Renowned CX expert and New York Times bestselling author Shep Hyken asserts that "a brand is shaped by the customer's experience, and the experience is delivered by the employees." Therefore, empowering your team is critical for ensuring a seamless customer experience.
This article outlines the advantages and limitations of the popular product analytics tools Amplitude and FullStory. By reviewing essential features, pricing, use cases, and customer feedback, you can choose the most suitable option to empower your employees and, consequently, enhance the overall customer experience.
What is Amplitude?
Amplitude is a comprehensive digital analytics platform that helps companies understand the customer journey. The software provides a complete view of customer and product data using a high-performing database of digital behavior categorized into events, users, and groups. Amplitude’s intuitive customer behavior collects data, provides recommendations, and allows agents to deploy experimentation (testing) all within the platform.
What is FullStory?
FullStory is a digital experience intelligence (DXI) platform that enhances online user experiences. The software records and reproduces real-time user interactions on websites and web apps, offering insights into customer behavior. With features like session replay, heatmaps, funnels, and powerful search capabilities, FullStory enables businesses to identify usability issues, discover optimization opportunities, and make data-driven decisions to improve their customer experience.
Amplitude vs FullStory: Which is a better product analytic tool?
Both platforms share a common goal: improving the customer journey.
However, Amplitude and FullStory approach the problem differently. Amplitude is essentially an analytics tool that leverages data and personalization to hone in on user growth. On the other hand, FullStory emphasizes session replay and digital experience intelligence, allowing teams to watch user sessions to identify areas that can be improved.
Below are the essential features that will provide you with a comprehensive understanding of the strengths of each platform and how they improve your customer journey.
Amplitude features
- Customer data platform: Uses analytics to discover new audiences and sync behavior data.
- Product analytics: Leverage data to answer questions and make impactful decisions.
- Amplitude ai: Ask questions and get business insights instantly using LLMs.
- Product testing: Personalized experiments within the platform, worthy of replacing your current testing software.
- Data management: Complete view of customer and product data connected to your entire ecosystem.
FullStory features
- Session insights: Retroactive, tagless autocapture securely records all customer behaviors.
- Complete data capture: FullStory’s patented DX Data Engine automatically logs all user interactions.
- Product analytics: Data collected from recordings are accessible in user-friendly dashboards and ready to glean actionable insights from.
- Heatmaps: Engagement is mapped, identifying hot spots and filtering events into categories like dead clicks and rage clicks.
Amplitude vs FullStory: Use case comparison
Both platforms help companies understand their customers by generating user behavior data. Below are some specific use cases for Amplitude and FullStory.
Amplitude use cases
- Increase conversion rates with quantitative product insights
- Drive cross-selling for e-commerce marketplaces
- Analyze the impact of new feature releases
FullStory use cases
- Helping finserv and insurance companies to identify fraud
- Empowering online retailers to improve CX
- Optimize hyper-personalized e-gaming experience
- Make UX decisions using data
Amplitude vs FullStory: User reviews comparison
Feedback from users is an excellent way to decide if Amplitude or FullStory is the right platform to empower your employees with product analytics. Check out user reviews and ratings below.
Amplitude user reviews and rating
Amplitude Analytics has a 4.5/5 Star rating on G2 based on over 2,000 reviews. Here’s some of the positive feedback from the platform’s users:
- “Great tool for action tracking from a support standpoint.”
- “Most well-made tool for clickstream analytics.”
- “Best for event wise data tracking.”
On the flip side, some users have noted the following negatives:
- “Amplitude makes it difficult to parse out nuanced information on data”
- “No option to create a custom event on the funnel”
FullStory user reviews and rating
FullStory also has a 4.5 Star rating on G2 but is only based on 350 reviews. Here’s what FullStory users like about the software:
- “Tells full story of user’s digital experience on websites and applications.”
- “Captures everything for in-depth analytics.”
- “Extremely useful session replay.”
And here’s what some FullStory users dislike about the product:
- “Few new features and improvements.”
