API Monitoring Basics

Are you interested in learning about API monitoring? Then you’ve come to the right article. Below, we explain what APIs are and why they’re valuable, explore the basics of API monitoring, and wrap up with practical advice on how to get comprehensive API monitoring in your organization.

What are APIs?

Application programming interfaces, better known as APIs, enable different internal and external applications to communicate and share information. To non-technical readers this may sound simple, but in reality, it’s transformative. APIs underpin nearly every modern digital experience, and the vast majority of software developers rely on them.

Industry forecasts also highlight their importance. For example, Fortune Business Insights projects the global API management market to grow from USD 5.42 billion in 2024 to USD 37.17 billion by 2032.

The opportunities APIs provide are substantial: they enable service integration, accelerate development, drive innovation, support customization, reduce costs, and improve user experiences.

However, when APIs underperform or break, the impact can be serious – from disrupted operations and customer churn to increased security risks. That’s why organizations need effective API monitoring.

What is API Monitoring?

API monitoring refers to the continuous testing and validation of APIs to ensure they are functioning as expected. This typically covers five key areas:

• Availability: Verifying that APIs are reachable and responding to requests.
• Performance: Measuring response times across environments to ensure they meet expectations.
• Data validation: Confirming that APIs return the right data in the expected format.
• Third-party integrations: Checking that externally managed APIs used by the organization (e.g., chat apps, document repositories) continue to function properly, especially after updates or changes.
• Security: Detecting anomalies, misuse, or improper access patterns that could indicate compliance or security issues.

AlertBot: Advanced API Monitoring Made Easy

AlertBot delivers advanced and comprehensive API monitoring through an easy-to-manage solution. It provides detailed performance reports that enable developers and IT teams to quickly detect, diagnose, and resolve issues, including potential problems that could disrupt operations in the future.

Some of the world’s largest and most successful organizations rely on AlertBot to ensure API functionality, performance, and reliability.

Click here to start your free trial. No credit card is required, nothing needs to be installed, and you’ll be set up within minutes.

100% Solutions, Zero Snark: What Makes AlertBot Customer Support Superior

Let’s start with a blatant truth: If we tell you that AlertBot offers “superior customer support,” then you are perfectly within your rights to respond with a tepid “meh,” or perhaps an irritated “so what?”

Why? Because EVERY COMPANY in this industry claims to offer amazing customer support. Of course, many of them provide mediocre customer service, and a few of them deliver awful customer service. But according to their advertising, marketing, and sales team, their customer service is nothing short of blissful and life-changing.

And so, to get back to the point: We understand that you might shrug and roll your eyes when we claim to offer incredible customer service. You’ve heard that generic song sung before by many companies, many times. It was nice at first, then it became boring, and now it’s just annoying.

At AlertBot, we don’t just talk about providing superior customer support, we back up this claim with action, and stake our reputation on it. Here is what you can expect:

• You will always connect with a qualified expert.

Have you ever asked a company for help, and quickly realized that YOU know more about the product or service than THEY do? It’s a scary, sinking feeling. Kind of like boarding a plane and seeing the pilot leafing through a copy of “Flying for Dummies.”

We are not about causing uneasy, sinking feelings. When you contact our team, you will always connect with a qualified expert. Be assured that your assigned expert understands our solution and technology inside and out, and also has vast experience dealing with various use cases and scenarios.

And in the rare event that your assigned expert cannot answer your question or solve your problem, then they will take full ownership, stay focused, and achieve a resolution as quickly as possible. They will take your matter as seriously as you do — perhaps even more.

You might be thinking: “This sounds good, but isn’t it the norm?” The answer is no. Experts aren’t cheap and easy to find (and keep!). Many companies cut corners in this area by staffing their support team with untrained, unqualified people who take 10 times as long to solve a problem 1/10^th as competently.

• You can always expect a timely response.

When customers contact our support team, they aren’t doing it because they have a new joke they want to share, or want to discuss the latest Taylor Swift rumor. They are calling us because they have a PROBLEM THAT THEY WANT TO SOLVE.

It could be a relatively minor problem, or it could be a large scale 5-alarm whopper of a crisis. Regardless of the scope: our customers contact us because they need something to happen or stop happening — and FAST.

We get it. And that’s why we respond rapidly to all support requests, and treat them as urgent and time sensitive. Many other companies don’t do this, and some simply can’t because they don’t have the qualified people — or enough of the qualified people.

• We are very friendly.

As customers — either getting support for something we own personally, or on behalf of our company —we have all been there many times: we (eventually) get the technical answers and help we need, but the experience is something between unpleasant and humiliating. Sadly, some people cannot feel smart unless they go out of their way to try and make other people feel stupid.

