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The Content Corner: User Research for Complex Systems

My office is preparing to embark on a complete redesign of a 10-year-old system that averages 20,000 users a month. The success and adoption of the new system design and the product as a whole will be heavily determined by how well our team translates users’ needs. Providing a good user experience will also play
Nov 16, 2015

Engage the Community with Visual Greatness

The power of using social media to find and create images can be overwhelming. What image do I post? How can I get more followers when I don’t have animals or pretty pictures to share? All good questions. The fact is, no matter what your agency does you can find a visual way to tell
Nov 13, 2015
Josh Clark, one of the pioneers of touch Web design, and author of Tapworthy and Designing for Touch, published an excellent article on A List Apart analyzing How We Hold Our Gadgets that has a wealth of data and graphics about this interesting and emerging design challenge. Below are 5 notable lessons from the post: 1. Portrait (vertical) orientation dominates
Nov 10, 2015

Creating Connection with Instagram

I’ve been thinking a lot about Instagram lately. It’s pretty big, especially among the younger populations (AKA. Millennials). Actually, from what I can tell, it’s pretty big with lots of different age groups, genders, and ethnicities; and it’s growing every day. Full disclosure: I use Instagram in my personal
Nov 10, 2015

The Content Corner: Structured Content and the Power of Syndication

A recent DigitalGov webinar on syndicated content and the recent achievements of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention helped open my eyes even wider to the possibilities of open and structured content. By offering critical health information via syndication, CDC and other Department of Health and Human Services agencies are helping resource-strapped local agencies share
Nov 09, 2015

USCIS Twitter Office Hours

On September 1, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) hosted our first Twitter Office Hours, a Twitter chat for USCIS customers. The purpose of this pilot event was to offer our customers a different way to engage with us. We aimed to leverage Twitter to answer questions on our agency’s programs and policies and to
Nov 06, 2015

#SomosSocial: 5 Keys for Government to Reach Hispanics Through Social Media

Hispanics are one of fastest growing demographics in the U.S. But like any demographic, there are important nuances to consider when connecting with this audience. Insight into your audience’s motivations, behavior and preferences is key for anyone trying to engage with the public. We know every day that more and more Hispanics are on social
Nov 05, 2015
Looking for health or science related images? The National Institutes of Health (NIH) recently launched the NIH Image Gallery on Flickr. The Image Gallery offers a wide variety of scientific, biomedical and disease related imagery as well as photos of NIH
Nov 04, 2015
An industry group tracking the growth and production of the “Internet of Things,” a term given to Internet-connected devices and accessories, is predicting that growth will slow over the next 6 months, but then surge 3 times as fast, over the following year. The research was organized by the IoT M2M Council, which is made
Nov 03, 2015

Modernizing Federal Cybersecurity

Summary: Today, the Administration directed a series of actions to continue strengthening Federal cybersecurity & modernizing the government’s technology infrastructure. Strengthening the cybersecurity of Federal networks, systems, and data is one of the most important challenges we face as a Nation. Every day, public and private sector leaders—my team included—are directing significant resources to address
Nov 02, 2015

The Content Corner: The Joys of the Content Template

Many of us depend a great deal on subject matter experts (SMEs) to generate content that will eventually end up on our site. These are men and women that have critical knowledge to share with our audiences, and it is our job to make it match our various editorial and content guidelines. Using a simple
Nov 02, 2015

New Website. New Farmers.

USDA has been looking for ways to improve content delivery to our customers and making their first interaction with USDA and government a positive one. In 2014, USDA launched New Farmers, a website dedicated to helping new and beginning farmers and ranchers find the resources
Oct 30, 2015