Small Wins, Big Impact: Leveraging and Elevating User Engagement
Summary
Join Irina Tikhonova and Kari Dietrich in this session focused on the importance of starting small when elevating user experiences. We discuss how to focus on user journeys, involve the right stakeholders, and push for data-driven and human-centered policy changes.
Key Insights
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Starting with small targeted digital pilots can generate large savings and efficiency gains in local government services.
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Grand Rapids’ 311 service redesign reduced walk-ins by 79% and saved $200,000 in staff costs within six weeks.
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Granicus platform offers a modular, ‘Lego-block’ approach allowing government clients to build tailored user experiences.
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Combining technology with consulting services around data, personas, and user journeys improves digital transformation outcomes.
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Real user testing with diverse populations reveals deeper insights than relying solely on personas or anecdotal data.
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In Wyandotte County, policies created services that were not equitable, especially for those without legal representation.
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Iterative, user-centered design processes with hybrid content management help improve government website content consistency.
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Resistance to change inside government is common and requires persistent champions like Becky Joglover to overcome.
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Digital services designed for the most marginalized users tend to improve usability for the entire resident population.
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Government websites should act as online government itself, not just provide information about government.
Notable Quotes
"Big projects tend to get out of hand and scare stakeholders, so starting small is key to scaling impact."
"Granicus is like Lego blocks — you can create any type of engagement and experience you want."
"Majority of users relied heavily on Google to find government services rather than navigating the site itself."
"84% of website contributors didn’t know their own top pages or important analytics."
"Digital transformation can be slowed down by leadership resistance and a desire for gradual change."
"If you fix the problems for marginalized communities, you really fix them for everyone."
"People just wanted to get in, get what they needed, and get out without figuring out government operations."
"Websites and digital spaces should be government, not just provide information about government."
"You never get all your usability testers to respond, you always need to recruit more than you think."
"Employees creating content improved rapidly when centralized guidelines and editing were applied."
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