Measuring the performance of electronic government services

The WorldWideWeb (WWW) and the Internet have streamlined government information, products, and services. Electronic government now includes on-line filing of documents, notification of entitlements, permits, registration, and disaster relief. This paper addresses the question, can a marketing model be used by Federal and state agencies to improve the content and value of electronic services to the public? Six Federal and state e-service programs were analyzed – the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the US Mint, the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the US Postal Service (USPS), and the e-State-government systems of California and New Jersey. Five marketing indicators were used – consumer awareness, popularity, contact efficiency, conversion, and retention. Awareness deals with the number of visitors on site. Popularity refers to the rank of the site. Contact efficiency indicates site usability and content. Conversion refers to customer satisfaction, transactions and time on the site. Retention deals with customer loyalty. Web traffic reports and customer surveys were used as proxies to analyze and compare a sample of Federal and state e-service agencies. The results support the use of a marketing framework in organizing and evaluating these sites. The case studies demonstrate how statistical and survey data were combined for a robust assessment of the e-services.