The Eurostat study of public services online published in February 2005 found that the UK’s were the most sophisticated at serving the citizen in any of the countries studied, but also revealed that only around 11% of UK internet users were actively using public authority websites. In the local authority sector, the ‘Connect to your Council’ marketing and communications campaign is a direct response by Communities and Local Government (CLG) designed to both increase the numbers of citizens experiencing the improved public services that e-government can bring and increase the efficiency of service delivery through the optimisation of web-based self-service.

Policy Context

In 2004, the UK Government issued a benchmark standard for high quality strategies to ensure that new electronic services and channels get high levels of take-up. This includes a requirement for a proactive strategy for migration of customers to cheaper channels, with quality criteria including: - Service marketing approach capable of achieving take-up by different customer groups; - Service marketing approach has been benchmarked against relevant best practice in both the public and private sectors; - Marketing plan aligned with Directgov (www.direct.gov.uk) portal. The Local e-Government Programme (Localegov) in England transformed the e-enablement of council services in England, from 26% in March 2002 to 100% by April 2006. The Eurostat study of public services online published by the EU in February 2005, confirmed that the infrastructure for e-services was in now place, but also revealed that that the public in the UK were not yet experiencing the improved services that e-government can bring The Campaign uses a marketing communications (marcomms) and market research-based approach to driving the take-up of online local services. This approach was originally trialled in a National Project with local authorities called e-Citizen (www.e-citizen.gov.uk) conducted between 2004 and 2005, which established that up to 46% of the adult population of England (22.5 million citizens) were willing to use local authority e-channels given the right degree of awareness. Prior to the commencement of the ‘Connect to your Council’ Campaign, the Central Office of Information (COI) was commissioned to undertake a feasibility study to investigate increasing the take-up of local authority e-services via a national marketing campaign. This recommended that the Campaign be undertaken. The Campaign also contributes to European Union policy in terms of an information society for all by addressing low levels of public awareness in the UK about new online channels for local government services.

Description of target users and groups

Anyone with access to the internet and is open to using the internet – at work, at home or via intermediaries or other sources. Although initially these are most likely to be people in younger age groups (25-44) in employment who are comfortable with technology, the Campaign is reaching, and appealing, to a broad diversity of users across England, with between 85%-90% of all adults in England (44.1 million people) having had an opportunity to see or hear the Campaign advertising.

Description of the way to implement the initiative

The ‘Connect to your Council’ Campaign is run according to Managing Successful Programmes (MSP) methodology, for the co-ordinated organisation, direction and implementation of a portfolio of activities that together achieve outcomes and realise benefits that are of strategic importance. This includes ensuring that all interested parties (the stakeholders) are involved. In order to ensure that we consulted and involved local authorities as key stakeholders, we sought their representation on the Programme Board and established a Communications Forum of PR and communications professionals in local government to act as a ‘sounding board’ for Campaign plans. In an 'offline' context, the promotion of online local services is backed up by our associated PR activity for the Campaign working with the Government News Network (GNN). We are aware that marketing activity alone will not lead to sustainable improvements in the take-up of online services. Rather, for effective and efficient administration the culture of local government must be changed in order to mainstream and embed the role of online services alongside offline delivery methods. To this extent, PR activity is designed to direct the 'online' message internally with local authority staff who also need to be involved in the marketing and promotion of the website. PR activity is also designed to help optimise public use of online services by emphasising the speed, comfort, ease and variety offered by online access compared to telephone or direct contact. It also attempts to convey the fun and adventure of going online to find information – where one enquiry often opens another world of unexpected information.

Main results, benefits and impacts

An independent impact study carried o ut by the Central Office of Informationshowed that the Campaign reached an estimated 85-90% of all adults in England (around 44.1 million people) with an Opportunity to See (OTS) or Hear (OTH) of around 20 occasions each and was recalled by 38% of the target group. The online advertising alone on websites and search engines has generated over 225 million page impressions and 860,000 click-through visits into the Campaign website. Around 1.3 million new visitors were attracted to council websites last summer as a direct result of the Campaign. TNS research into public attitudes and behaviours amongst internet users also reveals some significant switching of channel loyalty, with rising website use and falling telephone use between April and July 2006. The real measure of the success of the Campaign is shown by the increase in Internet users accessing council websites – up 88% from 1-in-11 adults pre Campaign to 1-in-6 post Campaign. Figures show that more than 6,000 abandoned cars were reported online to councils in England in June alone via the campaign website at www.direct.gov.uk/mycouncil – enough to fill all the public parking spaces in a city the size of Cambridge. In the longer term, it is estimated that encouraging more customers to go online will create over £1 billion efficiency savings nationally by 2008 for reinvestment elsewhere in local authority front-line service delivery. The Campaign is unique in using marketing to connect the national Directgov portal for government services with the online services of 388 local authorities. With local authorities accounting for around 80% of all government services to the citizen in England, we deliberately adopted low key approach to Directgov branding, with creative executions designed to: - make councils the 'heroes' of the advertising; - create a call to action; - build the association between councils and the services represented; - Communicate the online message. By running the Campaign as a national exercise, we were able to bring to the table world-class players in terms of the creative agency for the advertising (Euro RSCG), media buying (Carat/COI), and market research (Taylor Nelson Sofres) that would not normally be affordable at the individual local authority level. Our extensive qualitative research testing of Campaign materials with focus groups of members of the public has also produced a set of creative marketing materials for print, radio and online media that are proven to actually work in terms of raising public awareness of online local authority services.

Return on investment

Return on investment: Not applicable / Not available

Track record of sharing

We have recently worked with the European Institute of Public Administration (EIPA) to present good practice case studies about the ‘Connect to your Council’ Campaign to audiences in Greece - Athens (December 2006) and Thessaloniki (March 2007). All creative materials from the Campaign are available free of charge from the ProductShare website. We have also distributed this material in the form of a CD toolkit to all local authorities in England. This is designed to allow local authorities to use the material for their own locally-branded take-up campaigns. For example, the London Borough of Lewisham used free ‘Connect to your Council’ promotional materials about online payment of parking fines to create a combination of posters, advertisements, stickers and a web button, for use in the civic magazine, and on local buses and parking meters. As an immediate result, the monthly revenue from parking fines collected electronically rose from around £3,000 (Euro 5,000) to over £15,000 (Euro 22,000) per month.

Lessons learnt

Lesson 1 - Marketing expenditure must be used in a targeted way, to achieve defined strategic objectives, e.g. more people making payments online. Our Campaign work shows that people respond to a service-specific ‘call to action’ about going online (e.g. to renew library books, make a schools application), but that more general marketing messages about themed groups of services tend to fail. Lesson 2 - In order to get more people online, marketing should avoid sending out mixed channel messages. For example, our print adverts were careful to give the Campaign URL and then reinforce this online message through use of a pull-down menu and cursor, as well as highlighting the service issue within the frame of a computer screen. Including council phone numbers and other contact information should be avoided as they can simply reinforce in-grained behaviour. Lesson 3 - Citizens need little active persuasion to take-up online council services if the messages are clear, i.e. primary task is to raise awareness. Anything which obscures the message or reduces standout and appeal will be detrimental to the effectiveness of the marketing. Tactical slogans or mission statements that offer a different message (e.g. X is a ‘local town for local people’) should be avoided. Scope: National