Arkansas State Website Wins Two Awards

MarCom and Davey Awards honor beta.arkansas.gov for creative design

LITTLE ROCK, Ark.--()--The state of Arkansas recently won two international awards—a MarCom Gold Award and a Davey Silver Award—for the newly redesigned “beta” of its official state website, Arkansas.gov.

Developed in partnership with the Information Network of Arkansas (INA), the redesigned beta.arkansas.gov was prompted by site visitor data and feedback from users who said they wanted to quickly get the information and services needed, do what they came to do and get on with their day. The new design features citizen-centric curated content, uses easy-to-read text and places links to the most commonly accessed government services up front. A new search engine consolidates information for more than 850 services from multiple state, local and municipal agencies, presenting them in a conversational way.

The state debuted beta.arkansas.gov in June and is gathering citizen feedback before officially launching it as the definitive Arkansas.gov in the coming months. When it launches, the new state portal will use a chatbot to provide faster Help Center assistance to tens of thousands of citizens.

“It’s an honor for the state to be recognized yet again for its long history of innovation with the state website design,” Secretary of State and INA Board Chair Mark Martin said. “We have been getting positive feedback from citizens over the past several months, and we appreciate that these industry awards validate our simplified approach and recognize the new technologies we’re exploring to provide faster and more efficient service on Arkansas.gov.”

The MarCom Awards are administered by the Association of Marketing and Communications Professionals (AMCP) and honor excellence in marketing and communications. Since its inception in 2004, MarCom has evolved into one of the largest, most respected creative competitions in the world. Beta.arkansas.gov was chosen as a gold winner in the Government Website category from more than 6,000 overall entries.

With nearly 4,000 entries from around the world, the Davey Awards honor the finest creative work from the best agencies, firms and companies worldwide. This year the Davey’s recognized beta.arkansas.gov with a Silver Award in the Government Website category. The competition is sanctioned and judged by the Academy of Interactive and Visual Arts, an invitation-only body consisting of top-tier professionals from acclaimed media, advertising and marketing firms. Entries are judged to evaluate distinction in creative work based on a standard of excellence determined by the AIVA for each category.

About the Information Network of Arkansas

The Information Network of Arkansas (INA) is a public-private partnership between the state of Arkansas and the Arkansas Information Consortium (AIC) that helps state government entities Web-enable their information and services. Little Rock-based AIC is celebrating its 20th year as the state’s official digital government services partner, and is part of digital government firm NIC’s (EGOV) family of companies. INA operates Arkansas.gov, the official website of the state of Arkansas, which offers more than 850 state and local online services.

ABOUT NIC

NIC (NASDAQ: EGOV), which is celebrating 25 years as a company in 2017, has seen the transition of digital services from green-screen computers to mobile apps and artificial intelligence. Founded in 1992, NIC is the nation's premier provider of innovative government solutions and secure payment processing, which help make government more accessible and convenient for everyone through technology. The family of NIC companies has a library of more than 12,000 digital government solutions for more than 4,500 federal, state and local agencies in the United States. Among those solutions is the ground-breaking personal digital government assistant, Gov2Go, aimed at providing constituents easy, personal interactions with government. Additional information is available at www.egov.com.

Contacts

Information Network of Arkansas
Bob Sanders, 501-324-8900
General Manager
bob@ark.org

Release Summary

Arkansas wins two international awards for the redesigned "beta" of its official state website, Arkansas.gov.

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Contacts

Information Network of Arkansas
Bob Sanders, 501-324-8900
General Manager
bob@ark.org