At AlertBot, we are all about educating and empowering our customers. We are professional and friendly, and actively LISTEN to our customers to fully understand their issues, so that we can determine the best way to approach and address them. We’re about solutions, not snark!

In fact, many of our customers have formed relationships over the years with different members of our support team, and ask for them by name. We see that as a clear sign that we are doing the right things, the right way.

What’s more, we communicate effectively and clearly with different types of roles. When we’re communicating with technical experts, we speak fluent techie, right down to the smallest, geekiest detail. And when we’re communicating with CEOs and other non-technical leaders, we focus on objectives, timelines, expectations, and the big picture — because that’s what matters most.

Straight from Our Customers

To prove that we “walk the talk,” here is a sampling of what some AlertBot customers have say about their customer support experience:

• “The other thing that sets AlertBot apart is true world class support. In my role, my team has to work with many other technical support teams and I can tell you that the team we work with at AlertBot is not only very knowledgeable, but are also very easy to work with and are super-fast to respond to our needs.”

• “I’ve used AlertBot at several companies – the level of customer support and uptime have kept me a customer.”

• “This product was very easy to setup and use. Tech support has been very responsive and knowledgeable, which is very important to me.”

• “Very happy with the product and service.”

• “We cannot say anything bad about it. They respond quickly to support requests and emails too.
  Highly recommend it.”

• “Easy to use, great Customer Service/Support Team.”

You will find many more reviews at Capterra.com (customer support rating 5/5), SoftwareAdvice.com (customer support rating 5/5), and G2.com (customer support rating 9.8/10).

Discover why some of the world’s largest and most successful companies trust AlertBot — and our legendary customer support! — to keep their websites operational and optimized.

Start a free trial of AlertBot today. There is nothing to download or install, no billing no billing information is required, and you will be 100% setup in minutes. Get started now: click here.

A Closer Look at AlertBot’s Email Reports

At AlertBot, we know our customers don’t want too much data about their websites and tasks. Instead, they want clear, organized, and reliable intelligence that tells them: what happened recently, what’s happening now, what’s likely to happen in the near future — and what they can do about it. That’s where email reports enter the story.

Here are the five sections in AlertBot’s email reports: Availability, Performance, Common Errors, Failure Events, and Confirmed Failures.

Availability

The Availability section of the email report displays the overall uptime of the websites that you are testing. Additionally, it is color coded.

• Green indicates that everything is working perfectly (or nearly perfectly).
• Yellow indicates that there may be some minor concerns.
• Red indicates significant concerns that should be addressed.

Performance

The performance section of the email report provides details for the websites that you are testing. It displays a breakdown (measured in seconds) of each process, along with individual web pages that are associated with that process.

This is useful for daily website monitoring and studying long-term patterns to ensure their functionality. It helps in checking the performance of websites on a regular basis and analyzing trends over time. This is important to ensure that websites are functioning properly and meeting their objectives.

Common Errors

The email report’s common errors section shows all failures and transition errors that happened within a certain time. The list includes confirmed events, as well as those that are intermittent. Use this information to check for problems with websites or processes, or issues that need more investigating and analyzing.

Failure Events

Here, you will find a list of all confirmed failures (as indicated in the Common Errors section) for each hour in the past week. The failure events are also color coded:

• Red indicates significant areas of concern.
• Yellow indicates minor areas of concern (some confirmed failures).
• Green indicates no areas of concern.

Confirmed Failures

Finally, the confirmed failures section of the email report logs all problem areas. Notably, these have all been confirmed from a secondary location — i.e., they are actual failure events and not false positives.

With this in mind, there can be scenarios where confirmed failure events do not necessarily indicate a problem. For example, you may see that over the past week a website failed 10 times at 1:00am. However, after digging deeper you may discover that this is happening due to maintenance. If so, then you can simply set up a maintenance window.

The Final Word

In the 1990s flick Apollo 13, the big brains at NASA said that “failure is not an option.” Unfortunately, down here on earth, sometimes things in general — and websites and their related processes specifically — don’t work as expected.

Fortunately, that’s where AlertBot’s detailed, yet clear and focused, email reports make a transformative difference. It’s not just raw information. It’s actionable intelligence!

But what sets AlertBot apart is not just the information it provides, but how it presents it. Our reports are clear, concise, and focused, ensuring that you can quickly grasp the key insights without getting lost in a sea of technical jargon. We understand that not everyone is a tech expert, and that’s why we’ve made our reports accessible to all.

So why wait? Take control of your online presence and ensure that your website is running smoothly. Don’t let website issues hold you back – let AlertBot be your trusted companion in the digital realm.

