Citizen experience
AUSTRALIAN CITIZENS HAVE BEEN EMBRACING DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES FOR YEARS. HOWEVER, SINCE THE PANDEMIC HIT, THE COUNTRY’S DIGITAL UPTAKE HAS ACCELERATED AT LIGHTNING SPEED.
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ore than ever before, Australians expect that they can access just about anything online: from shopping and food delivery, to streaming music and television, right through to accessing government services. They expect a rising standard of online experience. Whether it’s paying council rates or submitting tax claims to the ATO, the digitisation of government services quite simply makes everyday life easier. But as the digital economy rapidly evolves, so must those services and how they are delivered. Creating a digital platform where citizens can interact with departments and agencies is just the beginning — these platforms must be constantly evaluated and adjusted in order to continually improve the citizen experience. And in order to do this, governments need to turn to big data and data analytics. BIG DATA, BETTER SERVICES Big data analytics has completely transformed private enterprise, giving companies the ability to establish a 360° view of their customer base, segmenting them by demographics and tailoring products and services based on their customers’ specific behaviours,
14 | GOVTECH REVIEW Q2 2022
HOW BIG DATA
IMPROVES THE CITIZEN EXPERIENCE James Horne, CEO, Balance Internet
preferences and unique tastes. However, this level of business intelligence isn’t reserved for private enterprise — it can also be used by government departments whilst being compliant with privacy requirements, to improve the citizen experience. Every web click represents a step in a citizen’s online journey; a journey which can be collected and stored for future analysis. Over time, the data collected from thousands of citizens’ journeys begins to show patterns in their behaviour — highlighting popular products and services, as well as potential issues that may need
addressing. Perhaps there’s a point where a large number of users suddenly fall off, indicating that the site is lacking the right information and needs to be adjusted in some way. Perhaps a large number of citizens from a particular regional location are all searching for the same thing, indicating that the department may need to rework messaging or add new services to that particular location. The way citizens interact with a platform tells a story — and when the data from those interactions is analysed and actioned appropriately, it can help improve departmental effectiveness.
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