Birmingham City Council Website Awards
Birmingham City Council is Europe’s largest local authority serving over one million customers and its website attracts 4,486,793 unique visitors a year.
2017 was a remarkable year for the city council's website wining 3 awards.
Webby Awards
Birmingham City Council has been awarded official Honouree status in the 2017 Webby Awards, the leading international award honouring excellence on the internet.
The website, launched in August 2016, was recognised in the Public Sector and Activism category, under Mobile Sites and Apps sector.
Paula Buckley, Assistant Director, Customer Services at Birmingham City Council, said:
One of our core objectives in the redesign was tackling resident concerns around a lack of mobile responsiveness, so to be recognised in the mobile category in particular is fantastic.
A Webby is the internet’s highest honour but ultimately it’s down to how our residents find the service and so far, the feedback has been outstanding.
Lovie Awards
Birmingham City Council has won a Gold award and a People’s Choice award at the Lovies, Europe’s leading awards organisation honouring excellence in design and user experience on the internet.
The International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences (IADAS), which selects the Lovie Award Winners, named Birmingham City Council ‘Gold Winner’ in the ‘Websites, Government & Civic’ category.
The website also received the ‘People’s Lovie’ in the same ‘Websites, Government & Civic’ category’, which is decided by public vote.
Matt Culpin, Creative Director at Spacecraft Digital said:
Mobile responsiveness and accessibility were absolutely key to our mission. We did a lot of discovery work with customers throughout the process and spent time analysing the data of the previous site. User testing was conducted throughout the design and build process and we were laser focused on establishing and defining user needs.
Eye tracking also played a big part, once something had been created; it was presented to people for us to gather evidence into what their eyes were drawn to. We were able to see heatmaps of where people were looking and test pathways based on specific tasks. The result was a redesign based on thorough intelligence!
Plain English Campaign Award
Birmingham City Council has won a Plain English Campaign Award for its website.
Plain English Campaign said:
The new website is a joy to use, and is a credit to everyone involved. It looks great, is easy to navigate and is a vast improvement. Perhaps this example will set a precedent other city councils might follow?
Deputy Leader Cllr Brigid Jones said:
We are delighted that our website has won the Plain English Campaign website category. A lot of work has been done to make sure Birmingham City Council’s website is accessible to as many people as possible.