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Usability Testing ofRMA’s Website
What We’ve Learned So Far forwww.rma.usda.gov
Janet StevensRMA Website Project Manager
What Is Usability?• The measure of the quality of a user's
experience when interacting with a product or system, such as a web site, a software application, mobile technology, or any user-operated device.
Why Usability Testing?• People cannot find the information they seek
on web sites about 60% of the time. Could ours be that bad or worse?
• For 42 major sites where usability had been emphasized at the design stage, they performed 135 percent better on average. Could we see comparable traffic gains?
• More than 90% of users went to only 1% of the Microsoft site. Could we have a lot of content that is rarely seen? How much can be removed?
Why Now?• Site statistics showed that
the rapid annual growth following our first redesign in Oct. 1999 had slowed.
• We decided to transition the site to a portal, but what did our audiences want more of? Less of? How did they use our site? How did they want theinformation to be presented? PDAs? Cell phones?
0
150
300
450
600
750
1999-2000 2000-2001 2001-2002
Annual Percent Increase
Hits
Visitors
Why Contract Out?• Complying with Section 508 accessibility
requirements for the web pages would use up existing web team resources
• There would be no resources left to help developers ensure Section 508 compliance of existing online applications
• There was no formal team experience with or education on web usability testing
• There was no current data available on our core audiences
Our Goals• Learn about our 3 major audiences:
– Producers, especially limited-resource, minority, and specialty crop
– Commodity insurance agents who sell to and manage policies/claims for producers
– RMA and FSA employees, especially in the field offices, who producers rely on extensively for program information and education
Our Goals• Have an independent review of the
accessibility/usability of our online applications and web site template
• Have the user interface of our top two online applications completely redesigned
• Get usability/accessibility training and documentation for the web team and developers
What We Learned About Our Core
Audiences• Producers:– Who use the Internet tend to be younger, more
technology savvy, more highly educated, and operators of larger farms
– Do not regularly go to Web sites to get information; however, some want to conduct business with the government online in the future
– In many operations task a spouse or child to gather relevant ag information and news for the enterprise
– Look for specific information: a quotation, a premium estimate, or a county production average
What We Learned About Our Core
Audiences• Producers:– Connect at lower bandwidths, do not scroll, and are
impatient with slow downloads/screen refreshes– Want lessons learned/best practices and see what
other producers are doing re: insurance, planting techniques, or farm management case studies
– Like finding hints, tips, and suggestions for improving their operation
– Want to use the Internet in the future for online trainings, rather than attending local events
– Want to learn more about insurance costs/options without an agent
What We Learned About Our Core
Audiences• Commodity Insurance Agents:– Connect at higher bandwidths– Tend to have our site as their home page– Are familiar with agency/insurance terms, but there
were some terms used on our applications that even they did not know
– Monitor our site for the latest agency news– Use our daily ag weather information, but rely on
producers and local contacts for local weather news– Want producers to come to them before selecting
insurance products
What We Learned About Our Core
Audiences• Commodity Insurance Agents:– Visit Tools and Calculators extensively and most
used either the Summary of Business or the Premium Calculator every week or several times a week
– Tended to use the proprietary version of the Premium Calculator provided by their insurance company, not our version. Sometimes because they were used to it or they felt it had more features than ours, which some discovered wasn’t necessarily true
What We Learned About Our Core
Audiences• RMA/FSA Employees:– Use the information on our intranet unless they
can only find it on the public site– Look at information on a larger scale, such as
yearly trends for overall participation rates or acres enrolled in the commodity insurance program
– Have direct contact with producers and often help them use the site
– Need to find a specific answer in a short period of time for a congressional or media inquiry
The Basics
Participants would scroll to here, then go back to the top. They don’t tend to go “below the fold.”
The Basics: Summary of Business
Users didn‘t:• Like the constant refreshes to load information•Want their results to come up in a new browser window•Understand all of the terminology
Users wanted:• To be able to select multiple items and generate a custom report with subtotals•A better Help function
The Basics:Premium Calculator
• Producers were confused about the login, output, and terminology• Since not all of the agents knew all the terms, no producer--and even some agents--could generate an accurate quote
Putting It All Together• We need to make our applications and
web site template more usable by:– Improving the terms & organization of our
nav bar– Segregating information based on audience
type; often their needs are too diverse– Improving our online glossary– Adding producer case studies to teach
others about best practices– Improving our search capabilities
Next Steps1. Review information from our card
sorting exercises to help us understand what terms our audiences recognize and how they group them to redevelop the nav bar and site structure
2. Review and approve initial rebuilds of the template and the applications in wireframes before coding
Next Steps3. Build out new Premium Calculator
and Summary of Business. Use the new templates for the other online apps so they have the same look and feel
4. Attend vendor-developed usability and accessibility training. Use what we learn to train other web page editors
Next Steps5. Reorganize content and provide it
based on audience intentions6. Gradually phase in web content
management system to ensure site consistency and content accuracy
7. Participate in the ACSI customer satisfaction survey to continually monitor how we’re doing (see www.theacsi.org)
Thank you!
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