The city of San Jose has developed an 8 point usability scale for its government websites.
These 8 steps lay out simple criteria for key factors to make a website work for visitors. These principles can also apply to legal aid, court, and other law help websites.
Our Legal Help Dashboard 4 key categories (tech performance, discoverability, content, and user-friendly design) subsume many of these individual 8 points. But it’s very useful to see them laid out!
Here are the alpha standards they propose for public interest website quality:
- Easy to Use
- Easy to Understand
- Error-free
- Mobile-friendly
- Accessible
- Consistently Designed
- Fast
- Discoverable
For legal help, we might add a few key other things on:
- Making jurisdiction very clear, so people aren’t relying on the wrong region’s laws
- Using content presentations that will be scannable, presentable on Google, and likely to convey complex legal issues
- Available in key languages other than English
- Built for people in high-stress, panic modes — so constantly offering phone numbers & easy access points in addition to the legal information