Getting started with AlertBot is a breeze. With our free trial, you can experience the power of our email reports without any commitment. No need to download or install anything, and rest assured, we won’t ask for any billing information. In just a matter of minutes, you’ll be fully set up and ready to uncover the hidden potential of your website: click here.

A Closer Look at AlertBot’s Alert Group Feature

If we start by sharing that AlertBot’s alert group feature lets you, well, alert certain groups, then you might wonder what earth-shattering revelations we have in store — such as water is wet, fire is hot, and the pain of Game of Throne’s final season will never, ever go away (seriously, whatever happened to Gendry?!).

Yes, you’re right: the alert group feature IS about alerting groups of people about a site failure — but as George R.R. Martin would say: there is much more to the story! Here’s a rundown of some interesting details that you may not be aware of:

Notes

When you set up an alert group, you can add notes if you feel that it would benefit your team. For example, you can let your Web Team know who the communication point person during a failure event should be or if it should include several people from the team, provide updates about vacation schedules, and anything else that you deem relevant.

Notification Order

You can choose when members of an alert group are notified of a site failure, from immediately all the way up to 48 hours later. For example, your Web Team can be alerted right away during a site failure event, and your CTO can be alerted 1 hour later into a site failure event and so on (if the problem persists). You can choose the frequency of alerting and how many times individuals or a group of people can be alerted during downtime events on your site.

Contact Method

You can also choose which email address will be contacted, based on the notification order. For example, an immediate alert can be sent to [email protected] and other teams/emails if selected, and then an hour later another alert can be sent to [email protected] and so on until the site is back up and running.

Monitors

What happens if you’re doing some testing or updating, and you don’t want failure events across all site monitors to trigger an alert (and maybe spark some anxiety)? No problem: you can choose which specific monitors are associated with an alert group.

But don’t worry: if you have a whole bunch of monitors and want to include them all, then you don’t have to manually add each one to an alert group. Simply select “All monitors in the account” and you’re good to go!

Do You Have 30 Seconds?

We’ve saved the best part for last: setting up a new alert group doesn’t take hours, or even minutes — it takes seconds. Simply choose the options you need, and you’re all set. And changing an alert group’s settings is just as fast (maybe even faster).

Try AlertBot Now

Reading is fun. But experiencing is better (unless you happen to be reading Game of Thrones and are perfectly happy learning about White Walkers vs. hanging out with them). Put AlertBot to the test by launching your free trial today. Play around with alert groups, along with many other features and functions.

 There is nothing to download or install, no billing information is required, and you will be 100% setup in minutes. Get started now: click here.

Why Your Website Monitoring Solution Needs a Do-Not-Disturb Feature

It is so low-tech that Gen Z’ers and other digital natives may faint (or perhaps the avatar in a VR game that they are playing may faint) to learn that one of the greatest inventions in the history of our species is the humble do-not-disturb sign. Indeed, this magical placard is like having a very own private Gandalf shouting: YOU SHALL NOT PASS!

However, the glory of do-not-disturb is not limited to hotels, motels, and teenagers’ bedrooms. It is also a must-have feature in website monitoring solutions.

Why is a Do-Not-Disturb Feature So Important?

It does not take a Jeopardy! champion to know that do-not-disturb means (…wait for it…) “do-not-disturb” — which seems like the very last thing that organizations would want if there are site performance issues. On the contrary, the alarm bells via SMS, email and/or phone call should ring loud and clear. Or…maybe not.

In some cases, it makes perfect sense to pull individuals or teams off the notification list. For example:

• An individual such as a CTO or SysAdmin is on leave (vacation, illness, personal, etc.).
• A site is being tested, migrated or updated, and as such it will go offline for a specific and predictable period of time.
• Per policy, certain individuals/teams do not get alerted to website performance issues during specific times (e.g. after hours, weekends, holidays, etc.).

What to Look For

A do-not-disturb feature is essential. But this does not mean that all website monitoring solutions that claim to offer this are in the same class. Here is what to look for:

• An extremely easy-to-use dashboard. Advanced technology is dizzyingly complex. But if you need a PhD in computer science and a wall full of industry certificates to use the do-not-disturb feature, then keep looking. Easy does it.
• The ability to create as few or as many do-not-disturb events as required, and to see all of them at-a-glance through the extremely easy-to-use dashboard.
• The option to add notes so that everyone understands why a do-not-disturb schedule was created. For example: “we are migrating to new site on 2/15 and as a result the site will be down from 12:00am to 4:00am”.
• The option to select individuals or teams who will not get notified.
• The option to schedule the do-not-disturb as a one-time or ongoing event.
• The option to select what sites the do-not-disturb applies to. For example: the Dev Team will not be alerted to uptime issues for, say, the “ACME Anti-Roadrunner Anvils” site from 12:00am to 5:00am on 2/15, but they will be alerted to performance issues for all other sites that are being monitored.

