Identifying Usability Problems. Developing Effective Websites.

Henry M Jackson nonprofit foundation website screenshot

A recently redesigned website for Henry M Jackson Foundation, a Seattle-based nonprofit diversifying and democratizing  public policy by broadening access to public policy graduate study programs; and encouraging young legislators to build relationships across party lines through cross-partisan dialogue, debate, and action.

Despite using a WordPress-approved Theme, the foundation’s previous mobile site speed was sluggish, primarily due too excessive number of Plugins and associated Javascript. Our goal was to improve benchmark performance, while modernizing the brand identity and improving ease of use.

Scope of Work

  • Accessibility Consulting
  • Performance Optimization
  • Visual Design
  • WordPress Theme Development
  • WordPress Training & Consulting

Performance

Mobile page load speed was improved significantly by reducing web server requests 66%, from 102 to 35 and by reducing overall page size 54%, from 1.196 Mb to 551 Kb.

Accessibility

Improvements include higher contrast colors to better adhere to Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) color contrast ratio guidelines; increased font sizes; increased vertical rhythm; a navigation skip link; and text links with 2 visual indicators.

Before & After Performance Comparison

Performance Metric old website New Website
Google Lighthouse: Accessibility 94/100 100/100
Google Lighthouse: Best Practices 83/100 92/100
Google Lighthouse: Mobile Speed 56/100 88/100
Google Lighthouse: Desktop Speed 97/100 98/100
Google Lighthouse: Search Engine Optimization 93/100 92/100
WebPageTest Speed Index 4.036 3.318
Total Homepage File Size 1.196 Mb (636 Kb Images + 253 Kb Scripts + 145 Kb CSS + 177 Kb Fonts + 13 Kb HTML) 551 Kb (317 Kb Images + 113 Kb Scripts + 106 Kb CSS + 16 Kb Fonts + 12 Kb HTML)
Total Web Server Requests 102 (7 Images + 47 Scripts + 41 CSS + 4 Font + 2 Other + 1 HTML) 35 (5 Images + 11 Scripts + 14 CSS + 2 Fonts + 2 Other + 1 HTML)
Estimated Mobile Homepage Load Time ~4 seconds ~3.3 seconds

WebPage Test Speed Index: median = ~3.591; top 10% = <1.388
In 2022, the average page size = ~2.4 Mb and median page size = ~2.1 Mb.
Database-driven websites, like WordPress, are more performance optimized when server requests are < 40 – 60.

Site Credits

Visual Design: Erik Fadiman
WordPress Theme Development: Scott Marlow

Posted on