Defining Citizen Engagement: A Discussion on
How to Assess Government Site Performance
September 15, 2011
Government Site Visitation has declined in total unique visitors since July 2010
despite growth across the Total Internet in most categories.
Change vs.
July - 2010
Total Internet Visitation to Online Categories
250,000
+0%
+7%
+2%
+6%
Total Unique Visitors (000)
200,000
+16%
+9%
+16%
150,000
+4%
+11%
-2%
100,000
50,000
0
Jul-10
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Jul-11
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Source: comScore Media Metrix Media Trend, July 2010 – July 2011
Visitation and engagement to government sites has declined since
July 2010 despite an increase in Internet users.
July 2010 Government
Sites
July 2011 Government
Sites
Avg. Daily Visitors
10.96 MM
10.12 MM
Avg. Minutes / Day
9.0
8.3
Avg. Pages / Day
13.5
12.6
Category
Avg. Visits / Day
1.3
1.3
Avg. Days / Visitor
3.8
3.6
Avg. Min / Visitor
34.4
29.7
Total Internet
+10%
Since Jul-09
213,584
215,054
Jul-10
Jul-11
195,538
Avg. Pages / Visitor
51
45
Jul-09
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Source: comScore Media Metrix Key Measures, July 2011
Government sites reach a higher percentage of women across nearly
all age brackets.
 Women users of government sites between the ages of 45-54 spend 6.6
hours per month on government related sites, the highest of any age and
gender bracket and 2 hours more than men of the same age.
– Women across all ages spend over 5 hours more on government sites than men.
Government
Government
Males
%Reach by Age & Gender
Males
Time Spent (Hours per Visitor)
Females
60
7
50
6
Females
5
40
4
30
3
20
2
10
1
0
0
12-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
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55-64
Proprietary.
12-24
65+
4
25-34
35-44
45-54
Source: comScore Demographic Profile, July 2011
55-64
65+
.gov Reform Effort
 Part of President Obama's Campaign to Cut Waste, identifying
unnecessary websites that can be consolidated into other websites
to reduce costs and improve the quality of service to the American
public.
 Requires federal agencies to take specific steps to strengthen
customer service, including how they deliver services and
information on federal ".gov" websites.
 Improve Customer Service Delivery
 Advance Customer Service through Innovative Technology
 Solicit Timely Customer Feedback
 Improve Online Services
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Assessing Citizen Engagement across
Government Sites
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What is Engagement?
 The number of visitors to a site?
 Growth in visitation from year to year?
 The amount of time spent on a site?
 Reach of specific population or location?
 Accessibility via portal search?
 Relevance among comparable sites?
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The number of visitors to a site?
July 2011
Unique
Visitors (000)
July 2010
Unique
Visitors (000)
July 2011
Unique
Visitors (000)
Two Year
Change
NIH.gov
9,082
8,183
9,082
46%
ED.gov
7,831
8,672
7,831
12%
IRS.gov
4,651
4,349
4,651
10%
SSA.gov
4,007
4,135
4,007
21%
Weather.gov
3,553
4,075
3,553
-5%
OPM.gov
3,226
3,614
3,226
11%
NOAA.gov
3,128
4,243
3,128
-4%
State.gov
2,397
2,760
2,397
5%
NASA.gov
2,105
1,853
2,105
-28%
CDC.gov
1,819
2,170
1,819
-31%
Site
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Source: comScore Media Metrix Long Term Media Trend July 2009 – July 2011
Growth in visitation from year to year?
July 2009
Unique
Visitors (000)
July 2010
Unique
Visitors (000)
July 2011
Unique
Visitors (000)
Two Year
Change
NIH.gov
6,235
8,183
9,082
46%
ED.gov
7,008
8,672
7,831
12%
IRS.gov
4,226
4,349
4,651
10%
SSA.gov
3,308
4,135
4,007
21%
Weather.gov
3,728
4,075
3,553
-5%
OPM.gov
2,909
3,614
3,226
11%
NOAA.gov
3,254
4,243
3,128
-4%
State.gov
2,277
2,760
2,397
5%
NASA.gov
2,933
1,853
2,105
-28%
CDC.gov
2,632
2,170
1,819
-31%
Site
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Source: comScore Media Metrix Long Term Media Trend July 2009 – July 2011
Growth in visitation from year to year?
