Successful Website Redesign: More Than a New Look

Background:  In 2011, CDC reorganized the agency’s adolescent and school health work. Following this reorganization, the Healthy Youth Website, www.cdc.gov/healthyyouth, was co-managed by NCHHSTP’s Division of Adolescent Health (DASH) and NCCDPHP’s Division of Population Health (DPH). In 2014, the site content was split. DPH moved their content to a new website and DASH maintained its current web presence.

Program background:  The goal was to update the Healthy Youth Website to better align the content with DASH’s mission and vision of healthy teens who become healthy adults. Project objectives included:

1. Developing a well-designed, easy-to-navigate Website
2. Ensuring available content is current, pertinent, and specific to the needs of target audiences
3. Presenting the content in a streamlined and tailored way to optimize organization and improve site usability.

DASH’s Health Communications Team (HCT) convened a content workgroup—a representative group from each of DASH’s branches to meet these goals. The workgroup provided thoughtful and informative feedback to facilitate the design and development of a Website reflective of DASH’s core mission.  The workgroup made determinations about shared content and developed a set of content criteria.  Web content was streamlined from 433 DASH-owned web pages to 95 pages, a 78% reduction in web pages.

Evaluation Methods and Results:  Prior to the redesign, DASH conducted user experience (UX) testing to learn how visitors used the Website. A UX specialist conducted a heuristic review and comprehensive interviews with DASH partners. Results and recommendations from the testing was a starting point for the redesign. In 2015 an OptimalSort card sort was conducted via email with 9 partners. Participants sorted 29 cards into 10 groups, which informed the placement of web pages and the overall navigation. Following the Website redesign launch, Treejack, a UX testing tool based on a technique known as ‘reverse card sorting,’ was used to measure the ease with which information on the Website was found using the left navigation. This testing was conducted via email to partners and other public health professionals, and conducted in-person at two national conferences using a randomization feature in Treejack. In total, 39 participants completed the testing.  Testing results identified changes needed to make the Website easier to navigate for first-time visitors. The success rate for completing tasks in Treejack was higher among users familiar with the Website. The testing also revealed that some navigation items need renaming. Segmenting content based on intended audiences is also in process (i.e., “for parents,” “for clinicians,” “for schools”).

Conclusions:  The reduction of Website content as well as the reorganization of existing content offers users an easier way to navigate, access, and use the information on the Healthy Youth Website.

Implications for research and/or practice:  The contributions of the web content workgroup were invaluable to the success of the Website redesign process. The workgroup helped significantly in the redesign process operating smoothly and allowing deliverables to be completed on schedule. Using multiple types of user testing, including heuristic reviews, interviews, cardsort activities, and Treejack, allowed the HCT to make improvements to the redesigned Website based on user feedback.