The Importance of Testing Your Website (and Why Most Small Businesses Skip It)
TL;DR – Quick Version for Busy People
Short version: If you don’t test your website properly, you’re probably losing customers without even realising it. Broken links, confusing wording, spelling mistakes, and pages that don’t work properly all quietly push people away.
Website testing isn’t just for tech teams or big companies. It’s something every small business should do regularly. It means checking your links, reading your content properly, making sure everything works, and confirming your website actually says what you meant it to say. Not what you accidentally typed at 11pm on a Tuesday.
In this post, we’ll go through the different types of website testing in a simple, practical way. We’ll look at checking internal and external links, proofreading for spelling and grammar, and something even more important: making sure your content actually makes sense to someone else. We’ll also talk about why getting someone unfamiliar with your business to test your site can be one of the smartest moves you make.
If your website is meant to bring in enquiries or customers, then testing it properly is not optional. It’s one of the easiest ways to improve trust, boost conversions, and stop people clicking away.
Why Testing Your Website Actually Matters More Than You Think
It’s easy to think of your website as something you “set and forget”. You build it, you like how it looks, and then you move on to everything else in your business. But the reality is that your website is more like a shopfront than a poster. People walk in (or click in), look around, and instantly decide whether they trust you or not.
If something is broken, confusing, or just slightly off, visitors won’t usually tell you. They just leave. That’s why testing matters so much. It helps you catch the little problems before they quietly cost you customers.
Think about how people behave online. They are impatient. If a page takes too long to load, they’re gone. If a button doesn’t work, they’re gone. If your wording is unclear, they might stay—but they’ll feel unsure about buying from you. That uncertainty is enough to lose a sale.
Testing your website isn’t about being perfectionist for the sake of it. It’s about removing friction. Every broken link fixed, every typo corrected, every confusing sentence improved is one less reason for someone to leave.
It also affects credibility. A clean, working, well-written site gives the impression that your business is organised and reliable. A messy one does the opposite, even if your actual service is brilliant.
And here’s the key point: most business owners are too close to their own content to see the issues. You know what you meant when you wrote it, so your brain “fills in the gaps”. Your customers don’t have that advantage. That’s why structured testing is so important—it forces you to look at your site through fresh eyes.
Testing Internal Links – Making Sure Your Website Actually Works
Internal links are the links that connect pages within your own website. Things like “About Us”, “Services”, “Contact”, blog posts, or product pages. When they work properly, they guide people smoothly through your site. When they don’t, it feels like walking through a shop where half the doors are locked or getting part way down a road to find a road closed sign.
Testing internal links is one of the simplest but most overlooked parts of website maintenance. You’d be surprised how often links break after updates, page moves, or small edits. A page might get renamed, deleted, or shifted, and suddenly a link leads nowhere. That’s frustrating for visitors and damaging for trust.
A good way to manually test internal links is to go through your website like a customer. Don’t use shortcuts. Click everything on the menus and links on the page content. Start from your homepage and move page by page. Ask yourself: does this take me where I expect to go? Does it feel natural, or am I getting lost?
Another useful method is to imagine different customer journeys. For example, someone might land on a blog post first, not your homepage. From there, can they easily find your services? Can they contact you without hunting around?
It also helps to think about mobile users. A link might work fine on desktop but be awkward or hidden on a phone. Testing across devices is important because many users are browsing on mobile now.
If you want to go a step further, you can even ask someone else in your team to test the site without guidance. Don’t explain anything—just see if they can naturally navigate it. If they get stuck, that’s valuable feedback.
Personally I use a tool called Xenu Link Sleuth that runs on Windows and walks through a site a page at a time and checks all the links on the page – it’s been around for a long while (I think I first used it back in the late 90’s) and is something I have installed on every Windows PC I’ve used since. You can read more about it at https://home.snafu.de a/tilman/xenulink.html and download it from the same place. There are other tools that do a similar job but the advantage of Xenu, at least in my eyes, is that it does one job and does it very well.
The goal here is simple: every internal link should feel like a clear next step, not a guessing game. When your internal structure works well, your website starts to feel effortless to use—and that’s when people are more likely to stick around and buy from you.
External Links – Trust, Reputation, and Not Sending People Into Dead Ends
External links are the links that take people away from your website to somewhere else. This might be your social media pages, booking systems, payment providers, partner sites, or useful resources you reference in your content.
At first glance, external links might not seem as important as internal ones, but they actually play a big role in trust. If you send someone to another website and it doesn’t work, loads slowly, or goes to the wrong place, it reflects badly on you—even though it’s not technically your fault.
Testing external links is about making sure that every path you send your visitors down actually works. Click them all. Don’t assume they’re fine just because they worked last year. Websites change constantly, and third-party services update their URLs more often than you’d expect.
It’s also worth thinking about relevance. Just because a link works doesn’t mean it’s still useful. Maybe you linked to an article or tool that has since been replaced by something better. Keeping external links updated helps your site feel current and well cared for.
Another important detail is user experience. When someone clicks an external link, do you want them to stay on your site in another tab, or leave completely? Small choices like opening links in a new tab can make a big difference to how long people stay connected to your business.
And here’s something people often forget: external links are part of your brand experience. If you send users to low-quality or spammy websites, it can affect how they perceive your professionalism. You’re effectively saying, “I trust this place enough to send you there”, so it needs to be a good match.
So testing external links isn’t just a technical task—it’s about protecting your reputation and making sure every recommendation you make still earns its place.
Spelling and Grammar – The Small Errors That Cause Big Doubts
Spelling and grammar mistakes might seem minor, but they have a surprisingly big impact on how people perceive your business. A single typo won’t ruin your reputation, but a pattern of errors can make your site feel rushed or unprofessional.
