Test results for Small business support - find information

Here is the table of test results for this task. The score on each row is out of a possible total of 20, and the importance column is a rating of 1-5 according to how important testers considered being able to complete this task was.

Filter within results: or click headings to sort.

CouncilNavigationA-ZGoogleSite searchScoreTestsImportance
Barnsley Metropolitan Borough CouncilEasyDifficultVery easy120
Birmingham City CouncilGave upEasyGave up23
Birmingham City CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy13
Bracknell Forest CouncilEasyVery easyEasy93
Bracknell Forest CouncilEasyVery easyVery easy163
Bracknell Forest CouncilEasyEasyEasy123
Carlisle City CouncilDifficultEasyDifficult63
Chelmsford City CouncilEasyVery easyVery easy180
Cheshire East CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy203
Cheshire West and Chester CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy53
Copeland Borough CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy153
Coventry City CouncilEasyEasyDifficult80
Coventry City CouncilDifficultVery easyVery easy163
Coventry City CouncilEasyVery easyEasy140
Darlington Borough CouncilGave upVery easyVery easy33
Devon County CouncilVery easyEasyVery easy30
East Lindsey District CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy50
Essex County CouncilEasyDifficultEasy80
Great Yarmouth Borough CouncilEasyEasyEasy123
Greater London AuthorityVery easyVery easyVery easy33
Harrow CouncilVery easyVery easyEasy63
Harrow CouncilVery easyEasyEasy93
Ipswich Borough CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy31
Liverpool City CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy203
London Borough of LewishamVery easyVery easyVery easy201
Manchester City CouncilVery easyDifficultDifficult73
Neath Port Talbot County Borough CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy80
Newark and Sherwood District CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy150
Newcastle City CouncilVery easyVery easyVery easy201
North Lincolnshire Council
Plymouth City CouncilVery easyEasyDifficult73
Tandridge District CouncilVery easyEasyEasy90
Wandsworth CouncilEasyDifficultVery easy143

Specific comments made about this task

Birmingham City Council - 2013-12-02
Internal search took me to the business library page under leisure and tourism

Birmingham City Council - 2016-07-18
Was very easy to find the relevant section, but the first substantive page I looked at said 'applications are now open until November 2013!'

Bracknell Forest Council - 2014-03-05
quite long and nothing specifically for small businesses

Bracknell Forest Council - 2014-03-12
Content relates to businesses in general rather than specifically "small" businesses

Copeland Borough Council - 2014-02-12
Notwithstanding having had such a poor experience in testing other aspects of this site, I was actually quite impressed with how easy it was to navigate to complete this task and the range of information offered. As with some other tasks, the external Google search revealed more information than the internal search.

Coventry City Council - 2013-12-24
Unclear what is meant by 'support' (Advice? Grants? Loans?)

Coventry City Council - 2014-02-06
This was a very easy task to search apart from the A-Z (that could have been more specific). There could have been a heading saying 'Business Support' but there wasn't. Instead, it said other ones and you didn't know which one to click on. The most relevant ones came at the top of the Internal and Google searches so it was easy. The Naviagtion home page result was very easy even though there was alot of straight forward clicking. It was well organised and in the section you'd expect it to be in (The 'Business and Licensing ' one). Just the A-Z needs improving but I assume most people wouldn't pick this as the first method but would do the Google search or the Internal search as the first ones followed by the Naviagation result and then the A-Z (which was the least helpful of the four).

Devon County Council - 2013-12-06
the council has two sites in this area - the main site and one called investdevon...

Essex County Council - 2014-02-05
Too many clicks to find key information. Lots of diversion to other sites. One branch takes you to a site called Essex Business Support - which seems like another collection of links - whilst another takes you to Business Link - well, it actually takes you to the GOV.UK home page. Search box contrast is not very good but the search term pointed at the relevant page. Essex Business Support uses Flash for navigation though thankfully there is a non-Flash alternative - but you have to click on a link to get to the navigation. Please don't make me use an A to Z! Though in this case, nice short relevant list and "Business advice and support" was the right page.

Harrow Council - 2013-12-17
Not much actual information.

Liverpool City Council - 2015-01-15
The information is easy to find.

Manchester City Council - 2013-12-17
More lists in a random order rather than alphabetical order.

Newark and Sherwood District Council - 2015-08-18
excellent website. modern, up-to-date, easy to use

North Lincolnshire Council - 2014-02-26
hard to navigate to from homepage, nothing obvious in the A-Z under either S or B, site search produced no useful results, google search produced a link in the top ten but on investigation a higher rated link to ainvestinnorthernlincolnshire also appeared to be a council site but this wasn't obvious as there was no reference to the council on the site.