The Bottom Line

 Without a versatile do-not-disturb feature, members of your organization will be very disturbed — because at certain times, they will be alerted to website performance issues that they cannot and should not do anything about. This is a waste of time and resources, and can trigger confusion and chaos (and, let’s face it, it’s not great for blood pressure levels, either).

AlertBot’s website monitoring solution has a built-in do-not-disturb feature that checks ALL of the boxes described above. Learn more with a free trial. There is nothing to download and install, no billing information required, and you will be 100% setup in minutes. Get started now: click here.

The year was 1995. Michael Jordan returned to the NBA. Amazon sold its first book. Windows 95 unleashed the era of taskbars, long filenames, and the recycle bin. And when people weren’t dancing the Macarena, they were flocking to see Apollo 13 and hear Tom Hanks utter the phrase that would launch millions of (mostly annoying) impersonations: “Houston, we have a problem.”

Thankfully, the eggheads in space and the eggheads on the ground worked tirelessly (and apparently smoked a whole lot of cigarettes) to get the crew home. But it was the pivotal moment when the failure was first reported that triggered the spectacular problem-solving process. If it happened an hour — or maybe even a few minutes — later, then the outcome could have been tragic instead of triumphant.

Admittedly, the brave, intrepid professionals in charge of keeping their organization’s website online and functional DON’T have to deal with life-and-death scenarios. But they DO need to deal with problems that, if left unsolved, will significantly damage competitive advantage, brand reputation and sales (immediately if we’re talking e-commerce, and eventually if we aren’t). And that’s where AlertBot’s failure alerting feature enters the picture.

What is Failure Alerting?

Failure alerting is when designated individuals — such as a SysAdmin, CTO, CIO, CEO, and so on — are proactively notified when something goes wrong with a website, such as downtime, errors, slowness, or unresponsive behavior.

As a result, just like in Apollo 13, the right people can take swift, intelligent action to fix things before visitors/customers sound the alarm bell, or worse, head out the (virtual) door and go straight to a competitor without looking back.

Notification Methods

AlertBot customers can choose any or all of the following methods to notify team members of a website failure event:

• Email
• Text Message
• Phone Call

For example, a SysAdmin could receive an email, a text message, and a phone call the moment something goes wrong.

Automatic Escalation

Now, if we were in NASA Mission Control circa 1970, someone wearing really thick horned-rimmed glasses would rise above the cigarette smoke and ask: What happens if the SysAdmin doesn’t receive the email, text message, and phone call? It’s a good question, and there is an even better answer: don’t worry about it.

AlertBot’s failure reporting feature can be configured to escalate the website failure warning if certain individuals don’t respond within a specific timeframe. For example, if a SysAdmin is indisposed for any reason (driving, sleeping, etc.), then after two minutes the alert can be pushed to another designated team member such as the CTO. And if the CTO doesn’t respond within two minutes, then the alert can be pushed to the CIO, and so on.

Ideally, the individual (or multiple individuals) who are sent the first alert receive it immediately, and take rapid action. But if they don’t or can’t, then the alert is escalated accordingly. It is important to note that all of this happens automatically, so there is no possibility of human error.

Granted, none of this is as entertaining as watching Apollo 13. There’s no rousing soundtrack or Tom Hanks. Heck, there’s not even Kevin Bacon.

But when it comes to fixing website problems as quickly as possible, organizations know that the less drama, the better. That’s precisely what AlertBot’s multi-channel, auto-escalating failure reporting feature delivers. We don’t need an Oscar. We just need extremely satisfied customers — and we have a lot of those.

Next Up: Reviewing Failure Events Online

 In our next blog, we’ll explore reviewing failure events online to pinpoint issues and detect problems. Stay tuned!

Launch a free trial of AlertBot’s acclaimed site uptime monitoring solution. No credit card. Nothing to download. Get started in minutes. And if you decide to purchase our solution, there are NO setup fees!

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What is Proactive ScriptAssist and Why is it a Game-Changer?

Sometimes — not often, but every now and then — we come across an invention that is so remarkably useful, that we wonder: how did I survive without this?

High speed internet comes to mind. So do GPS devices. And who wants to imagine a world without the cronut?

Well, it’s time to add one more invention to the list: Proactive ScriptAssist.

The Back Story
Websites are not static things. They change over time; sometimes in minor ways, and other times in major ways (for fun, check out the Internet Archive’s Wayback Machine to see what some of your favorite websites looked like in the past — like Apple’s home page from 1996 which invites folks to learn about “the future of the Macintosh”).

