Change of season at ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Weather website
A few weeks ago we announced that we were making some improvements to the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳'s Weather website, including a clearer, more focused design of the homepage.
Since then we've been running a "beta" version of the new site to allow us to try out these new features and listen to your comments and feedback. Following that successful trial period, I'm pleased to say that we are launching the new weather site today.
We've had a great response to the beta site which has received around 230,000 visitors per week and I'd like to thank those who have taken the time to try it out and give us your comments. These figures are very similar to the numbers of people who have tested beta versions of the new iPlayer site and the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ homepage, which shows how many of you value the weather website.
We've worked hard to improve the functionality of the site, whilst retaining all of the more detailed forecast information such as humidity, pressure and visibility. The majority of the feedback we've received has been very positive with many users saying that a variety of information can be accessed at a glance, they like the design and perhaps most importantly, the website is clearer and easier to use.
I've blogged about the key improvements to the site previously but as a reminder these are:
• A more focused and clear homepage design giving instant access to a five day forecast and a video forecast.
• Easily personalised forecast favourites which allow you to save a range of locations to appear in the drop down menu.
• Improved navigation across the site allowing more editorial content, including audience pictures on the homepage.
We've listened to your suggestions while the beta site has been live and also implemented some changes that were already in the pipeline such as the print function and the full UK forecast map.
Although we're launching the new site officially today, we'll continue to look at ways to improve the site and there are aspects that we'll continue to work on over the coming weeks. These include making the maps load more smoothly and developing a mobile version of the site.
In addition to these improvements, we want to hear your views on the new site and we'll continue to monitor your feedback, we're using the #bbcweather hashtag on Twitter to group conversation, or you can comment below.
Liz Howell is head of ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ Weather.
