Army.mil – Usability Case Study

Jun 19, 2013

If you want to make a website more efficient and user friendly, then it’s not enough just to have your most valuable information on the site. People are busy—they want to find what they’re looking for, and they want it fast. You don’t always need to redesign an entire site to make things easier to find. Sometimes, a few small changes can do the trick.

The DigitalGov User Experience team looked at Army.mil and recommended a few minor changes, which added significantly to the website’s success. After some tests were completed, and data was collected, the First Fridays and Army.mil teams together identified the two most significant usability problems, and some possible solutions to solve them. 
<h2>
  Problem 1: Top Page Elements Visually Distracting and Not Related to Top Tasks
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<p>
  The &#8220;My.Army.mil&#8221; and &#8220;Hot Topic&#8221; elements at the top of the page were visually distracting and took up a lot of room, despite not being related to top tasks.
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<h2>
  Solution 1: Remove Distracting Elements
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<p>
  The Army simply removed these elements to give the rest of the information on the page more prominence.
</p>

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  <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2013/12/army.mil-before.png">

  Screenshot of Army.mil before user testing.


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<h2>
  Problem 2: Users Not Able to Find Information on Family Benefits
</h2>

<p>
  Users were not finding important information because it was buried too deep on the site.
</p>

<h2>
  Solution 2: Add &#8216;Quick Links&#8217; Section with Popular Information
</h2>

<div>
  After removing the two distracting items in Solution #1 above, they added a &#8220;Quick Links&#8221; section on their homepage, which has information ranked by popular searches done on the site. This took information that was &#8220;buried&#8221; deeper on the site and brought it up to the homepage, reducing the time users needed to find this critical information.
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  <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/digitalgov/_legacy-img/2013/12/army.mil-after.png">

  Screenshot of Army.mil after user testing.


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Originally posted by Jonathan Rubin on Jun 19, 2013
Jun 19, 2013