Now, for visitors, the fact that websites constantly change is not a problem. In fact, it’s often a good thing because the change is an update, addition, or improvement of some kind.

But for IT and InfoSec professionals who are in charge of (among other things) website monitoring in their company, these changes can — and often do — trigger all kinds of bugs and errors. Fields and forms stop working, elements stop loading (or they load v..e..r..y….s..l..o..w..l..y), and there can be security vulnerabilities as well.

Multi-Step Monitoring
Thankfully, there is a way to verify that everything is working before site visitors start sounding the alarm bells — or worse, disappearing never to return.

This method is to implement an easy-to-use web recorder to create scripts of what site visitors actually/ typically do on various web pages, and make sure that everything is working properly. This is highly effective. That’s the good news.

The not-so-good news, is that when changes occur — even fairly small ones — re-scripting monitors can be a complex process that, in some scenarios, may require a level of expertise and experience that some IT/InfoSec professionals don’t have.

What’s the solution to this obstacle? Let’s all say it together: Proactive ScriptAssist!

About Proactive ScriptAssist
Available EXCLUSIVELY from AlertBot, Proactive Script Assist is an optional plan that includes the following:

• Our team watches over an account, and proactively re-scripts any monitors that fail. We do all of the work, and our team has years of experience. After all, we created the technology, and we know how it works!
• Failing monitors are evaluated within 3 hours, and the customer is notified of the situation.
• Failing monitors are re-scripted within 3 to 24 hours (our response time is rapid, but the actual duration depends on the complexity — some re-scripting efforts take longer than others).
• Customers get unlimited re-scripting and configuration updates from our team year-round.

Plus, if needed our team offers advanced support over remote desktop sessions (join.me sessions). This is not always necessary, but it is another layer of help just in case.

The Bottom Line
Inventions that changed our lives: High speed internet. GPS. Cronuts. And now, AlertBot’s Proactive ScriptAssist. It’s an elite list, and one that we’re honored to join.

Learn More
Ready to make your IT/InfoSec teams weep with joy (which is nothing like the weeping they did that time the intern wiped out the backup)?

If you’re a current AlertBot customer, then contact your Account Manager today.

If you haven’t yet experienced AlertBot, then start your free trial today. You’ll be setup in minutes. No billing information, nothing to install, and no hassle.

Now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re going to read about the future of the Macintosh while enjoying a cronut or two (or 5).

Multi-Step Monitoring: Why it’s Essential and How it Works

 The term “essential” is thrown around pretty loosely these days. That new show about the hospital (no, not that one… not that one either… yeah that one) is advertised as essential viewing. A newly-released track by a hip hop artist that describes how little they need to release new tracks in order to live much, much better than the rest of us? That’s essential listening. And how can we forget that new muffin that cannot legally be advertised as a muffin, because is technically more of a candy. That’s essential snacking (“mmmmmm….pseudo muffin”).

But then on the other end of the hype spectrum, there are things that are legitimately essential, because going without them could lead to dire consequences — or maybe even a catastrophe. And for e-commerce companies, one tool that truly qualifies as essential is multi-step monitoring.

What is Multi-Step Monitoring?

In a break with tradition in the complex world of technology, multi-step monitoring is pretty much what it sounds like: a way to track the various steps that customers take as they move through pages on a website. This way, businesses can proactively identify and fix problems such as buttons that don’t work, forms that won’t submit, links that don’t go anywhere, pages that take too long to load, and so on.

Why is Multi-Step Monitoring Essential?

 Most customers who run into problems don’t shrug them off. They get mad. And that compels them to hit the brakes and head for the exit. In fact, a whopping 88% of online consumers are less likely to return to a site after just one bad experience. So, yeah, preventing about 9 in 10 customers from disappearing is important. One might even say that it’s… wait for it… ESSENTIAL!

How Multi-Step Monitoring Works

In AlertBot, configuring multi-step monitoring is remarkably easy, and doesn’t require an advanced degree in Hypercomplex Supergeerkery, with additional specialized certifications in Megaultra Nerdology. Here is how it works (a video tutorial is also available):

• Step 1: Login to AlertBot
• Step 2: Go to “Monitors”
• Step 3: Set up a new monitor.
• Step 4: Select the TrueBrowser® Multi-Step Monitor option.
• Step 5: Download the AlertBot Recorder (available for PC currently — this step only has to be completed once).
• Step 6: Give the monitor a name (e.g. “Amazon 1 Multi-Step Monitor”).
• Step 7: Launch the AlertBot Recorder, input the URL of the site (e.g. Amazon.com), and record a script simply by simulating actions that a customer would take. It is also a good idea to label steps/phases (e.g. “Homepage”, “Add to Cart,” etc.), which can be helpful when analyzing reports later on.
• Step 8: Save the script with a unique name (e.g. “Amazon test”).
• Step 9: Upload the script into TrueBrowser® Multi-Step Monitor (which was launched in Step 4).
• Step 10: Hit the “Test” button.

