Homepage Refresh

We are gearing up for a summer 2018 refresh of the home page. The design is still a concept; we have started gathering data about student priorities through usability testing and using it to consider shuffling around some content. We aren't aiming for a massive redesign and are looking to primarily move more of the tools up on the page that are used and add some new content that users expect to find on the home page including study spaces and events. We are also hoping to add more clarity to our services by reducing ambiguity between those services.

We do not have a final design yet and are planning several more rounds of data gathering from students and staff. We understand the library home page is a vital tool so want to ensure we have good reason to consider moving or relabeling something on it. We will be soliciting some feedback through surveys about observations and priorities over the spring, and closer to launch of the new design we will provide early access for staff use.

The design included in this post is the 13^th iteration since we started considering the changes fall of 2017. Here is a list of changes in this design:

• Hours & Locations is given more precedence, taking the place of the news. Moving this gives us more space to provide more information, and we can tie study spaces, which currently does not have a place on the home page, to the library information. Students have cited this as content they expect and want on the home page.
• Events are in the same "column" as locations and groups more of the content together. We have events/exhibits/classes/workshops in multiple tools and locations on the website, so this attempts to pull them together in one place.
• My Account link is added to the search box. We added a My Account link to the Library Services box this week per findings in usability testing, but it still feels like a core task that should be represented higher up the page. We can track usage of both links to see what is working, and determine if one might be unnecessary.
• The archives image moves up to replace the generic Weisman Museum graphic. The archival image will need to be less focal and more pattern-oriented to avoid being too distracting. The purpose of shifting the background image higher is tri-fold: 1) increased visibility and awareness of digital collections, 2) will give a freshness to the page that may be lost by moving the news farther down the page, 3) and it reduces the number of large images on the page (for a small speed improvement).
• Databases and E-Journals are condensed into one shortened Suggested Resources list from the original 13 databases and 5 journal titles. We saw marked drop off in usage via clicks as well as in usability testing after the first five databases. "All Guides" becomes a separate "thing".
• E-Journals and Tools are replaced by a list of audience pages that are currently in the Library Services box. These pages proved to be quite popular in navigating the library.
• News takes on the form of Google Material's "card" style, which is consistent with how users often get news bits. News becomes "features" so the content may be more flexible to include news, featured librarian, promoted events, and potentially other content such as new e-resource promotions.
• Library Services has many more services listed. Users often preferred to find a link to a service directly from the home page or on an audience page. This attempts to group them more meaningfully for quicker scanning.
• Digital collections has more flexibility to display explanatory content.
• My Library would have a new "home" in the main navigation of the site. If the user is logged out, the link would be My Library, and when signed in, it would read "[username]'s library". The new navigation could have links into My Account, some generic audience links (based on their profile) such as the Undergraduate Services page for an undergraduate, as well as the current list of Library Course Pages. This proposal is all conceptual.

Please feel free to provide feedback on this current design iteration, and please also consider providing us with user stories to help us test the design.