Do you find that your reporting tools indicate an application is performing as expected, yet your end users still complain about performance, usability, and availability?

Application performance monitoring tools take into account factors that influence the end user experience, but they are blind to what the end user actually sees. Issues that impact user perception include:

• Slow transaction times
• Cumbersome navigation
• System errors
• Unintuitive interfaces

Performance teams must align Service Level Agreements (SLAs) with the actual user experience, plus they need to accelerate root cause analysis, report accurate and meaningful metrics, and manage the costs required to run the application. All of these goals depend on measurable end user performance data. Without it, many discussions regarding performance are based on user impressions, limited visual observations, and occasional stopwatch timings. Application Performance teams need to base decisions on grounded data, not inaccurate extrapolations that lead to ill-advised actions. Knoa Experience and Performance Management (EPM) solutions provide a comprehensive and accurate view of enterprise applications, from the end user perspective. Knoa EPM captures end-to-end transaction response times, ecosystem and application errors, and a time-synchronized workflow-from all users, all locations, all the time. Knoa EPM gives you global performance profiling. Without any scripting, configuring or training, Knoa presents accurate, response times, as experienced by the end users, for every transaction. The Knoa Management Dashboard presents the comprehensive metrics detailed metrics in multiple high-level views, which allow you to spot trends and hotspots:

• Response times by transaction, end user, location, and application instance
• Response times across a specified date range
• Response times by location
• Response times by top users

Knoa's optional Alerting capability allow you to take proactive measures to keep response times within target ranges - before end users experience become aware of any performance issues. What is often too overlooked in the performance management discipline is that application performance is just one of the key drivers of return on investment (ROI) from enterprise applications. Of course, an efficient, responsive infrastructure, and a well-performing application are necessary. But, it's all for naught if you do not build and sustain adoption and efficient and effective use of the application by your end users. So user performance is also critical. A comprehensive performance management strategy must reach beyond infrastructure and application performance to the monitor, measure and manage how end users are utilizing the application to optimize business process execution. Knoa EPM provides a complete picture of end user experience by focusing on both the experience the end user receives from the application and the performance the end user achieves working with the application.

Accelerate root cause analysis by isolating the impact of user behavior on performance. Determine whether multiple applications were being run on a user's PC at the time of an issue. Deliver the most impactful improvements first by conducting global application performance profiling.Improve issue prioritization by profiling which transactions are used the most frequently. Measure the impact of system errors on end user productivity. Report accurate, comprehensive metrics that align SLAs with end user reality. Gather comprehensive metrics to report performance and ROI.

Knoa enables you to ensure the apps are working effectively and that users are working with them as intended. Take your performance support to the next level by employing some of these best practices.

1. Proactively contact end users who are having problems
   Use Knoa EPM key performance indicators to receive alerts when transactions exceed warning thresholds. With the Knoa Utilization Report, you can identify the exact end users affected and proactively inform them of the issue and next steps. This outreach reduces 'noise' from the support process, eliminates unnecessary and repetitive support calls, and helps reduce user frustration.
   

2. Validate whether a reported performance problem is widespread or an anomaly.
   If an end user reports that the system is slow or presenting errors, you can run a Knoa inquiry that compares that end user's experience with those of a peer group. You can also compare a location or department against a similar group to determine whether an anomaly or unrelated issue is at the root of the issue.
   

3. Periodically review response time trends and develop action plans when necessary.
   On a regular basis, investigate response time by functional categories, like "execute", "navigate", and "save". The insight may reveal a big opportunity to improve response time.

4. Determine whether the application or the end user is at the core of an issue Knoa research indicates that end user behavior is often the cause of reported issues. Run a Knoa inquiry that compares the experience and performance of a specific user to that of a peer group including:
   • Active utilization
   • Response time
   • System errors
   • User errors

This information will enable the support team to eliminate end user errors before investing in back-end root cause analysis. Accelerate root cause analysis by isolating the impact of user behavior on performance. Determine whether multiple applications were being run on a user's PC at the time of an issue. Deliver the most impactful improvements first by conducting global application performance profiling.

Improve issue prioritization by profiling which transactions are used the most frequently. Measure the impact of system errors on end user productivity. Report accurate, comprehensive metrics that align SLAs with end user reality. Gather comprehensive metrics to report performance and ROI.