USA.gov Blog

A good following on social media is fundamental to USAGov’s goal of getting clear and helpful government information to Spanish speakers around the country. To make sure we’re reaching the right people at the right time with valuable content, our team began to rethink our USAGov en Español Twitter strategy.

User data guides what we do at USAGov. Without it, we wouldn’t know what government questions people are searching for. And we wouldn’t know how to design our content to make it easier for people to find and understand the answers.

USAGov receives and responds to questions directly from the public in many ways: through social media, on page surveys on USA.gov and USAGov en Español, and through chats and calls. One powerful tool in the USAGov toolbelt is our interactive voice response (IVR) system in both English and Spanish through the USAGov Contact Center.

During the coronavirus pandemic, government websites are working to make their COVID-19-related content easier for people to find in search engine results. They’re doing it by using SpecialAnnouncement schema.org tags.

Visit this blog post from Digital.gov to get a clear explanation of how these tags work, and find out what USA.gov is learning by using them.

Throughout USAGov’s history, we’ve relied on the expertise of federal agencies to help fulfill our mission of giving the public clear, accurate information about government services and programs. Connecting regularly keeps us up-to-date with agencies’ priorities and activities. We do this in many ways.

A significant part of USAGov’s work is to answer the public’s questions about government through our USAGov Contact Center. In 2019, we received more than 430,000 calls. Our agents answered many requests for other agencies’ phone numbers and questions about the status of applications, payments, or personal information. We believed that we could answer these requests more efficiently by expanding our use of interactive voice response (IVR). An IVR is an automated system that routes callers on a phone tree, based on their voice responses or pressing a specific button on their phone keypad.

How many people are visiting USA.gov and USA.gov/espanol right now? What kind of devices are they using and what content are they looking for the most? These are all easy-to-answer questions with the USAGov analytics dashboard. It’s open to everyone and provides a snapshot of popular content on our websites and technical and geographical stats about our users. 

Earlier this year, we piloted our USAGov chatbot to help visitors find answers to their questions about scams and fraud. After the launch, we made tweaks to the interface based on customer feedback and usage data. 

USAGov manages a contact center that answers questions from the public via phone and chat in both English and Spanish. We analyze the types of questions we get so we can learn about our users and their needs. This data allows us to continuously revise and improve the ways we’re providing services to our audience, not just through the USAGov Contact Center, but online at USA.gov, and through outreach and social media as well. 

The USAGov team plays a challenging, but important role in times of national disaster in helping people across the country prepare for and recover from disasters. To do this, we use different tactics across our channels to ensure we are delivering accurate, helpful information to those who needed it most.