Testing

Testing tasks

Now that you've done all the heavy lifting, how do ensure your website is a hit with the people who matter the most—your users?

Ensure your website functions well with user tests

Once you’ve designed a viable website, test it out with real users before sharing it with the world. Pre-launch testing lets you analyze how well your design is functioning, make last-minute adjustments, address bugs and glitches that come up, and make sure your customers have the best possible experience when it goes live.

"Take advantage of the various tools that exist—heatmaps, for example—and have people not involved in the website design process use it before it goes live. If you find that users are rage-clicking in some areas, or never visiting others, the web development team will gain valuable insight that will drive necessary course corrections before a site is live—significantly improving the user journey and user experience with a given site."

Conducting pre-launch testing with people who didn’t participate in the design process is the only way to eliminate bias and make sure you get genuine user feedback about how well your site is working.

Try these techniques:

Lab observation sessions: observe users as they engage with your site in-person. Then ask interview questions about their experience to get more context.

Remote observation: use Hotjar’s Observe tools like

Heatmaps⁠

and

Session Recordings⁠

to get a granular view into how research participants are navigating your site. Recordings show you every movement a user takes, so you can spot blockers, pinpoint areas for improvement and ask follow-up questions.

Surveys: have participants carry out certain actions on your site, then give them a survey to fill out based on their product experience. You can also include short onsite surveys to get feedback on important pages and website elements while users are engaging with them. Use Hotjar’s Ask tools to place non-intrusive

Surveys⁠

Feedback widgets⁠

at key points in the user journey.

Beta testing: soft-launch your website as a

minimum viable product (MVP)⁠

to a limited group of users. Collect their feedback periodically and ask them to report bugs and problems as they arise.

Functionality Checklist

Functionality Checklist

Name

Link

Notes

Check submission forms and feedback

Open

Check Storage and email notifications

Open

Check Auto Responders

Open

Test Internal Links (open in new tab)

Open

Test Social Media Links

Open

Click header logo to see if it links to homepage

Open

Test Loading Speed

Open

Check 404 Redirects

Open

Test Integrations

Open

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