So you’ve done the hard work. You’ve worked with your designers and developers and the site is finally looking the way you dreamed. But before you send your new baby out into the world, it is vital that you do your own pre-launch tests.
Your developers should have tests of their own. It should be more detailed than yours – the Little Fire Digital test list is 74 tests long (longer for e-commerce). But still, your network may differ from theirs; your browsers may be different from theirs – it is almost impossible to pick up every client-side scenario.
We use BrowserStack to test websites – it offers well over 100 test platforms (including a huge array of touch-screen devices). If we were to run all our tests on all those devices, we would need to run tens of thousands of steps. No one has the budget – so we target a range of major browsers and software.
So, before launching a website, conducting your own pre-launch tests is crucial to ensure it is fully functional, user-friendly, and optimised for search engines. Here’s a checklist of key pre-launch tests you should consider:
1. Functionality Testing
- Links: Broken links look unprofessional and harm both your Search Engine Rankings and client trust. Testing all internal and external links on anything other than a tiny website is very long-winded. But ensuring they are not broken and lead to the correct pages is vital. SEO software like SemRush will audit your site and locate broken links for you – your developer should have an eye on this.
- Forms: Check all forms (contact, registration, etc.) to ensure they capture and submit data as intended. Because these are hidden settings, developers and clients often miss them.
- Search Functionality: If your site has a search feature, test it with various keywords to ensure it returns accurate results. This is something you are more likely to be able to test well than your developers.
2. Usability Testing
Usability testing is tricky. By the time a site is ready to launch, it is likely that both you, the client, and your developers will be very familiar with it. If at all possible, you need to organise at least some hallway testing. Anyone who hasn’t used the site before will be in a much better position to test the following:
- Navigation: Is the site’s navigation intuitive, and do the menus and buttons work correctly?
- Content: Review all text for typos, grammar errors and readability. Ensure the content layout is consistent across the site. Again, you will know your business and content better than your developers.
- Mobile Responsiveness: Test your website on various devices (phones, tablets) to ensure it looks and functions well on all screen sizes. As we detailed above, you may have different devices and screen sizes than those your developers use – it may have passed all their tests, yet still look different on your iPad.
3. Performance Testing
- Load Time: Use tools like Google PageSpeed Insights or GTmetrix to test your site’s loading speed and implement their optimisation suggestions.
- Stress Testing: Evaluate how your site performs under high-traffic conditions. Tools like K6 can simulate multiple users accessing your site simultaneously.
Resolving performance issues can take time and involve a fair degree of interference with the underlying page structure. A site should be retested after performance tuning. These are developer-level tests but, if your site is performing well, they are likely to boast about the site’s performance. If they don’t, you should ask the question.
4. SEO and Analytics Testing
- SEO Basics: Check that all pages have meta titles and descriptions, headers, and alt text for optimised images for your target keywords. Again, for even quite a small site, SemRush or similar software will help identify SEO opportunities and failures.
- Sitemap and Robots.txt: Ensure your sitemap is up to date and correctly submitted to search engines via Google Search Console. Also, verify that your robots.txt file is correctly configured to allow or disallow search engine crawlers as needed.
- Analytics: Set up Google Analytics, or your preferred analytics tool, and ensure it tracks data across the site correctly.
5. Security Testing
- SSL Certificate: Verify that your SSL certificate is correctly installed, and your site is accessible via HTTPS to ensure data is securely encrypted.
- Vulnerability Scan: Use security tools to scan your website for vulnerabilities that hackers could exploit.
6. Compliance and Accessibility Testing
- Legal Compliance: Ensure your site complies with legal requirements, such as GDPR, CCPA, or other relevant privacy regulations, including having a privacy policy and cookie consent where required.
- Accessibility: Test your website against WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) to ensure it is accessible to people with disabilities. Tools like the WAVE Web Accessibility Evaluation Tool can help with this.
7. Cross-Browser Testing
- Compatibility: Test your website on each of the major browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge) and versions to ensure consistent performance and appearance.
8. Backup and Recovery
- Backup Systems: Ensure that your website’s backup systems are working correctly, and you can restore from a backup if needed.
You won’t be able to complete all these tests yourself – you’ll need your developers to prove that some are satisfied. However, conducting these pre-launch tests can help identify and rectify issues before your website goes live, ensuring a smooth launch and a positive user experience from day one.