trial
NoYes
Free/Freemium Version
NoNo
Premium Consulting/Integration Services
NoNo
Entry-level Setup FeeNo setup feeNo setup fee
Additional Details
More Pricing Information
Community Pulse
ApplauseUserTesting
Best Alternatives
ApplauseUserTesting
Small Businesses

No answers on this topic

Smartlook
Smartlook
Score 8.4 out of 10
Medium-sized Companies

No answers on this topic

Optimal Workshop
Optimal Workshop
Score 9.2 out of 10
Enterprises

No answers on this topic

Optimal Workshop
Optimal Workshop
Score 9.2 out of 10
All AlternativesView all alternativesView all alternatives
User Ratings
ApplauseUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
10.0
(12 ratings)
8.3
(180 ratings)
Likelihood to Renew
8.2
(1 ratings)
5.3
(8 ratings)
Usability
6.4
(1 ratings)
8.2
(158 ratings)
Availability
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Performance
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Support Rating
9.1
(1 ratings)
8.5
(158 ratings)
Implementation Rating
9.1
(1 ratings)
4.8
(4 ratings)
Configurability
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Product Scalability
-
(0 ratings)
7.3
(1 ratings)
Vendor post-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
Vendor pre-sale
-
(0 ratings)
9.1
(1 ratings)
User Testimonials
ApplauseUserTesting
Likelihood to Recommend
Applause
Tester skill and experience is varied so it's important for the project manager to properly understand your requirements. The better they can build a team to suit your needs, the better your results will be. This will require a number of test cycles and fine tuning to get it right. It also fares better with consumer applications which are designed for the "common" user. For example, if you have a niche product designed for businesses, this type of testing may not be a good fit.
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UserTesting
UserTesting makes finding respondents super quick and easy. I'm always amazed at how quickly I can fully recruit for an unmoderated or moderated test and how fast contributors are to upload their videos. Contributors are also well-trained to answer a prompt in its entirety and always provide thoughtful answers.
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Pros
Applause
  • In-the-wild testing - it cannot be done internally. It's impossible to cover the wide matrix of devices and OS versions.
  • Exploratory testing - more eyes see more. Every mind is unique and thinks of a workflow differently - provides better coverage of the product.
  • Care provided by test lead is essential - they help a lot with initial bug triage and bug transfer to our internal systems.
  • Retest of found tickets once they are fixed - saves time!
  • Applause people make a good effort to create a relationship, it's not just business.
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UserTesting
  • Product Manager who follows up on your UserTesting usage and gives advice/support when you need it.
  • UserTesting University is a great platform to learn how to use UT and general information about research.
  • UserTesting can find participants quickly, so you won't need to wait long before you can start the analysis.
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Cons
Applause
  • In using MBM (Mobile Beta Management), it would be better to have the surveys be based on completion of a specific task instead of time or number of app access. This might be a little more complex to set up, but would be well worth it.
  • A "stakeholder management" view would be nice to allow those not normally using the tool to get a quick status of testing.
  • A "stakeholder management" view for MBM would be nice to allow those not normally using the tool to get a quick status of progress and user feedback.
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UserTesting
  • A centralized platform to recommend products and use cases would be handy so that users can suggest what they could use more of.
  • Integration with newer payment methods and gift card services could expand the user base.
  • Some products are business-critical and thus require sophisticated testing. This service could be added.
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Likelihood to Renew
Applause
The one missing point is for the price - it's quite expensive to maintain the service to the extent of how we use it (dozens of test cycles and hundreds of test case hours on monthly basis). However the benefits still weights the price, especially when thinking of the price of potential hot fixes. Still, the price can be a reason to take a look on how competition is doing.
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UserTesting
I'm very happy with my experience of the product and the level of service and learning resources they provide. If the service becomes more expensive than it currently is then we might not be able to justify additional cost - but this is theoretical. I would recommend UserTesting and would ideally renew our contract.
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Usability
Applause
The UI and the whole app is updated on regular basis, quite often actually. There are some cool features, like integration with several other bug tracking tools, which makes the bug management really easy. However there are some key usability issues within some of the less used workflows, which brings the score down a bit. They need to work on better switching between products and better bug search, especially across purchased products.
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UserTesting