And that’s all there is to it. When the test is complete (this can take up to two minutes), a report is automatically generated that shows:

• The duration of each phase/step in the process.
• Whether each process was successful or unsuccessful.
• A waterfall chart capturing a breakdown of everything that loads on each individual page (e.g. request times, file transfers, etc.).
• Raw browser request data that reveals anything that is not working, or that could be contributing to a degraded user experience (e.g. loading large files or images that cause slowdowns).

Tests can be run at anytime to verify that problems are fixed and improvements are made. It’s remarkably easy. And yes, it’s essential.

Learn More

Discover the benefits of multi-step monitoring. Start a FREE TRIAL of AlertBot now. There’s no billing information required, no installation, and you’ll be setup within minutes. 

The 3-Step Communication Game Plan for a Site Outage (One of Our LEAST Favorite Things)

If those von Trapp Family singers from The Sound of Music collectively woke up in a really, really bad mood and decided to write a song about their least favorite things, then it’s a safe bet that not being able to connect to a website would make the list (alongside airline passengers who tilt their seat back, and clam shell plastic packaging).

Indeed, the level of rage that many people experience when their browser presents them with a “cannot connect to that website” message is enough to trigger a blood pressure monitoring app alarm on a smartwatch. It’s the equivalent of going to a store, only to find out that the door is locked. Actually, it may be worse than that, because at least there could be some therapeutic comfort in commiserating with other disappointed customers. But in the virtual world, the journey is usually solo — and so is the misery.

The bad news is that there is no way to absolutely, completely, and ultimately prevent site outages from happening. However, the good news is that companies can — actually, scratch that: they must — be proactive to mitigate the pain and suffering; both across their site visitors, and for themselves. To that end, here is a three-step communication game plan:

Step 1: Tell the story.

Without delay (not even for lunch), companies should leap into their operational digital properties — e.g. social media, email, SMS, chat, widget, etc. — and clearly describe:

• What’s going on and why the site is down.
• When the outage started.
• What is being done.
• When the outage is likely to end based on all available information and best estimates.
• Options and workarounds (if they exist).
• Relevant policy or process changes (e.g. “due to this unforeseen event we are extending our normal 30-day return window, to ensure that customers who are affected can return items without any inconvenience”).

Step 2: Update the status page.

All of the information shared through social media and other channels should be published to a dedicated status page, which — as the name suggests — exists for one purpose only: to highlight and describe the status of a website (or possibly multiple websites that are part of the same brand or portfolio). It is vital to keep the status page updated to reflect the current phase: investigating, fixing, resolving, and resolved.

In addition, the status page should invite visitors to subscribe, so that they can receive real-time notifications when things change — and ultimately, when they get back to normal.

Step 3: Conduct a postmortem and share the findings.

Once the outage is history, companies should figure out precisely what went wrong. Using a top-rated site uptime monitoring tool, like AlertBot, can provide helpful clues, and just as valuably, ensure that there isn’t a repeat performance. This information should be shared with the customer community and all other stakeholders, such as suppliers and strategic partners.

Typically, this information is shared through a blog post, which all social media accounts such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram (etc.) point to. Even if the company is not technically at fault (after all, nobody wants to be assailed by a DDoS attack), the fact remains that visitors were inconvenienced. An authentic apology goes a long way to easing frayed nerves and restoring trust.

The Bottom Line

Site outages are dreadful. Yet, they happen, and companies need to have a communication game plan to minimize the frustration for visitors, and the adverse impact on their reputation. The von Trapp Family singers would approve (and probably turn it into a song that you can’t get out of your head, no matter how hard you try).

It’s Cyber Week! All new AlertBot signups this week get 20% off for the life of their account! Use promo code 2021CW20 when you sign up to claim this deal! https://www.AlertBot.com

It’s Black Friday all week for AlertBot! All new signups this week get 20% off for the life of their account! Use promo code 2021BF20 when you sign up to claim this deal!

https://www.AlertBot.com

What Exactly is a Website Monitoring “False Alarm”
and Why You Should Care About It

by Louis Kingston

You know what falsehoods are. You know what false teeth are. You may even know some falsehoods about false teeth. But do you know what a website monitoring false alarm (also known as a “false positive”) is? If not, then please keep reading to find out — because it’s a very big deal.