When testing for spelling and grammar, the key is not just running a tool and calling it done. Automated checkers are helpful, but they don’t catch everything. They won’t always understand context, tone, or whether a sentence actually reads naturally.
A practical approach is to read your content out loud. It sounds simple, but it works incredibly well. When you read silently, your brain tends to skip over mistakes because it already knows what you intended to say. Reading out loud forces you to slow down and actually hear the sentence. You could even move your finger over the words as you read them as this also makes you slow down.
You should also look out for consistency. Are you using UK English spelling throughout? For example here are 10 common UK vs US spelling differences:
- colour (UK) ? color (US)
- favour (UK) ? favor (US)
- centre (UK) ? center (US)
- organise (UK) ? organize (US)
- realise (UK) ? realize (US)
- defence (UK) ? defense (US)
- licence (UK noun) ? license (US noun + verb)
- travelling (UK) ? traveling (US)
- metre (UK) ? meter (US)
- programme (UK general use) ? program (US)
Are you switching between formal and informal tone without meaning to? These things can make your site feel slightly uneven, even if the content is technically correct.
Another useful tip is to break your content into smaller chunks when reviewing. Don’t try to edit an entire page in one go. Focus on one paragraph at a time. This stops your brain from getting overwhelmed and missing errors.
It’s also worth remembering that grammar isn’t just about correctness—it’s about clarity. A grammatically “correct” sentence can still be confusing if it’s too long or awkwardly structured. Sometimes the best fix is simply rewriting it in a more natural way.
Ultimately, spelling and grammar testing is about respect for your reader. It shows that you care enough to make your message clear and easy to follow. And in a world where people judge websites in seconds, that clarity really matters.
Proofreading for Meaning – Are You Actually Saying What You Think You’re Saying?
This is the stage of testing that most people skip, and it’s probably the most important one. Proofreading for meaning isn’t about typos or grammar. It’s about whether your content actually communicates what you intended.
It’s surprisingly easy for a sentence to be technically correct but completely unclear. This often happens when you’re too close to your own writing. You know what you meant, so your brain automatically fills in missing context that your reader doesn’t have.
A good way to test meaning is to step back and read your content as if you know nothing about your business. Does it still make sense? Or are you relying on assumptions the reader doesn’t have?
Another useful method is to check whether your key message is obvious. For example, if a page is meant to encourage people to book a service, is that clear within the first few lines? Or is the reader left guessing what to do next?
You should also watch out for sentences that sound impressive but don’t actually say anything useful. Sometimes we write in a way that feels professional but ends up being vague. Clear usually beats clever when it comes to websites.
One simple trick is to ask: “Could someone misinterpret this?” If the answer is yes, it’s worth rewriting. Ambiguity is one of the biggest hidden conversion killers online.
This type of testing is less about rules and more about empathy. You’re trying to see your content through your customer’s eyes, not your own. And that shift in perspective can dramatically improve how effective your website becomes.
Getting Fresh Eyes – Why Someone Who Doesn’t Know Your Business Is Your Secret Weapon
No matter how carefully you test your own website, you will always miss things. That’s not a criticism—it’s just how familiarity works. When you know your business inside out, your brain fills in gaps automatically, even when they’re not really there.
This is why getting someone unfamiliar with your website to test it is one of the most powerful things you can do. Ideally, this should be someone who doesn’t know your services well. In some cases, it can even be someone completely outside your industry.
Ask them to perform simple tasks: find a service, contact you, understand what you offer, or locate pricing information. Then watch what they do without guiding them. The moments where they hesitate, click around confused, or misunderstand something are gold. That’s where your website is leaking clarity.
Fresh testers will also spot things you’ve become blind to. Maybe your navigation makes sense to you but not to them. Maybe your homepage assumes too much prior knowledge (does it say that you are an accountant / cake baker / plumber etc?). Or maybe your wording is full of internal jargon that outsiders don’t understand.
You don’t need a big focus group or expensive testing setup. Even one or two people can give you incredibly useful feedback. The key is that they think differently from you, not the same way.
It can feel slightly uncomfortable watching someone struggle with something you created, but that discomfort is exactly what makes this process valuable. It highlights real-world user experience, not your assumptions about it.
Once you see your site through fresh eyes, it becomes much easier to make meaningful improvements. And those improvements often lead directly to better engagement, more enquiries, and more sales.
Final Thoughts – Testing Isn’t a One-Off Job
Website testing isn’t something you do once and forget about. It’s an ongoing habit. Your site changes, your content evolves, and external links shift over time. What worked perfectly six months ago might not work today.
The good news is that you don’t need to spend hours on it every week. Small, regular checks are far more effective than occasional deep dives. A quick link check here, a content read-through there, and an occasional fresh set of eyes can make a huge difference over time.
Think of testing as part of running your business, not a separate task. Just like you’d check stock, respond to emails, or update pricing, your website deserves the same attention.
When you test properly, you’re not just fixing problems—you’re improving how people experience your business online. And in many cases, that experience is the first impression people will ever have of you.
A well-tested website feels smooth, clear, and trustworthy. And in a competitive online world, that’s often what makes the difference between someone clicking away and someone becoming a customer.
About the Author
John K Mitchell has been optimising websites for search engines since 1997, which was before Google even started. Coming from a programming background, John realised early on that by studying search results carefully he could begin to work out, or at least make educated guesses about, why certain pages ranked where they did.
Since then, he has worked on thousands of websites across many industries, often achieving strong search results for clients. His current figures include over 1,000 first-place rankings in Google and many rankings within the top five positions.
John is currently not looking for new clients but writes these posts to guide small business owners and help them better understand how search engines and websites work.