The Better to Know website has been live for close to 10 years. It is the government's main online resource on the topic of sexual health. The design, branding and content are all created to appeal to the website's main user group - Yukon youth. The idea is to connect them with up-to-date facts, information and locally available services so they can make informed decisions.

Earlier this year staff who manage this website met with eServices to find out how they could redesign the website. We call this a pre-discovery meeting and it's how we can learn more about the project, UX and business objectives, current usage, project budget, timeline, etc.

Rather than starting with a solution like a website redesign, we start by understanding what problem teams are trying to solve. As it turns out, no one was really clear on what the problem was. The team were unsure if young people were using the website and it was not easy for staff to update the website.

It was clear we had to get to work to better understand the user and business needs.

User research in Discovery

Working with the project team we set a few UX activities in motion. The team set up a Discovery Workshop with a vendor and eServices reviewed available user feedback and website analytics .

Discovery workshop

Working with a vendor, the team identified user and business needs and how the existing website met or fell short meeting those needs. 

They also created some wireframes to work through how the content could be organized on the website and they started to update the look and feel.

eServices analysis of available data

At the same time, we got to work analysing anonymous comments and questions submitted by youth after school presentations and we had a look at the site's website analytics. The purpose of this user research was to:

• understand if the content on the site was meeting or not meeting their needs;
• identify what topics students found to be useful;
• find out if there were any gaps in content youth expected to see;
• find out if people were finding and interacting with the content on the website. 

User feedback analysis

Several themes became apparent after reviewing the comments and questions students submitted. 

• Puberty. This included topics like changing bodies and myths and facts about this phase of life.
• Everything about sex. Topics under this theme included: body fluids, conception, positions, STIs, reasons for having sex and masturbation.
• Sexual health and personal hygiene. Students were interested in learning about tampons, pads and pantyliners, personal hygiene and shaving.
• Pregnancy and adoption. This theme included topics like conception, how to tell if you are pregnant, what to do if you are pregnant, abortion, adoption and when to have a baby.
• Childbirth. Topics included giving birth and what happens after a baby is born. There were also quite a few questions about twins and triplets.
• Emotions and feelings. Students had questions about why they feel the way they do, self harm, crushes and love.
• Contraception. The topics on the minds' of students were types of contraception, how to use them and where to get them.
• Sexualized assault. There were a range of topics students were interested in from understanding what sexual abuse is, talking to a parent and accessing supports.
• Where to turn of you have questions. Students wanted reliable sources of information and access to professionals they might reach out to - for example sexual health coordinators.
• Sex, gender and sexual identity. There were a variety of comments from students who wanted to understand more about themselves and classmates.

How the team applied user research findings to the new website

The project team used these content themes to inform the main categories on the new website. And the topics students identified fell into these new categories.

• STIs (Everything about sex)
• 2S/LGBTQ+ (sex, gender and sexual identity)
• The body (puberty, personal hygiene, Emotions and feelings)
• Consent (sexualized assault, 
• Birth control (contraception)
• Sexual activity (Everything about sex, sexual health)
• Pregnancy (childbirth, pregnancy and adoption)
• Contact us (where to turn if you have questions). This is technically not a main category, but it is represented.

Analytics analysis

We looked at the website analytics from January 1, 20 to September 27, 2023 and the biggest thing that stood out was the high (80% and over) bounce rate on multiple pages. Bounce rate alone is not a red flag, but these pages did have a call to action. We expected to see users:

• spend time on the page to consume information; or
• click on a link to start a process or access a resource; or
• download a document.

And we did not see this. The time on page for information was too quick to get the information and leave. And we could see the other pages had an action a user needed to take and they were not. We determined this was for the following reasons.

1. The page titles are ambiguous. If someone gets to a page directly from a search engine, the content on the page might not match what they were looking for so they scan the page and leave right away. For example, "Treatment" or "Testing." If I Googled "Where can I get treatment for an STI" and a page called "Treament" only has content about how to treat an STI - I'll see that right away and leave and try something else.
2. There are multiple pages on one topic. People might scan the page and if they don't see the thing they are looking for, they leave the page. For example:
   • Biological sex vs. gender (bounce rate 86%)
   • LGBTQ+ (bounce rate 84%)
   • Sexual orientation (100%)

How the team applied analytics insights to the new website

The team took the following actions to improve the user experience on the new website.

• Renamed pages so it's clear what the topic is. For example, rather than "Treatment" they went with "How are STIs treated?" so people know what they are getting and the page delivers on that promise. 
• Consolidated duplicate or similar content. Having one page on a topic gives users confidence they are in the right place.
• Applied design elements to show the relationship between related content. If a user lands on the page called "How are STIs treated?" but they were more interested in what the symptoms of an STI are, they can see the relationship between the pages by scanning the page. 

User research in Alpha and Beta

Once the team worked with a developer to build a working prototype based on what they'd learned in Discovery, it was time to run usability tests to make sure the changes had resulted in improvements the user experience. 

We had participants perform 7 tasks and we watched to see if they were successful at completing them. 

• If they were successful we looked at our notes to see if there were sticky points they encountered and we removed them to make the website even better to use.
• If they failed we looked at how could we improve the website to ensure their success.

What we learned from usability testing

Overall the participants were successful at completing the tasks. But, there was some work to do because they:

• all failed one task; and
• on a couple of the tasks where they were successful, they did run into a few snags we needed to address. 

Interacting with the support services menu

When participants interacted with the Support Services menu they got a bit lost. The menu has additional topics that are not represented in the main category section of the home page. On one task the participants all got to the correct section, but the content was not organized the way they expected it to be and they were not confident what they should do next.

To help users know what to do, the team added clear headings and calls to action to direct people to the correct resources. They also completely overhauled the page titles that appear in this section to make it clearer what type of information people could expect to find on the page. 

Failure to get a free pregnancy test

All participants failed to complete this task. They got to the right section, but then:

• within the "Pregnancy" category all of the page titles sounded similar; and 
• the link to the information to get the free test was hidden under the name of the agency that provides the tests so they all missed it.

To address this, the team used plain language and links to the agency and they updated the page titles so each piece of content stands alone.

Navigating between pages

Participants had no trouble finding the right category in most cases. Once they landed on a page, and tried to navigate around, some participants did get confused. There were two issues. 

1. When participants clicked the “Back to main” they were expecting to go to the previous screen and not back to the home page. Once they had a bit more experience using the website, they did figure it out with minimal effort. 
2. Some participants did not know the “buttons” were links to related pages in that section. This did not appear to impact their ability to perform tasks.    

As these were not barriers to success the team decided to monitor website user feedback and conduct more testing after they launched the website.

User research after the website launched

The new Better to Know website launched this summer. The team will be monitoring user feedback to see if their users have identified any areas that may need to be refined. They will also be looking at their website analytics for indicators of how people behave on the website. 

If they identify any issues they will run another round of usability testing and interviews to get to the root of the problem so they can address it. 

The team will continue to iterate the website based on user research and as they plan to add more features in the future. 

For questions about the Better to Know website and user research email eservices@yukon.ca.