Orange County Register

Ever gone on a four-month test drive? Folks at the Register have, at least in the digital sense.

We’ve conducted several rounds of user tests to discover what people like and what’s missing from our new OCRegister.com beta site, and the train keeps a rolling. We want to hear from you, too.

It’s time to tap into your inner “Lewis and Clark” by navigating through the beta site and telling us what you think. Do you like the new design (pictured at left)? Do you know how to personalize the home page? Do you know where to find news pertaining to the OC neighborhood you live in? Do you think the content within these city pages is useful? What’s missing?

Use the real-time chat and feedback e-mail for individual questions, or share it in the comments area of this blog if you think others in the community might share your sentiments. As we’ve done in the past few months, we’ll make adjustments based on the feedback we receive prior to the Nov. 9 launch.

Even after the launch, we’ll continue listening, tweaking and improving our new baby (the beta test phase is akin to taking prenatal classes before the birth, if you will).

Luckily, we’ve had a little practice leading up to the beta launch. We first surveyed a small group of Register Insiders on July 1-2. We also invited people who regularly go to ocregister.com, as well as people who rarely or never go there. We asked to find certain content within the new site and evaluated how they found it – i.e. how easy or difficult it was to find.

Employees from each division of Orange County Register Communications also participated in two rounds of usability tests (because it’s safe to say folks here have a vested interest in our site as well).

Here’s a snapshot of comments that came from our usability tests, and some updates we made based on what we heard:

A sampling of users’ comments:

• “It’s more appealing to the eye and better organized”
• “It’s more interactive”
• “This looks more professional. The (current site) looks high-schoolish”
• “There’s a lot you can do with it”
• “(Content boxes are) organized like a file cabinet” (referring to ability to add, minimize, expand or remove sections)

A few updates to the beta site as a result of users’ feedback:

• “EDIT” was added alongside black arrow icons located within section content boxes (several people couldn’t find the standalone icons along top right of each section box. When they were pointed out, survey respondents didn’t understand what they were for. Adding “EDIT” to this area clarifies this is a place to add, edit, minimize or remove content sections)
• Classified tab at top of home page renamed from “Home” to “Real Estate,” to avoid confusion with the other HOME reference in the main blue navigation bar at the top of the home page.

What do you think? What would make the site more useful to you? Share your thoughts below.

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