Press release

Mississippi’s Digital Government Experience Named Best in the Nation

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Sponsored by Businesswire

The Center for Digital Government has awarded first place to Mississippi’s official state website, ms.gov, and associated digital government services in the annual Government Experience Awards. Mississippi received top honors for the seamless use of emerging technology, introduction of advanced citizen-centric platforms, and people-first delivery of digital government services to better connect government to its citizens and improve service delivery.

“Mississippi is excited and honored to be recognized by the Center for Digital Government for our achievements in government experience,” said Michele Blocker, Interim Executive Director of Mississippi Information Technology Services. “As a technology agency, we strive to respond to Mississippians’ needs with new sophisticated online experiences, like chatbot and voice assistant technology, that raise the bar for citizen engagement. This award is yet another confirmation that Mississippi continues to be on the forefront of digital government services.”

The Government Experience Awards recognize the achievements and best practices of states, cities, and counties that excel at creating useful online government services and applications. The Center for Digital Government is a national research and advisory institute on information technology policies and sets the standard for measuring best practices in state and local government.

This is Mississippi’s first time taking the coveted top spot but the sixth consecutive year placing in the top five.

Ms.gov offers an easy, convenient way for Mississippians to access more than 300 online services. MISSI, the state’s award-winning digital government chatbot, was enhanced in 2020 and as a cornerstone of the design experience made finding services and assistance easier than ever. As the first state in the nation to offer a state government chatbot, MISSI, now supports 400 types of interactions to support users seeking information quickly. In fiscal year 2020, Mississippi’s government websites and applications served over 7.3 million site visitors and securely processed over 1.1 million digital government transactions totaling more than $100 million for the state – a 32% digital adoption increase over 2019.

Development, hosting, and maintenance of the ms.gov platforms, valued at more than $2.5 million, have been provided at no cost to the state of Mississippi through a self-funded, public-private partnership between the state of Mississippi and NIC Mississippi, a division of national digital government solutions firm NIC Inc.

More About ms.gov:

Twitter: @msdotgov

Facebook: facebook.com/msdotgov

Instagram: instagram.com/msdotgov

Ask Mississippi Amazon Alexa and Google Home Action: https://www.ms.gov/msi/myms/ask-mississippi

MISSI Chatbot and Apple Business Chat: www.ms.gov/Technology

About NIC Mississippi

NIC Mississippi is a public-private partnership between the state of Mississippi and NIC Mississippi that helps state government entities Web-enable their information and services. Jackson-based NIC Mississippi is celebrating its 10th year as the state’s official digital government services partner and is part of digital government firm NIC’s family of companies. NIC Mississippi operates ms.gov, the official website of the state of Mississippi, which offers more than 300 state and local online services.

About NIC Inc.

NIC (Nasdaq: EGOV) is a leading digital government solutions and payments company, serving more than 7,000 federal, state and local government agencies across the nation. With headquarters in Olathe, Kan., NIC partners with the majority of U.S. states to deliver user-friendly digital services that make it easier and more efficient to interact with government – providing valuable conveniences like applying for unemployment insurance, submitting business filings, renewing licenses, accessing information and making secure payments without visiting a government office. In the COVID-19 era and beyond, NIC helps government agencies rapidly deliver digital solutions to provide essential services to citizens and businesses alike. Having served the public sector for nearly 30 years, NIC continues to evolve with its federal, state and local government partners to deliver innovative and cost-effective digital government to constituents. Learn more at www.egov.com.