Case Study 3 - Root Cause Analysis - E-commerce App Cart Additions 15% declined

Flipkart observed a ~15% decline in “cart additions” (users adding items to their cart) over the last three days, primarily on the mobile app. ⸻ Diagnostic Approach by Candidate: 1. Clarification of Metrics: • Ensured clear definition of “cart additions.” • Confirmed the issue is specific to the mobile app, not the website. 2. Initial Checks: • Analytics tools were functioning normally—no logging issues. • Competition, campaigns, and sales events didn’t indicate any correlation. • No noticeable decline among specific user segments or locations. 3. App-Specific Investigation: • Inquired about recent app updates. Flipkart had indeed pushed major updates on both Android and iOS, especially focused on improving the checkout flow. • Issue was observed only on Android, not iOS. 4. Bug Reports: • Post-update, there was a spike in bug reports, particularly related to payment and checkout issues. 5. User Journey Deep Dive: • Hypothesized that the issue could be in the transition from viewing a product to adding it to the cart. • Explored visibility and functionality of the “Add to Cart” button on the product listing pages. • Suggested checking event logging to trace the user action flow—whether users were clicking “Add to Cart” and if the event was successfully registering. 6. Key Insight: • Data showed no cart additions on a specific Android app version, strongly suggesting the bug was introduced in that release. • Candidate concluded the likely issue lies with the Add to Cart functionality being broken or not triggering the backend event correctly. ⸻ Resolution Direction: Candidate recommended deep event flow analysis on the Android app version to confirm where the “Add to Cart” interaction is breaking. The Interviewer confirmed this diagnosis as accurate. ⸻ Takeaway: A structured approach—starting from metric definition, segmentation, external/internal changes, and finally drilling into the app flow—helped accurately identify that a recent Android app update likely broke the cart addition functionality. ⸻ Let me know if you want this turned into a carousel or case study format.