The project looks at ways to improve websites funded by the legal aid organization.
 
The Legal Services Corp. (LSC) has helped legal aid organizations put together web content in all 50 states and the territories over the past 15 years. But while legal information doesn't change very often, the internet and the ways we consume it sure do.
 
To help legal aid organizations keep their web presence current, especially with the pace of smartphone adoption, LSC has released a report examining legal aid website content and user accessibility. The report was accompanied by a toolkit designed to help legal aid organizations retool their web presence for the modern user.
 
The report and toolkit, part of the LSC's Statewide Website Evaluation Project, evaluated websites with regard to nine different factors: ease of navigation, accessibility, visual design and iconography, plain language, content presentation, mobile friendliness, community engagement, language access and user support.
 
James Sandman, president of LSC, told Legaltech News that the project is an effort to get a full picture of the state of LSC-sponsored legal aid sites.
 
“These websites have been around for roughly 15 years, but they've never been evaluated, and they're different from one another. We thought in light of the investment we'd made, we ought to step back and do an assessment,” Sandman said.
 
Sandman found two important takeaways in the report: the importance of prioritizing mobile access, and the need to cut back and streamline information on the websites.
 
“Virtually all of these websites were originally created with the notion that people would be accessing them from a desktop [computer],” Sandman said. “Often, they don't translate well to mobile.” This, he added, is a problem for users who primarily access the internet through their phones—an increasing demographic among legal aid clients.
 
Additionally, while it may seem intuitive to dump a ton of information on a legal resource website, Sandman said that users are more likely to find relevant information if it's distilled into the most important pieces.
 
“Lawyers often operate on the assumption that more information is better,” he said. “The research shows the opposite. You want to streamline and simplify and disregard content, and limit yourself to the information that is most critical for people to know so that they can find it quickly.”
 
Overall, he hopes the report findings can help legal aid organizations clarify content. “The websites need to be simplified. They currently contain too much information and overwhelm users so that users can't find the information that's most relevant to their particular problem,” Sandman added.
 
While legal aid attorneys and organizations are clearly committed to improving access to legal resources, many groups find themselves stretched for time and resources, which can make improvements to a website seem like an easy thing to stick on the backburner. Sandman encouraged attorneys to dedicate some time and energy to their web presence.
 
“That increases access,” Sandman said. “It's important to not let the perfect make the enemy of the good.”
 
As for time and resource constraints, Sandman explained that the project intended to ensure that practitioners would have the tools to restructure their web presence according to the report's guidance. “That's what the toolkit is all about. It's about putting the resources in the hands of the website managers to allow them to follow up on the recommendations,” he said.
 
Additionally, Sandman noted that the LSC's Technology Initiative Grant Program will be looking favorably at proposals that aim to implement the report's recommendations, and will be conducting oversight of grantees.
 
The evaluation project, report and toolkit were produced with help from EY Intuitive, the design and research wing of consulting group EY, and private funding from the Ford Foundation.