USA Swimming Launches New Website; Brings Improved Features into User’s Experience

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USA Swimming today unveiled an overhauled version of USASwimming.org, with a new website that serves visitors personalized content based on their role in USA Swimming and incorporates the organization’s Deck Pass benefits throughout the site.

Content is segmented into ‘personas’ based on whether the user is primarily a swimmer, coach, parent, official or team leader. The information is then presented based on the user’s primary role, such as top workouts for athletes, coaching tips for coaches, nutrition recommendations for parents, training resources and rules interpretations for officials and club and governance documents for team leaders.

Also integrated throughout the site are the important membership features of a Deck Pass account – such as times, performance achievements and certifications. Deck Pass can be personalized and customized to the user’s profile, with new data visualizations that quickly and easily track individual progress and that of the team.

“As USA Swimming’s digital communication hub, this new site will be the primary source for information, times, events, education and resources about the sport and the organization. The new version of Deck Pass will stand out as an incredible member benefit,” said USA Swimming Chief Marketing Officer Matt Farrell. “The three main goals of the site, and our measures of success, will be programs, participation and purchase. We will use the site to drive usage of our many programs offered, encourage participation in the sport and also drive revenue.”

With nearly 60 percent of USASwimming.org traffic coming from mobile devices, the new site is mobile-friendly to get those users the most frequently-accessed content fast. A responsive design highlights large, vibrant images and content blocks that stack and re-order for thousands of variations of laptops, tablets or phones.

“After getting feedback from users and a thorough analysis of user experience, we’re bringing forward some great features that USA Swimming members will love, including personalized content, bookmarks, streamlined navigation and new-and-improved Deck Pass integrated throughout the site,” USA Swimming Director of IT John Burbidge. “With the trend of more users accessing the site on handheld devices, they will find this site to be more usable than ever.”

For a quick tutorial on the new site, please click here. Key features include:

  • Focus on Video: USA Swimming Productions will produce more video content than ever with features and instructional content. During live events, we’ll add a video player to the home page so you can instantly tune in
  • Personalization: Based on the user’s account profile, content is served (and color-coded) to match the role of the user – swimmers, coaches, parents, officials and team leaders.  Everything is available to all users, we just optimize the site to make it effortless to find the most useful information
  • Deck Pass: Deck Pass used to primarily be an app on your phone. Now, the Deck Pass experience is integrated throughout the site for times, certifications, goals, patches and rankings. New data visualizations make it even easier to track progress
  • Navigation: Fewer number of main sections give better focus to the most visited content. It’s easy to access personalized content, times, finding a swim team and event calendars
  • Resources: Off the main navigation, users can find information by filtering or browsing the topics such as Safe Sport requirements, background checks, programs & services, National Team services and education materials
  • Times Section: The most-used function of the site has a new search option to find individual times, rankings, events and power point calculators without leaving the page. Plus, there is still quick access to time standards and more
  • Bookmarks: Users can enjoy a bookmark feature to save their favorite pages and then easily be directed to them through the top navigation. Frequently-needed pages are now just one quick click away
  • Mobile First: Design and navigation is built for mobile users first to get them the most frequently-accessed content fast. The site is also optimized to appear higher in search rankings
  • Responsive Design: The site will detect the device accessing the site and display the page to fit the screen. With today’s ‘scrolling’ navigation, images and content blocks stack and re-order for easier viewing
  • Design Features: Naturally, we built in some fun, and functional, design features of the site. There is a color coding system for each audience and personalized content on the site and in Deck Pass. You’ll see that images of tiles in the pool make icons for bookmarks and the navigation in the mobile site

This project was led internally by USA Swimming’s IT and Business Development (strategy and content) departments. Technology experts involved in the project were Statera (technology and software development), Code + Theory (architecture and navigation), Colle+McVoy (design) and Sitefinity (CMS).

About USA Swimming

As the National Governing Body for the sport of swimming in the United States, USA Swimming is a 400,000-member service organization that promotes the culture of swimming by creating opportunities for swimmers and coaches of all backgrounds to participate and advance in the sport through clubs, events and education. Our membership is comprised of swimmers from the age group level to the Olympic Team, as well as coaches and volunteers. USA Swimming is responsible for selecting and training teams for international competition including the Olympic Games, and strives to serve the sport through its core objectives: Build the base, Promote the sport, Achieve competitive success. For more information, visit www.usaswimming.org.

Press release courtesy of USA Swimming.

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Lauren Rutland
6 years ago

Anyone else noticing the massive voids? Seems like they tried doing a tetris/puzzle design but left massive empty spots for no apparent reason…

Dirk G. Winkler
6 years ago

Site is not loading and n any of my devices!!

Robert Reiser
6 years ago

The times database is terrible

Clay Sebring
6 years ago
Reply to  Robert Reiser

Agreed. Many duplicate entries on the Top 100 Lists making them more like a top 85 list….

Robert Reiser
6 years ago
Reply to  Robert Reiser

It’s also out of order and turns what was in one page and in order into four or more pages

Anne Mason
6 years ago

Frustrated and can’t find the stuff I used most often. Seems very user unfriendly with a lot of supersized photos and not much info.

Emily
Emily
6 years ago

Can’t search for a swimmer easily either – terrible.

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