USABILITY AND ITS ROLE IN ENHANCING THE ONLINE

USER EXPERIENCE IN THE EGYPTIAN WEB-BASED

GOVERNMENTAL SERVICES PORTALS

Mostafa Mahmoud Abou EL Neil

Information and Decision Support Center (IDSC), The Egyptian Cabinet, Egypt

1, Magless El Shaàb st., Kasr El Einy, Postal code: 11582 P.O. Box: 191 Magless El Shaàb, Cairo, Egypt

Keywords: Usability, user experience, online credibility, Egyptian governmental portals, visual consistency, intelligent

assistance, visual consistency, interactive help.

Abstract: In Egypt we should start from where the others ended, we should shift the focus from programmer-computer

interaction to user-computer interaction. The number of internet users in Egypt has been increased by

2.520.0% more than 10% of the population with change rate 5.59%. The research methodology based on

analytical investigation using four most important usability issues toward enhancing the online user,

beneficiaries and investors experience and in the same time related to the nature of the selected Egyptian

Ministers websites and services portals. While the study focus is on how usability standards can improve the

online user, beneficiaries and investors experience, it also presents insights on bridging the gap between

what online beneficiaries want and what they really get from the Egyptian Governmental Portals, This paper

also suggest some visual solutions that would better support beneficiaries’ needs.

1 INTRODUCTION

Usability considered as one of the most essential

factors in the web information systems industry. The

term usability was first popularized in the early

1980's (Gould & Lewis, 1985). Due to the successful

implementation of the “free-access to Internet”

strategy in 2002, Egypt now has the largest Internet

market in Africa (Paul Budde Communication Pty

Ltd, 2007). A “PC for Every Home” initiative in

2002 followed by a “Broadband Internet” initiative

launched by the government in 2003. The paper

analyzes and evaluates the aptitude of carefully

selected Egyptian governmental portals in accurately

serving the main beneficiaries and targeted users.

2 RESEARCH PROBLEM

There are no examined usability standards tailored

according to the targeted beneficiaries and investors.

The online users, beneficiaries and investors

don’t gain the maximum advantages from the e-

services provided online by the Egyptian

government.

3 RESEARCH OBJECTIVES

Highlight the benefits of formulating usability

standers tailored specially according to the online

user, beneficiaries and investors’ needs and

requirements.

The research aim to emphasize the role of

applying the usability standards as major phase in

the Egyptian governmental portals development

strategy, and how it can impact the online user

experience.

4 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

The research methodology based on analytical

investigation using the four most important usability

issues toward enhancing the online user,

beneficiaries and investors experience and in the

same time related to the nature of the selected

Egyptian Ministers websites and services portals.

The websites samples limited to selection from

the Egyptian Ministers websites and services portals.

The websites screen shots and samples retrieved

308

Mahmoud Abou EL Neil M. (2008).

USABILITY AND ITS ROLE IN ENHANCING THE ONLINE USER EXPERIENCE IN THE EGYPTIAN WEB-BASED GOVERNMENTAL SERVICES

PORTALS.

In Proceedings of the Fourth International Conference on Web Information Systems and Technologies, pages 308-312

DOI: 10.5220/0001527203080312

 SciTePress

from the worldwide web during the period of

September-October 2007.

5 USABILITY ISSUES

The usability issues envisioned from the “Research-

Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines-2006”,

the reasons I’ve selected this book, First because it is

published by the U.S. Department of Health &

Human Services and as forwarded: “effectively

respond to the President’s Management Agenda and

his E-government Act of 2002”. Second, the

contributors are: “Carefully selected panels of

professional Web designers, usability specialists,

and academic researchers” (U.S. HHS, 2003). Third

“the Guidelines have been widely used by

government agencies and the private sector,

implemented in academic curriculum, and translated

into several foreign languages” (U.S. HHS, 2006).

Also I’ve returned to many original references and

books to get more information which could help in

better usability investigation.

5.1 Communicating and Emphasizing

the Web Site’s Value and Purpose

Many users waste their time or even leave because

they misunderstand the purpose of a Web site. Most

people browsing or searching the Web will spend

very little time on each site. Emphasizing what the

site offers is the real value to users (Nielsen, 2003).

The Egyptian Ministry of CIT has performed an

exploratory study on the Governmental sector

employees opinions about the e-GOV project and

the implementation framework, the study discovered

that the most important and effective factor on the e-

GOV workflow is the citizens perception and

awareness about the importance and advantages

which could be achieved from using and

participating in the new e-governmental services,

and the adjustment between the new services and the

citizens life-style (e-Gov Program, MCIT, 2004).

From this study we clearly state the importance of

communicating and emphasizing the website value

and purpose and its impact on the implementation of

the E-GOV program and achieving its targeted

objectives.

We shouldn't expect users to read a lot of text or

to click into the Site to determine a Site’s purpose

(U.S. HHS, 2006). Designers should clearly and

prominently communicate the purpose and value of

the Web site on the homepage. In some cases the

purpose of a Web site is easily inferred. In other

cases, it may need to be explicitly stated through the

use of brief text or a tagline (U.S. HHS, 2006).

