State of Mississippi Finishes in Top Three for Government Experience

Mississippi’s electronic government services ranked third among the Nation’s best

JACKSON, Miss.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The official website of the State of Mississippi, ms.gov, won third place in the Center for Digital Government’s third annual Government Experience Awards. Ms.gov was recognized for its digital first approach to delivering citizen-focused services, and for implementing the latest emerging technologies to present a single view of Mississippi government that is accessible from any device.

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 the fifth consecutive year Mississippi has placed in the top five of the Center for Digital Government’s prestigious government awards.

“Mississippi is honored to be recognized by the Center for Digital Government for our achievements in government experience,” said Dr. Craig Orgeron, Executive Director of Mississippi Information Technology Services and State of Mississippi Chief Information Officer. “The continued success of the state’s online services and the emergence of new citizen-centric experiences has greatly enhanced the citizen-to-government relationship. This award is yet another confirmation that, through the launch of innovative solutions like the ms.gov chatbot, MISSI, the personalized myMississippi platform, and the Ask Mississippi digital voice assistant, Mississippi continues to raise the bar for citizen engagement.”

Ms.gov offers an easy, convenient way for Mississippians to access more than 250 online services, including driver license renewals, hunting and fishing license purchases, and MISSI, the state’s award-winning digital government chatbot. In 2018 alone, Mississippi’s electronic government technology served more than 1.5 million visitors and over 830,000 transactions across all online services. It securely processed more than $79 million in digital government transactions—a 13% digital adoption increase over 2017.

Additional notable innovations available on ms.gov include:

• MISSI, the ms.gov Chatbot – The state of Mississippi’s first chatbot, MISSI, is accessible from ms.gov and on citizens’ mobile devices. MISSI is able to direct users to what they are looking for, whether it is renewing their boating license or helping locate the closest DMV location. Since her inception, MISSI has helped multiple concurrent users at once and has helped answer over 35,000 questions. MISSI has further improved the availability of ms.gov citizen support statewide.
• myMississippi – myMS was created to make government interaction as effortless as possible by furthering engagement and customization on ms.gov for citizens. myMS encourages users to set and receive reminders and alerts for services important to them, opening communication channels between state and citizen. Since its introduction in 2015, myMS has been continually enhanced and over the last year realized a significant spike in adoption of more than 91% in new accounts created.
• Ask Mississippi Digital Voice Assistant – the Amazon Alexa and Google Home skills allow for direct citizen-to-government communication simply by using your voice. Users can ask, “Alexa, ask Mississippi if there are any traffic alerts in my area,” and “Alexa, ask Mississippi for my local news.” The Ask Mississippi myMS platform supports many additional state services including asking for when a user’s driver’s license expires, state facts and even phone numbers to state agencies.
• Apple Business Chat – a first for Mississippi government is the newest channel to the ms.gov experience in 2019. Now citizens can get the information they need right in the Messages app on their iPhone or iPad, which makes connecting with Mississippi government as easy as texting their favorite people. Apple Business chat gives citizens another avenue to get answers quickly, resolve issues and get in touch with state agencies. Users can easily find and start conversations from their browser, Maps, Search and by using Siri.

The entire ms.gov platform development, hosting, and maintenance, valued at more than $2 million, has been developed at no-cost to the state of Mississippi through a self-funded, public-private partnership between the state of Mississippi and eGovernment partner, Mississippi Interactive.

More about ms.gov:

Twitter: @msdotgov
Facebook: facebook.com/msdotgov
Instagram: instagram.com/msdotgov
Ask Mississippi Amazon Voice Skill: amazon.com/NIC-Inc-ms-gov/dp/B01E62XCZC/
Ask Mississippi Google Assistant: assistant.google.com/services/a/uid/0000001678187451
MISSI Chatbot and Apple Business Chat: www.ms.gov/Technology

About Mississippi Interactive

Mississippi Interactive (MSI) is a public-private partnership between the state of Mississippi and Mississippi Interactive, LLC that helps state government entities Web-enable their information and services. Jackson-based MSI is celebrating its ninth year as the state’s official digital government services partner and is part of digital government firm NIC’s (Nasdaq: EGOV) family of companies. MSI operates ms.gov, the official website of the state of Mississippi, which offers more than 250 state and local online services.

About NIC 


NIC Inc. (Nasdaq: EGOV) launched the digital government industry in 1992, and continues to lead it, providing a secure payment engine and thousands of digital government solutions across a network of more than 6,000 federal, state, and local government agencies. In addition, NIC is a leading provider of outdoor recreation solutions, with 1 out of 6 hunting and fishing licenses in the United States sold using an NIC service. The Company created the nation’s first personal assistant for government and comprehensive mobile platform, Gov2Go^®, as well as the innovative, data-driven prescription drug monitoring platform, RxGov®. More information is available at www.egov.com.

Contacts

Dana Wilson
Mississippi Interactive, LLC

601.351.5023