What is a False Alarm?

Remember back in grade school, when the fire bell suddenly went off in class and you were instructed to exit the class single-file and march outside? As you rose from your desk, heart racing, you wondered if you’d ever see your Trapper Keeper, Real Ghostbusters lunchbox and JanSport backpack ever again. But after you and your classmates were wrangled into the parking lot to stand in the brisk autumn air for what felt like an eternity, you soon learn it was just some older kid who thought it’d be funny to pull that shiny red lever on the hallway wall.

Well, that’s essentially what a false alarm is: a result that incorrectly indicates that a particular condition or attribute is present (i.e. it wasn’t a real fire consuming your place of education; it was merely a “false alarm” thanks to that jerk in the grade above yours).

What is a Website Monitoring False Alarm?

What you need and expect from a website monitoring tool is to know precisely when your website goes down. Why? Because research has found that the average cost of site downtime is $5,600 per minute. And remember, we are just talking about the average cost here. Some site downtime fiascos are much more costly. Just ask Amazon, which lost an estimated $99 million after going down for 63 minutes during Prime week in 2018. Granted, most businesses (including yours, unless you happen to be Jeff Bezos) won’t have to shell out $1.65 million a minute due to website downtime, but the basic point should be clear: site downtime is costly, and false alarms are supposed to minimize this financial damage.

But what happens when a website monitoring downtime alarm goes off, but nothing is actually wrong? It gets chalked up to a false alarm.

Why Website Monitoring False Alarms Are So Common

Many website monitoring tools — and virtually all of the free kind — have a test server in one location. If that test server detects that a website is not available, it does the only thing it can: sound the alarm. And that seems to be the correct thing to do, right? Well, not exactly.

Let’s say that that the website in this example is only down for a few seconds due to an isolated power outage. The test server has no way of knowing this (i.e. that the website is back up). And so, it is going to generate a false alarm.

The Solution: Multiple Testing Server Locations

Now, imagine that there are multiple test servers spread out across the country — say, one in New York and one in Los Angeles. The test server in New York detects that a website has gone down, and triggers a red alert (this test server is a big Star Trek fan). But it doesn’t sound the alarm. Instead, 60 seconds later the test server in Los Angeles checks in. If the website is up, then it cancels the red alert. If the website is down, then it confirms the initial diagnosis by the test server in New York, and the alarm goes off.

The AlertBot Advantage

At AlertBot, we hate false alarms even more than our customers. That’s why unlike many other website monitoring tools — and again, virtually all of the free ones — we have test servers located across the U.S. and worldwide. We don’t guess whether our customer’s website is down. We know.

Plus, when it is necessary to send out an alert, our system automatically and immediately contacts key people — such as network administrators, SysAdmins, CIOs, etc. — through email, SMS/text message, or phone (or any combination).

What’s more, our test servers keep checking for website site availability, and provide an update (again, in the preferred method) if it goes back up. We also highlight the amount of time that the website — or a specific portion/page of the website — was down. Our customers use this information to keep an eye on overall website performance, proactively detect problems, and ensure that their web host is consistently meeting uptime standards.

Ready to bid false alarms a true farewell? Then start a FREE TRIAL of AlertBot now. There’s no billing information required, no installation, and you’ll be setup within minutes. Click here.

Louis is a writer, author, and avid film fan. He has been writing professionally for tech blogs and local organizations for over a decade. Louis currently resides in Allentown, PA, with his wife and their German Shepherd Einstein, where he writes articles for InfoGenius, Inc, and overthinks the mythos of his favorite fandoms.

4 Essential Failure Analysis Reports for Monitoring Website Performance & Uptime

by Louis Kingston

It would be nice if the same commandment held for websites. However, even an infinity of buzz cuts cannot change the fact that, alas, sometimes websites fail. And so, the question then becomes: how do you minimize the likelihood, duration and severity of website failure?

The answer probably isn’t enough to inspire a movie. But it’s more than enough to help businesses detect and remedy underlying problems with their website before they become full-blown catastrophes: use failure analysis reports.

There are four types of failure analysis reports that every business should be generating on a regular basis: Waterfall Reports, Web Page Failure Reports, Downtime Tracking, and Failure Events.

• Waterfall Reports

Waterfall Reports enable businesses to analyze the performance of every object that loads on their web pages (e.g. scripts, stylesheets, images, etc.), in order to identify common sources of bottlenecks, errors and failures. Waterfall Reports also display HTTP response headers, which help track down the source of slowdowns and breakdowns.