5.2 Optimizing the Credibility of

Information-oriented Web Sites

Fogg, B.J. and others (April 2001) perform large

quantitative study on “What Makes Web Sites

Credible?” they outline some design implications

and present them as proposed guidelines for creating

highly credible Web sites, I will represent the

guidelines in simple and conciseness context: (Fogg,

B.J. and others-April 2001)

• Convey the “real world” aspect of the organization

through the design such as listing a physical

address and showing employee photographs.

Highlighting features that communicate the

legitimacy and accessibility of the organization.

• Including markers of expertise is a key component

in credibility. Important “expertise” elements

include listing an author’s credentials and

including citations and references.

• Including markers of trustworthiness by Adding

design elements such as linking to outside

materials and sources, stating a policy on content.

• Tailoring and personalizing the user experience:

People think a site is more credible when it

acknowledges that the user has visited it before.

• Avoid the pitfalls of amateurism: Organizations

should be ever vigilant—and perhaps obsessive—

and avoid small glitches in their Web sites. These

“small” glitches seem to have a large impact on

Web credibility perceptions.

5.3 Ensure Visual Consistency of

Website Elements within and

between Web Pages

Consistent placement of interface elements can help

users learn to recognize them, allowing maximum

benefit from experience using the site (Badre, 2002).

Mendes, Suomi, and Passos (2004) discussed the

low user take-up of e-Services as a main problem:

Many examinations and assessments have revealed

deficiencies. Long is the list of shortcomings: a

general lack in targeting the audience; an inadequate

and inconsistent design lacking of comments and

adequate examples; a sloppiness in maintenance

showing unreliable and outdated pieces of

information.

Two studies found that the number of errors

made using visually inconsistent displays is reliably

higher than when using visually consistent displays.

USABILITY AND ITS ROLE IN ENHANCING THE ONLINE USER EXPERIENCE IN THE EGYPTIAN

WEB-BASED GOVERNMENTAL SERVICES PORTALS

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Visual consistency includes: (U.S. HHS, 2006) size

and spacing of characters - colors used for labels -

fonts and backgrounds - locations of labels, text and

pictures - placing the navigation bar at the top or on

the left side of every page (Badre, 2002)

Earlier studies found that tasks performed on

more consistent interfaces resulted in: (U.S. HHS,

2006): Reduction in task completion times,

Reduction in errors, Increase in user satisfaction and

Reduction in learning time.

5.4 Provide Intelligent Assistance to the

Targeted Beneficiaries

Users sometimes require special assistance. This is

important if the site was designed for inexperienced

users or has many first time users. A special link was

prepared that allowed new users to access more

information about the site and described the best

way to navigate (U.S. HHS, 2006).

There are numerous variations of user assistance

offered to beneficiaries on the Web. Providing

tailored assistance for the beneficiaries of

governmental services portals to describe the

process of completing task of one or more specific

service, is something very important and has major

impact on the usability considering the task time

completion and error rate. The Egyptian internet

users need special assistance to help them use the

governmental e-service portals in more effective

way, the internet in Egypt since 1993 but serving the

citizens and helping them accomplish the same tasks

via the web they use to achieve in the physical

world, this transitional period needs special attention

while crafting the design and development strategy

of any Egyptian governmental portals.

FAQs are one of the widespread assistance

techniques. The design of FAQ should be concise,

simple questions with answers, designed in a way

that allows users to quickly scan for target words

(Robert w. Proctor & Kim-Phuong L. Vu, 2005).

The emphasis is now on designing intelligent

visually based systems that give relevant, context-

sensitive information to users, instead of text-based

information that has been adapted from paper-based

documentation (Robert w. Proctor & Kim-Phuong L.

Vu, 2005).

Baecker (2002) described five visually based

solutions or sets of tools to provide help to web

users including: (Robert w. Proctor & Kim-Phuong

L. Vu, 2005) Screen linking (remote control of users

screen) - Visual streaming (like video conferencing)

- Animated icons (like bubble help and tool tips) -

Screen capture (tools that allow easy capture for

demo purposes) - Structured video tools (multimedia

that show users how to do something)

Ames (2001) described how technical

communicators must continue the trend of designing

proactive, intelligent user assistance features that

provide context-sensitive, visually based interfaces

that give users the information they need, when they

need it (Robert w. Proctor & Kim-Phuong L. Vu,

2005).

6 USABILITY INVESTIGATION

AND SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS

Egyptian Government Services Portal: The web

site purpose and value are not clearly communicated

through the visual design. There is only the

traditional welcome message. There is no clear

message about the website purpose. Figure 1.

Figure 1: Egyptian Government Services Portal.

Suggested Solution 1: stating and communicating

the main purpose of the portal in clearly deliverable

message is very important to achieve its objectives.

Figure 1a.

Figure 1a: Suggested solution 1.

The Central Agency for Public Mobilization &

Statistics: the main purpose of the web site clearly

identified through the clearly stated slogan “Helping

you make informed decisions”, but there is no point

to the Egyptian government.

