1

USA.gov

The U.S. Government’s Official Web Portal

March 15, 2007

Presented by Thomas Freebairn

USA.gov Technology Solutions

202-219-1379 or thomas.freebairn@gsa.gov

2

What is www.USA.gov? U.S. government’s official web portal

USA.gov provides links to government websites and offers a robust search engine that indexes federal, state, local, tribal and territorial government information anywhere on the Internet

This portal also allows website visitors to find government information by various topics, including Organization Audience Topic Online service Location Frequency of request

3

USA.gov – The U.S.

Government’s Official Web

Portal

4

FirstGov Success

USA.gov FY 2002 FY 2003 FY 2004 FY 2005 FY 2006

Website Visitors 33 million 63 million 78 million 88 million 84 million

Web Page Views 91 million 176 million 203 million 179 million 176 million

5

How did www.USA.gov get its start?

In 2000, Internet entrepreneur Eric Brewer offered to donate a powerful search engine to the government. The gift accelerated work that had already begun on a government-wide portal

In June 2000, the President accepted the gift from Brewer’s nonprofit organization, the Federal Search Foundation, and instructed that FirstGov.gov, the predecessor to USA.gov was to be launched within 90 days

FirstGov.gov went online on September 22, 2000. GSA and 22 federal agencies funded the initiative in 2001 and 2002. Since 2002, it has also received annual appropriations from Congress

6

Determining Content for USA.gov

Who is the customer?

What do the customers want?

What does government have to offer?

With 24 million government web pages as potential resources, deciding on a structure and on feature topics is challenging. Our approach to developing USA.gov centers around the answers to these three questions:

7

Customers

Citizens Kids, parents, seniors, veterans, etc.

Businesses and Nonprofits Corporations, foreign businesses, nonprofits, and the self-

employed

Government Federal, state, and local government employees, military

personnel, and tribal governments

8

Determining Content for USA.gov:What Customers Want

Feedback from USA.gov visitors USA.gov site and search statistics Contact Us Suggest-A-Link Customer Satisfaction and other surveys Real-Time FAQs

Input from call centers (1-800-FED-INFO)

Input from government agencies & partners

Nationwide focus groups and usability tests

Internet and market research statistics

Search engine terms

9

Most Popular Topics at USA.gov

Government benefits and grants

Federal jobs

Buying things from government (e.g., cars, homes)

International travel

Naturalization and immigration

10

USA.gov Linking Policy

Official government-owned or supported site Official government information or services Complements existing information and services Accessible and applicable to a wide audience Relevant and useful for our customers Accurate and current Consistent with privacy and security policies User-friendly Highly desirable:

Crosses agency or intergovernmental boundaries Enables online transactions Includes ability to interact with government Provides information on service performance Provides community-level information and services

11

Features & Functionality: Search

12

Browsing USA.gov by Audience Channel

Citizen

Business

Government Employee

Audience Channels:

Kids

Parents

Seniors

Military and Veterans

Americans Abroad

Sub-Audience Channels:

13

Browsing USA.gov by Topical Directory

Topics featured in the Citizen Gateway include:

Benefits and Grants

Consumer Guides

Defense and International

Environment, Energy, and Agriculture

Family, Home, and Community

Health and Nutrition

History, Arts, and Culture

Jobs and Education

Money and Taxes

Public Safety and Law

Reference and General Government

Science and Technology

Travel and Recreation

Voting and Elections

14

Browsing USA.gov by Organization

A-Z Index of Government Agencies Based on the U.S.

Government Manual, but updated regularly

Available in printer-friendly format

Links (URLs) checked daily to correct broken or changed addresses

15

Browsing FirstGov.gov by Organization

State, Territorial, and Local Governments

State, city, and county home pages

State agencies by topic State governors State legislatures Statistics by state and

local area Tribal government

websites

16

www.GobiernoUSA.gov

17

GobiernoUSA.gov

GobiernoUSA.gov is a single Internet gateway to more than 120,000 federal, state, and local web pages available in Spanish.

This site represents an important outreach effort to Spanish speakers in

the U.S. who are not fully proficient in English, but who need meaningful access to official government programs and services.

Organized by four major audience groups:

Recursos Generales (General Resources for the Spanish-speaking public)

Recien Llegados (Newcomers to the U.S.)

Negocios (Spanish Businesses in the U.S.)

Visitantes Extranjeros (Foreign Visitors who may want to travel, study, or do business in the U.S.)

18

Topics include: health and safety education immigration citizenship federal benefits consumer protection housing business assistance legal resources the environment

GobiernoUSA.gov

19

Online Services

News and Important Links

Agency Index

Spanish language features also include:

GobiernoUSA.gov

20

Site Innovations: RSS Feeds

USA.gov launched RSS feeds in January 2006. RSS—or Really Simple Syndication—provides an easy way to keep up with important news and information without having to browse or search.

RSS is written in the Internet coding language known as XML. Users can collect and view feeds from different sources using as RSS Reader.

21

Another recent innovation on USA.gov sends an email update to those who’ve asked to be notified when their pages of interest are updated.

USA.gov currently provides this service for the top 35 web pages, including the reference page on Public Libraries.

Since GovDelivery’s launch: Nearly 28,000 subscriptions 94 email message have been sent More than 20,000 click-throughs were reported

Site Innovations: E-Mail Updates

22

Site Innovations: Search - Images

23

Site Innovations: Search - News

24

Future Plan: Refreshed Design To be unveiled this Spring

Incorporates- Best web site practices- Results of several rounds of usability tests with the public- Results of an ongoing online survey conducted on USA.gov

New Features- Get It Done Online Feature- Visitors Gateway- Font size options- Toggle between English and Spanish pages- Web Chat- Search Spotlight Featuring Senate and House of Representatives

25

26

27

Some Awards and EndorsementsSome Awards and Endorsements

“Favorite Places on the Web” (Chicago Sun Times) “Hot Sites” (USATODAY.com) “Top 100 Classic Sites” (PC Magazine) “#1 in Global E-Government Readiness” (United Nations) “#1 in Overall Federal e-Government” (Brown University) “Innovations in American Government Award” (Harvard

University) Español,gov: “Best Practices” award ( Web Content Managers

Group); high scorer in the American Customer Satisfaction Index

28

How You Can Contact FirstGov.gov:How You Can Contact FirstGov.gov:

USA.govOffice of Citizen Services and Communications U.S. General Services Administration1800 F Street, NW, Washington, DC 20405

1-800-FED-INFO/1-800-333-4636 (U.S. residents only)

http://www.firstgov.gov/feedback/FeedbackForm.jsp