Monitoring and observability: Today's “404 error” is tomorrow's customer drain

In the midst of the era of e-commerce and online transactions, the continuity of digital platforms has become a critical factor for companies' reputation and business. An error in the authentication of a banking app, the crash of a retail site on days of high traffic or a failure in the payment gateway can cause millions of dollars in losses in a matter of minutes.

New Relic's 2024 Observability Forecast indicates that engineering teams spent up to 30% of their time managing interrupts, and that those with the highest impact generated costs to companies of at least one million dollars per hour.

In this context, experts in monitoring and observability stress that the key is no longer just to react to a problem, but to anticipate it. “These situations will always be present. The goal is to detect them before users experience them,” says Néstor Contreras, Chile's Business Manager at Atentus, a firm specialized in digital experience management.

What does it mean to observe a digital system?

The concept of observability refers to the ability to understand what is happening within a digital ecosystem based on data, metrics and records. It's not just about monitoring falls, but about obtaining a comprehensive view to prevent incidents before they impact the business.

One approach that is gaining ground is that of end-to-end observability, which combines different layers of monitoring — from infrastructure to the end user experience — to anticipate failures. This model also integrates advanced analytics and data correlation, allowing companies to understand the behavior of their platforms and customers and make strategic decisions with accurate information.

Simulation as a preventive tool

One of the most used methodologies today is synthetic monitoring, which reproduces the navigation of real users on websites, mobile applications and even IVR systems. This way, it is possible to detect authentication errors, slow purchase processes or failures in integrations with third-party services, such as payment gateways, in advance.

Atentus, for example, implements this approach through its Sentinel method, which works 24 hours a day simulating critical interactions. There, automated alerts are generated in real time that allow companies to react before the end user perceives the problem. This model is called 360 observability.

The main risks that can be avoided

According to the specialists, having a solid observability scheme allows us to anticipate incidents that directly impact business continuity and user experience:

● Loss of customers and revenues: due to crashes or unavailability of sites and apps.
● Low conversion rate: due to slow critical processes such as payments or purchases.
● Collapse of the call center and branches: due to frustrated users.
● Abandonment of the platform: due to links or functionalities that do not work well.
● Slow page loading or navigation errors that users themselves detect before the company.
● Performance inconsistencies across devices or geographic locations.
● Failures in integrations with third parties, such as payment gateways

Specific cases: prevention rather than cure

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Recent experience shows that this approach is not a theory, but a concrete tool for avoiding crises.

This month in Chile, one of the most important banks suffered a drop of more than two hours in its web and mobile platforms, impacting the experience of its users, receiving complaints and generating fear because they could not make payments, transfers, or review their balances. Complaints accumulated on social networks and telephone service channels because of the collective fear of not being able to access their money. “More and more digital users don't give second chances to first bad experiences. Today's “404 error” is tomorrow's customer drain,” concludes Contreras.

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Source: Radio Nongüen.
http://radiononguen.net/inicio/blog/monitoreo-y-observabilidad-el-error-404-de-hoy-es-la-fuga-de-clientes-de-manana/