I'm working on a website redesign for a dental laboratory.
While testing the home page with a user, they never clicked on the links in the subnavigation. They clicked on the larger buttons in the links to the main pages.
The assumption when I created the wireframe was that the user would click on the descriptive links based on what they needed to do. I thought it would be super convenient to have a list ready for them to just click on the action that they intended to do.
I will admit that the testing was likely horribly flawed because this site is aimed at dentists and dental assistants, but the people in the first test group were office workers. I tried to explain not to overthink it and just to accomplish certain tasks. But they kept giving aesthetic feedback, so I wasted time explaining that it is a prototype and I did not need their advice on graphics (in a polite way of course).
I also admit that this might not even be a big deal, they competed their assigned tasks super fast regardless.
EDIT: After some suggestions from other professionals here, I created another revision (not yet tested with users). And this shows more of the page for additional context.
Please keep in mind that I am not a visual designer, so forgive the "developer art." Taking a content first design approach. I just kind of threw it together to test the layouts.