It can be difficult to organize our tests and go back and find information. I think the AI tools are helping and will help with this, but for now it is time consuming to sort through all of the tests and information and then synthesize it and share it with others. It just takes a lot of time.
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Reliability and Availability
Applause
No answers on this topic
UserTesting
Never encountered any problems
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Performance
Applause
No answers on this topic
UserTesting
Perfectly fine. Never had any problems.
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Support Rating
Applause
I know the score doesn't really correspond with my earlier answers, but I have really special relationship with the Applause people. I don't really go through official support. I rather use my internal connections to make my request handled as soon as possible - and it works really well! I don't need to go through the official channels. And it's known that the unofficial ones are much more effective. I can confirm!
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UserTesting
I've used the "power hour," as I think it's called. This really helped me gain a greater understanding of my specific needs and wants from the platform. This excellent service points to the excellent relationship UserTesting provides its clients. I would recommend this service to any of my colleagues.
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Implementation Rating
Applause
I didn't need to be involved at all. It was seamless from our perspective. All products were inserted in by Vendor, only Test Cycles we needed to insert ourselves initially. Now even that is handled by Vendor. The only thing we need to pay attention now is - to request cycles at the right time and review the bugs found during the test cycles. Nothing else. Very good experience!
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UserTesting
From a technical perspective, the implementation was extremely smooth. Most of the change management / implementation hurdles were clearing use of the tool through our various security, legal, and information privacy teams. Once these concerns were addressed (UserTesting.com was very helpful in providing all the needed documentation), the implementation process was very simple and we were able to get going right away.
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Alternatives Considered
Applause
By the time we signed the contract, there was no competition to Applause (back in time the company was called uTest). Ever since, we didn't evaluate anyone else because we built a very close relationship, which works for both sides. I think Applause is the furthest in building the test community
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UserTesting
The quality of the participants: they usually have good feedback and act like "professional" users. Which is good when we want a few insights in a short amount of time. Also, the interface is good. I miss having more features, like a good transcription tool like we have in Condens
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Scalability
Applause
No answers on this topic
UserTesting
The package we have limits the number of people who can set up tests. This prevents us from scaling the use of the platform.
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Return on Investment
Applause
  • Positive
  • - we were able to provide good QA on an increased number of deliverables in a shorter period of time.
  • - great interaction with the Applause team, test leads and others
  • - high quality candidates added to our team
  • Negative
  • - the contract model (based on number of projects for specified monthly periods) was a little tricky for our development life cycles and left us at times wanting to engage test cycles but unable to do so while simultaneously having a project sitting idle for weeks after test cycles completed. Our business model was not a great fit for the contract model.
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UserTesting
  • Increase in conversion rate of checkout completion following a redesign influenced by UserTesting through design iterations
  • Decrease in customer complaints regarding the checkout (-83%) following its redesign
  • Faster time to completion for AB Testing programme, and higher ROI as a result as tests had a higher chance of winning
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ScreenShots

UserTesting Screenshots

Screenshot of UserTesting's several solutions for gathering rich customer experience narratives.Screenshot of Interactive Path Flows
Built on recent research in data mining, the Interactive Path Flow aggregates interaction data across multiple participant sessions to visualize the customer journey, surface unexpected behaviors, and locate key moments in the customer journey.Screenshot of Keyword Mapping
Similar keywords are automatically grouped based on overall sentiment (positive, negative, or neutral) to identify themes. Highlight reels associated with each keyword are grouped together, to discover the why behind each sentiment.Screenshot of Video capture and live streaming
Digital and real-world customer experiences are recorded on desktop and mobile devices or live streamed for in-platform viewing.Screenshot of Audience targeting
Audiences are specified by screening contributors from UserTesting’s global network of contributors or connecting to any preferred network.