• Web Page Failure Reports

Many business websites have dozens of pages, and e-commerce websites can easily have more than 50, 100, or even 1000. Manually hunting for problems can be tedious and futile. That’s where Web Page Failure Reports come to the rescue. They often contain a screenshot of data a page might display during a failure event log. This information can then be used to fix issues before they trigger visitor/ customer rage.

• Downtime Tracking

No, Downtime Tracking isn’t the name of one of those bands that never smile when they sing. Rather, it’s a type of report that contains statistics on website and server downtime. Understanding the size, scope and source of downtime issues is critical to resolving them.  

• Failure Event Logs

Knowing that a web page — or element(s) within a web page — are failing is important, but it’s not the full story. Failure Event Logs fill in the gaps by providing detailed information about what tests were performed, the geographical locations affected, and the errors identified.

The Bottom Line

Are failure analysis reports as gripping and captivating as Apollo 13? No. Are they vital to website performance and business success? Yes. Because while website failure is unfortunately an occasional option, it absolutely cannot become a regular habit.

At AlertBot, we provide our customers with all of these failure analysis reports (and more) so they can get ahead of problems and avoid catastrophes. Start a free trial today.

Louis is a writer, author, and avid film fan. He has been writing professionally for tech blogs and local organizations for over a decade. Louis currently resides in Allentown, PA, with his wife and German Shepherd Einstein, where he writes articles for InfoGenius, Inc, and overthinks the mythos of his favorite fandoms.

3 Reasons Why It’s a Bad Idea to Buy Site Monitoring from Your Web Host

by Louis Kingston

For baseball pitchers, the two most glorious words in the English language are “perfect game.” For actors, it’s “Oscar win” (forget all that nonsense about how “it’s an honor just to be nominated.”). For school-aged kids, it’s “snow day.” And for businesses, of course, it’s “captive audience.”

Indeed, it doesn’t matter how compelling or clever a marketing and advertising campaign might be. If audiences don’t take notice and pay attention, it may as well not exist. And if you doubt this, think of the last time you sat through 20 minutes of movie trailers — not because you wanted to, but because there was nowhere else to go (at least, not without saying “excuse me…” 10 times as you painfully twisted and squirmed your way past annoyed fellow moviegoers).

Why does this matter? It’s because your web host is singing from the captive audience songbook when it repeatedly urges you to add site monitoring to your existing hosting package. At first glance, this may seem like a good idea. After all, you know that site monitoring is important. Why not just grab it from your web host, the same way you grab a side order of fries from a fast food restaurant? Well here’s why not:

1. Lack of Specialization

Your web host doesn’t specialize in site monitoring, which means they aren’t using the latest technology or hiring the most qualified professionals. Just as you wouldn’t want your doctor to sell you a timeshare during an exam (“You know what might help that bronchitis? Two weeks a year in a sunny and warm Florida condo, as you can see from this lovely brochure”), you don’t want your site monitoring company to do anything but site monitoring. It’s not something anyone should be dabbling in.

2. Lack of Service Offering

When web hosts offer site monitoring, they typically focus on uptime. But site monitoring isn’t just about letting you know when your site goes dark. It’s also about making sure that your site is performing the way it’s supposed to — which means that all elements are functional (e.g. buttons, forms, multi-step processes, etc.), and all pages are loading rapidly. Without this critical information, you may believe that everything with your site is fine and all lights are green; that is, until you begin hearing from irate customers and start losing sales.

3. Potential Conflict of Interest

Last but not least, your site host is supposed to meet an uptime standard as part of their service commitment. But if that same host is also monitoring your site performance, they may be less inclined to be completely transparent if they fall below this standard. And if they did fudge some of the numbers, how would you even know? With this in mind, are we saying that all hosts that offer site monitoring are unethical? Absolutely not. Are we saying that there is an inherent conflict of interest that should be at least concerning and troubling? You bet.

The Simple, Smart Solution

The best (and really, the only) way to solve this problem is to avoid it completely — which means not site monitoring from your host, and instead getting it from a proven, reputable vendor that:

• Specializes in site monitoring — it’s all they do 24/7/365.
• Offers both uptime monitoring and comprehensive performance monitoring — not just the former.
• Has zero conflict of interest telling you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth regarding how your site is doing.

Ready to safeguard and strengthen your business with world-class, surprisingly affordable site monitoring? Then you’re ready for AlertBot! We check all of these boxes, and are trusted by some of the world’s biggest companies. Start your free trial now.

Louis is a writer, author, and avid film fan. He has been writing professionally for tech blogs and local organizations for over a decade. Louis currently resides in Allentown, PA, with his wife and German Shepherd Einstein, where he writes articles for InfoGenius, Inc, and overthinks the mythos of his favorite fandoms.