Army Career Explorer (ACE) Now Mobile
By Col. Mike Runey, USAREC
July 11, 2014
What if prospects could explore Army careers and complete basic pre-qualifying on their mobile devices? Would such a mobile app not only encourage young people to contact a recruiter, but also allow them to use their phones to select from a map recruiting centers nearest their schools and work? And how about this---the prospect could begin their application online?
At GoArmy.com, prospects can do all of this through the Army Career Explorer (ACE) but not on their mobile devices. Because traffic to Goarmy.com and the use of mobile devices continues to climb steadily, Recruiting Command has optimized the first major section of ACE for mobile access.
Since October 2013, GoArmy.com has had over 15 million unique visitors. Nearly half of them used mobile devices to access the site. While the main GoArmy.com page is optimized for mobile, the Army Career Explorer was not. Until now!
Beginning in January, internal USAREC studies revealed increasing usage of ACE, but no increase in the number of prospects beginning or completing their online applications. A small team began retooling ACE using - responsive design - resulting in a web interface that appears appropriately on phones, tablets, and desktops.
The redesigned ACE has two goals: Increase user engagement on all devices and encourage earlier contact with the recruiters.
ACE retains the online application feature and utilizes modernized input methods to complete the initial portion of the application. To complete the full application, users are encouraged to switch from mobile to a desktop or large tablet due to the type and amount of input required.
Despite the fact that more than 13,000 new GoArmy.com accounts are created every month and more than 5,000 people are conducting job searches, the USAREC study revealed fewer visitors to the site are completing ACE and beginning their application process on line. Why were people dropping out?
Not being optimized for mobile was one major reason. The second was that the job search function did not return actionable results in many cases, actually discouraging prospects. The revised ACE retools the job search to point prospects to major career fields that match their interests and then encourages them to apply and contact a recruiter.
Check out the new ACE July 11, and let us know how we can better leverage this tool to accomplish our mission and recruit the most talented men and women for our Army by providing feedback on the google apps for government homepage, https://sites.google.com/a/goarmy.com/homepage/home/feedback (may requiregoary.com login)
1. Select the "ACE Mobile" category from the feedback forum.
2. Select the red "New Topic" button.
3. Inset your subject in the "subject" line and post your topic in the
box provided below.
4. Select the red "Post" button.
5. You're finished.
To reply to a topic:
1. Follow steps 1 and 2 above.
2. Select the Topic you would like to reply to.
3. Type your response in the box provided.
4. Select the green "Post" button or the red "Post Reply" button.
By Col. Mike Runey, USAREC
July 11, 2014
What if prospects could explore Army careers and complete basic pre-qualifying on their mobile devices? Would such a mobile app not only encourage young people to contact a recruiter, but also allow them to use their phones to select from a map recruiting centers nearest their schools and work? And how about this---the prospect could begin their application online?
At GoArmy.com, prospects can do all of this through the Army Career Explorer (ACE) but not on their mobile devices. Because traffic to Goarmy.com and the use of mobile devices continues to climb steadily, Recruiting Command has optimized the first major section of ACE for mobile access.
Since October 2013, GoArmy.com has had over 15 million unique visitors. Nearly half of them used mobile devices to access the site. While the main GoArmy.com page is optimized for mobile, the Army Career Explorer was not. Until now!
Beginning in January, internal USAREC studies revealed increasing usage of ACE, but no increase in the number of prospects beginning or completing their online applications. A small team began retooling ACE using - responsive design - resulting in a web interface that appears appropriately on phones, tablets, and desktops.
The redesigned ACE has two goals: Increase user engagement on all devices and encourage earlier contact with the recruiters.
ACE retains the online application feature and utilizes modernized input methods to complete the initial portion of the application. To complete the full application, users are encouraged to switch from mobile to a desktop or large tablet due to the type and amount of input required.
Despite the fact that more than 13,000 new GoArmy.com accounts are created every month and more than 5,000 people are conducting job searches, the USAREC study revealed fewer visitors to the site are completing ACE and beginning their application process on line. Why were people dropping out?
Not being optimized for mobile was one major reason. The second was that the job search function did not return actionable results in many cases, actually discouraging prospects. The revised ACE retools the job search to point prospects to major career fields that match their interests and then encourages them to apply and contact a recruiter.
Check out the new ACE July 11, and let us know how we can better leverage this tool to accomplish our mission and recruit the most talented men and women for our Army by providing feedback on the google apps for government homepage, https://sites.google.com/a/goarmy.com/homepage/home/feedback (may requiregoary.com login)
1. Select the "ACE Mobile" category from the feedback forum.
2. Select the red "New Topic" button.
3. Inset your subject in the "subject" line and post your topic in the
box provided below.
4. Select the red "Post" button.
5. You're finished.
To reply to a topic:
1. Follow steps 1 and 2 above.
2. Select the Topic you would like to reply to.
3. Type your response in the box provided.
4. Select the green "Post" button or the red "Post Reply" button.