The City of Omaha government website allows its 487,000 residents to obtain various information regarding the city ranging from policy information to license renewal. However, two issues that persists throughout the website. The first being hyperlinks are not clearly displayed and contents of interest not readily displayed or where the user would expect.
My team conducted a Heuristic Evaluation, Cognitive Walkthrough and Usabilty Test on the City of Omaha website. These methods were used to assess the site, identify any issues that were present, and recommend improvements based on the collected data.
I facilitated team meetings, composed problem statement and goals & objectives, conducted usability test sessions and formulated results for final report.
The first step in identifying any potential usability issues, we conducted a heuristic evaluation using the Nielsen-Normon Group's 10 Usability Heuristics and rated according to Jakob Nielsen's Usability Severity Rating Scale.
Next, we conducted a cognitive walkthrough based on the following tasks:
Lastly, we created a test plan for a moderated usability evaluation. We tested 8 participants on 3 tasks. Each session was conducted and recorded via Zoom, transcribed and archieved in the team's Google Drive.
Task 1: Subscribe to Mayor of Omaha's Newsletter
Task 2: Find Parks Near Residence
Task 3: Apply for a City of Omaha Job (For the General Public)
Task 1: Subscribe to Mayor of Omaha's Newsletter
Task 2: Find Parks Near Residence
Task 3: Apply for a City of Omaha Job (For the General Public)
All participants successfully completed tasks 1 and 3.
While completing task 3, 2 participants clicked on the “View Current Job Listings” button on the employment page, which took them to the same page.
Task 2 had 3 successful particpants with 2 rejections. Rejections resulted from particpants straying from the happy path by finding a park through the interactive map.
Task 1
No recommendations are needed because all participants completed the task without difficulties.
Task 2
Moving the Parks and Recreations Finder to the top of the Main Omaha Home page and/or the Parks, Recreations, & Public Property home page. Currently, the finder is too close to the bottom of the homepage, making it difficult for first-time users to find it.
Task 3
Removing the View Current Job Listings button from the Employment page because the user stays on the same page after clicking the button.
