Quantitative assessment of European municipal web sites: Development and use of an evaluation tool
Abstract
Purpose
The internet is becoming increasingly important in the communication between local governments and citizens, which makes the usability of municipal web sites a critical factor in government‐citizen communication. The purpose of this paper is to propose and test a model for evaluating the potential of municipal web sites.
Design/methodology/approach
In this work an objective investigation of the issue has been conducted by manually accessing and evaluating 84 European municipal web sites. Quality of web home pages was determined using an original Web Assessment Index, which focuses on four categories: accessibility, speed, navigability and content.
Findings
A detailed report of the results arising from this investigation is presented and systematically analyzed.
Originality/value
The most valuable output from this paper is not the ability to identify the best sites, but to see how each municipal site is compared to related sites and to spot ideas and practices that can improve city sites. These findings will be useful for both researchers and practitioners who seek to understand the issues relevant to municipal e‐government.
Keywords
Citation
Miranda, F.J., Sanguino, R. and Bañegil, T.M. (2009), "Quantitative assessment of European municipal web sites: Development and use of an evaluation tool", Internet Research, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 425-441. https://doi.org/10.1108/10662240910981380
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2009, Emerald Group Publishing Limited