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7 basic techniques to test your company’s website

Having a website that performs to its optimum capabilities is essential for a business. With customers flocking online to shop, it’s vital that not only is your website streamlined to run quicker for improved usage, but that it’s also capable of handling fluctuations in traffic.

A great web page isn’t only based on how it looks; it is also hugely important to have a site that runs efficiently. You may have a variety of different media on the homepage, such as videos, advertisements and scrolling banners, but they will all be useless if the site takes an age to load.

Having a streamlined website is essential, so conducting tests to ensure its running smoothly should be high on the list of a business’ priority. Here are a few basic checks you can conduct to test your company’s website. For more information, be sure to click here to learn more about web performance services from the NCC Group.

Check at home

Checking the speed and loading time of your website at work is all well and good, but at this location it’s likely you’ll have high-performance internet in place to meet the needs of day-to-day business. However, this won’t be the same for customers using slower domestic internet connections?

Check to see how your website performs on the network at home to see if there is a drastic change.

Ask friends and relatives across the country

Again, checking at home is fine, but your internet speed isn’t the same as everyone else’s. If you have friends and family based in the countryside, ask them to see how well your site performs. In some locations, the connection speed might be of a poorer quality, so having an optimised site is vital, especially since it’s these customers who are likely to use online services for shopping due to their location.

Use any device you can get your hands on

Your website might perform brilliantly on a laptop, but what about on any other connected device? Tablets, phablets and smartphones are becoming increasingly popular, with Time magazine, using statistics from NPD DisplaySearch, noting that the rising consumer interest in larger smartphones (phablets) has pushed worldwide tablet sales to just a mere 56 million. Therefore, having a page optimised for access from these devices is hugely important, so make sure you check its functionality on each.

Go to a public Wi-Fi spot

It’s rare that you’ll find a coffee shop anywhere in the UK that doesn’t offer free Wi-Fi. For many, there is nothing better than relaxing with a tall mocha and surfing the net on their tablet.

This is why you need to make sure your webpage performs admirably on public Wi-Fi networks. You don’t want someone airing his or her frustrations in public about your websites’ slow loading speed!

Use a free page analyser tool

Perhaps the most comprehensive and simple check you can do is using a free page analyser tool, such as the one offered by NCC Group. It only takes a couple of seconds and requires a URL address and a selection for a desired connection speed. This way, you can check your site’s performance under a number of different circumstances.

Try the site with and without media

If you are able to edit the website yourself, why not try and load it up and navigate it with and without media devices? If the impact on speed is minimal, the videos and scrolling banners might be worth keeping. If it increases lag significantly with the media in place, consider getting rid.

Try the site at different hours during the day

Obviously, people use the web at different times during the day, so it’s worth testing it out over a 24-hour period.

Remember, it’s not only the usage that differs, but also how we go online that changes too, as illustrated here by Comscore, so be sure to use a range of devices.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Will Hemner .