Change vs.
July - 2010
Fastest Growing Federal Government Sites
Total Unique Visitors (000)
10,000
9,000
9,082
8,000
7,831
7,000
7,008
6,000
6,235
5,000
4,000
3,000
4,007
3,308
2,000
1,000
+46%
NIH.gov
+12%
ED.gov
+21%
SSA.gov
+18%
HOUSE.gov
+160%
EFTPS.gov
1,462
1,234
1,016
391
0
Jul-09
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Jul-11
Source: comScore Media Metrix Long Term Media Trend July 2009 – July 2011
The amount of time spent on a site?
 Measuring a site’s content by unique visitor’s isn’t the only important metric
– understanding repeat visitation and UV’s to visitors is crucial as well.
25,000
21,669
20,000
16,497
14,735
15,000
13,186
9,082
10,000
5,000
9,542
7,831
7,309
4,651
3,553
3,128
3,226
0
Total UV’s (000)
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Total Visits (000)
11
7,272
4,007
The amount of time spent on a site?
Page Visitation Measurement
Minute Measurement
198
135
105
69
102
69
66
63
58
49
47
26
25
15
47
58
49
32
19
17
16
6
Total Pages Viewed
NIH.GOV
5
Avg. Pages per Visitor
ED.GOV
IRS.GOV
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Total Minutes
SSA.GOV
12
WEATHER.GOV
10
16 14
20 18
Avg. Minutes per Visitor
OPM.GOV
NOAA.GOV
Reach of a specific population or location?
Presence of
Children in Home
Gender
Males
52%
48%
Yes
30%
No
70%
Female Visitation Demographics
25%
Females
20%
15%
The Office of Women’s Health is a
prime example of a government
agency that engages their target
demographic with their online
presence.
10%
5%
0%
2-11
12-17
18-24
25-34
35-44
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45-54
Proprietary.
55-64
65+
13
Source: comScore Media Metrix, February 2011
Reach of a specific population or location?
NIH
WebMD Health
Everyday Health
Everyday Health tends to attract a larger amount of older visitors, whereas the NIH
attracts the largest amount of high income households. Females are much more frequent
visitors making up 2/3 of all visitation.
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Source: comScore Marketer, May 2011
Accessibility via portal search?
Destinations for
FLU
Destinations for
Tornado
Destinations for
Government Jobs
Search optimization is key to drive traffic to a website. How often users click on a your
site when it appears in a search engine is also a good measurement to determine
whether a site is providing the content that is useful to an internet user.
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Relevance among comparable sites?
Government Site Visitation
89,052
91,074
87,555
Jul-2010
Jan-2011
Jul-2011
Weather Category
Site UVs
Career Category
Site UVs
Shipping Category
Site UVs
16,799
42,918
12,494
12,359
14,841
9,032
26,380
10,726
2,903
3,553
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962
From the .gov Reform – Web Inventory Guidance
B) Use metrics to determine the value of each .gov domain
• How much visitor traffic is the site generating? Could more people
access the content if it was housed on another site that is already
generating a high volume of traffic?
• What is the user performance? How well can people accomplish
their top tasks on this site (not just starting at your site, but also
from a commercial search engine)? Is user performance improving,
declining, or staying steady? Are you measuring task completion
rates, time to complete tasks, other user performance metrics?
• Is the site fulfilling its intended purpose and reaching its intended
audience? What metrics do you have to demonstrate that?
• What is the level of customer satisfaction with the site? Is
satisfaction increasing or decreasing?
• Does the value of delivering the content (volume of visitors +
performance) exceed the cost of maintaining the site?
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What is Engagement?
 The number of visitors to a site?
 Growth in visitation from year to year?
 The amount of time spent on a site?
 Reach of specific population or location?
 Accessibility via portal search?
 Relevance in among comparable sites?
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Thank You.
About comScore:
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 comScore averaged 375 media
citations per day in 2010
Gillian Heltai
Senior Director, comScore
[email protected]
O 703.438.2013
M 703.307.9513
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to measure: e-commerce, video
streaming, and online search
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