GoArmy.com is an innovative site that is constantly adapting to meet the expectations of its core audience: young adults age 18-24. As a major recruiting portal for the U.S. Army, the site has to strike a careful balance between entertaining and providing a realistic portrait of Army life. TV commercials and print all point to the site as a one-stop location for comprehensive information about joining. With a diverse workforce of more than 650,000 people, that's a lot of material for any potential employer to cover.
Sgt. Star is a virtual search agent designed to meet this challenge in a compelling way. Ask the Sargeant, and he'll tell you: "STAR which stands for Strong, Trained And Ready. I'm an artificial intelligence agent created for the U.S. Army to provide you with information about Army life." Like Ikea's Anna, Sgt. Star can parse natural language and suggest areas of the site to explore. As an avatar designed to match wits with teenage boys, he's fairly difficult to stump.
The application pops up as daughter window to the side of your browser, and what's even more compelling is that Sgt. Star will update the main GoArmy window as you browse. Ask him about payscales, for example, and the browser points to the Benefits area. There's also an integrated live chat function that he will call on for backup. The application was developed by Next IT. You can read their case study here.
Misha Cornes
Strategists & Planners
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