"Today's complex, dynamic applications start with a user perspective, not an old style data-center-first view," Van Siclen says. "Rather than simply react to problems after they have impacted users, new generation APM is designed to optimize the speed of key transactions, proactively fix issues before they impact users and dramatically reduce the time it takes to get new features and functions to market."

Before implementing Compuware dynaTrace, Grau says Cars.com's monitoring system was basically his boss.

"He'd stop by my desk or call me and say, "Hey, the website is having issues,"" Grau says. "He'd always know before I did. It got pretty frustrating."

Now, Grau says, he always knows what is going on with the organization's applications and his team is able to proactively fix issues before they become noticeable to users.