Suggested Solution 2 Figure 2: Adding “Arab

Republic of Egypt” above the CAPMAS title.

Figure 2: Suggested solution 2.

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The Central Agency for Public Mobilization &

Statistics: since the website is offered in both

Arabic and English languages the organization name

should be clearly stated in both languages.

Suggested Solution 2: adding English organization

name in the Arabic interface. Figure 2.

Both CAPMAS & CMA websites suffer from

major usability problem related to the website visual

identity. There is no obvious visual message

clarifying the subordinately of these websites to the

Egyptian government.

Capital Market Authority : The website

presents example of not communicating the purpose

and value to the user unless he read a lot of text. As

shown in the next figure the purpose and value

stated under the Mission title. Figure 3.

Figure 3: Capital Market Authority.

Suggested Solution 3: Adding “The Egyptian”

or “Egypt's” under the CMA logo: Egypt’s Capital

Market Authority - The Egyptian Capital Market

Authority. Also as shown in Figure 3a, the designer

could communicate the added value right to the user

by bringing out the website main purpose on the

banner.

Figure 3a: Suggested solution 3.

Egyptian Government Services Portal: some

sections of the portal suffer from real consistency

problem, Figure 4 presents sample of the original

inside page including the main layout elements.

Figure 4: Egyptian Government Services Portal – Citizen

Services (Arabic only).

Figure 4a presents another page within another

section, the section title displayed in different font

kind with different visual effects from the section

title in Figure 3. Also the “user login” link is missing

and the vertical navigation area not exists.

Figure 4a: Egyptian Government Services Portal –

Universities admission (Arabic only).

Figure 4b presents another page in the same

website; with completely different layout, banner

design, color scheme, icons even some design

aspects in the logo have been changed.

Figure 4b: Egyptian Government Services Portal –

Taxation Service (Arabic only).

Egyptian Government Services Portal: the

website provide two basic solutions for helping

users, first is the traditional hypertext web-based

document containing brief about the portal and

description of the different sections (Arabic only),

second is simple FAQs page. There is no interactive

user assistance or visually based help interfaces.

Suggested Solution 4: The portal should provide

bilingual interactive demo for one or more of its

services. Also providing special assistance for the

complaints and inquiries section guiding the user

through the “Complaints, inquiries or Following up”

processes.

Egyptian Investment Portal: the portal

provides help demo to support the users using the

personalization features, the demo is “one shot

presentation” and doesn’t provide: indication to

navigation between the main sections or supportive

instructions such as “How to customize the Latest

News”, “How to use the Edit Button” or “Catalog

Zone”. Since the portal is multilingual the user

assistance should be in both languages.

Also the designer divided the FAQs into many

sections and pages, in most cases it requires from the

user more than 3 clicks to reach specific answer, and

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the site doesn't provide navigation options between

FAQs sections.

Suggested Solution 5 Figure 5: Adding auto-

hide taskbar containing the main help sections

should ease the navigation and proof the user control

over the presentation demo.

Figure 5: Suggested solution 5.

Suggested solution 6 Figure 6: providing direct

navigation links to the same level sections.

Figure 6: Suggested solution 6.

7 CONCLUSIONS AND

RECOMMENDATIONS

In order to encourage citizens, beneficiaries and

investors to benefit from the web-based

governmental services and motivate them to trust the

government initiatives and trends toward the e-Gov

program, usability standards must be adequately

applied and there should be enough usability tests

approved before the final launching of the

information portals.

Increasing attention should be paid to computing

research issues related to usability and visual design.

Usability has to be an intrinsic part of both web

products and the culture of Web information systems

development especially in the governmental sector

also designers should practice user-centric design

principles that are based on logical thinking from the

point of view of the end user: the beneficiary.

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Badre, A.N. (2002). Shaping Web Usability: Interaction

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E-Government Program, MCIT (2004) - EISI-

Government, The Egyptian Information Society

Initiative for Government Services Delivery (Arabic

version) - www.egypt.gov.eg/arabic/documents.

Erik P. Bucy and John E. Newhagen (2004) - Media

Access Social and Psychological Dimensions of New

Technology Use - Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

Fogg, B.J. and others (April 2001). What Makes A Web

Site Credible? A Report on a Large Quantitative Study

- Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab. Stanford

University - www.webcredibility.org/guidelines.

Jakob Nielsen - Alertbox, November 10, 2003 - The Ten

Most Violated Homepage Design Guidelines -

www.useit.com.

Karen Donoghue (2002) - Built for Use Driving

Profitability Through the User Experience - The

McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Manuel J. Mendes, Reima Suomi and Carlos Passos

(2004) - Digital Communities in a Networked Society:

e-Commerce, e-Business and e-Government - Kluwer

Academic Publishers.

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Convergence, Broadband & Internet Markets -

www.budde.com.au.

Peter Lyman and Hal R. Varian (2003)–How Much

Information?-Berkeley University of California.

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Handbook of Human Factors in Web Design -

Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc., Publishers.

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Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines -

www.usability.gov – USA.

U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (2006) -

Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines -

www.usability.gov – USA.

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