- “Little too expensive for its features.”
Amplitude vs FullStory: Pricing comparison
While Amplitude and FullStory each offer free starter plans, they are only meant to get a feel for the product. You’ll need to pay monthly to access the features you need to start improving your CX.
Amplitude pricing
Amplitude offers three paid tiers, starting with Plus at $49/month (annual) or $61/month (monthly). There are also Growth and Enterprise pricing options, which are custom packages and require contacting Amplitude’s sales team to determine cost.
FullStory pricing
Unfortunately, FullStory does not disclose its pricing online. However, customers have noted that the prices increased from a minimum of $199 to $899 per month. For an accurate quote, you’ll need to contact FullStory directly.
Amplitude vs FullStory: Deployment and integration comparison
One of the most significant advantages of choosing Amplitude or FullStory is how easy it is to start sending and recording user behaviors from your website or application. In addition, both project analytic tools will integrate seamlessly with your existing technology stack.
Amplitude deployment
You can send your web project’s data to Amplitude client-side, server-side, or through a third party via Segment, mParticle, or Tealium. Amplitude has native client-side SDKs for JS, Android, and iOS. For server-side deployments, you can use the HTTP API to send data directly from your server.
Amplitude data and marketing integrations
Amplitude integrates with over a hundred platforms, many of which you likely already use to generate customer data. Here are a few of the popular integrations:
- Snowflake
- Braze
- AWS S3
- Facebook Ads
- Google Analytics
- Mailchimp
FullStory deployment
Connecting FullStory to your website or application only requires copying and pasting a code snippet into your heading tag. FullStory is easily deployed into hosting platforms like Magneto and Shopify; you can find step-by-step tutorials on their Help Center.
FullStory integrations
FullStory offers 50 integrations with popular tools essential in modern digital marketing. Here are a few:
- BigCommerce
- Google Cloud
- Salesforce
- Slack
- Zendesk
Meet Fullview: The best alternative to Amplitude and FullStory
Fullview is an excellent alternative to FullStory and Amplitude for the following reasons:
- No downloads: Fullview doesn’t require downloads, everything is cloud based integrated with a simple code snippet.
- Data security: Fullview is based in the EU and is 100% GDPR compliant. It allows customers to store data on EU or US servers, depending on their requirements.
- Session replay capabilities: Fullview's standout feature is automatic session replays, capturing mouse movements, DOM events, and frustration signals for effective issue diagnosis.
- Cobrowsing: Unlike Amplitude and FullStory, Fullview enables cobrowsing calls within web apps, empowering customer support teams to efficiently and quickly solve customer support tickets with one-click screen control, while reducing the possibility of remote access scams.
- Console logs: Fullview provides comprehensive console logs during session replays and cobrowsing calls, eliminating guesswork in identifying errors and issues.
- Data blurring: Offering selective capture and blurring during cobrowsing and session replays, Fullview prioritizes user privacy and data protection.
- Cost-effective: Fullview is significantly more affordable with a forever free plan offering 1000 session replay recordings and four cobrowsing sessions per month. Paid plans start at $47 per seat for unlimited cobrowsing and $71/month for 10,000+ session replays.
- Integrations: Seamlessly integrate with popular CRM software like Intercom, Zendesk, and Salesforce to watch session replays and initiate cobrowsing calls straight from the software you already use for support.
Wrapping things up
Amplitude and FullStory are incredibly beneficial tools many companies have used to improve customer experience. However, if you are looking for a more hands-on solution that offers cobrowsing capabilities and is more cost-effective, we recommend exploring an alternative like Fullview.
Empowering your product team is an essential aspect of development. While Amplitude and FullStory allow you to gain valuable insights into user behavior, Fullview offers GDPR compliance, providing extra protection for your client’s data. Regardless of your chosen platform, you are well on your way to better understanding your user’s behaviors and dramatically improving the overall customer experience.
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Sources Last checked on date: 18-Oct-2023