TAKE ACTION AND PARTICIPATE!

DIGITAL TOOLS FOR PARTICIPATION: WHERE TO START?

With social distancing measures likely to be around for some time and with challenging questions and decisions in front of us, there has never been a greater need for high-quality digital engagement.

The web is filled with tools to enable participation, collaboration and discussion, but it can be difficult to know where to start and what is most convenient for my participatory process. This page aims to give you a space that will help you choose and connect digital tools for your participation process. It’s based on a combination of our own experience, discussion with other practitioners and knowledge of good engagement principles and practice.

Before you start:

The best (and only) place to start with digital engagement – as with any form of engagement – is with your purpose. Why do you want to involve the public? What impact are you looking to achieve?

As with any form of participation, it is important to consider accessibility and inclusion as part of your digital engagement planning. Do your intended participants have good quality internet connections? What devices, if any, do they have access to and use regularly (e.g. computers, tablets, smartphones)? How comfortable are they with using technology and different types of online platform? The answers to all of these questions will have implications for the tools you might choose, how you use them and what sort of support you provide to people to participate.

If you find it difficult to answer these questions, we have lots of information about the participation process here “GET TO KNOW” and in “BE CONSULTED” you can contact our experts of participation for guidance on designing participatory processes.

Below we have suggested for you digital tools according to different uses or functions. Some tools fulfil multiple (often connected) functions, but no tool can do everything. Sometimes, they’ll be best used in combination with one another to perform different tasks in an engagement process. Your “personal planning office” will help you to take action and participate.

COMMUNICATION 

(top down and botom up – information)

Survey form creator

(Commenting / feedback, Ideas generation)

Google Forms is a tool that allows collecting information from citizens through a personalized survey or quiz. The information is then collected and automatically connected to a spreadsheet. The spreadsheet is populated with the survey and quiz responses.

Advantages of the Google Forms

Get answers fast, you can schedule a meeting of citizens on the forum, manage people’s registration for training, conduct a quick poll, collect email addresses for the newsletter, prepare a test, etc.

Questions and answers the way you want, you can choose from many question types, such as multiple choice questions, drop-down lists, and linear scale. Add photos and videos from YouTube or let your imagination run wild and use filtering questions.

Ask or answer wherever you are, forms are fast, so you can easily (and with great effects) create, edit and fill out forms on screens of any size.

Order and transparency, survey responses are automatically and carefully collected in Forms, and response information and graphs are kept up to date. You can also view all this data in Sheets.

Build together with others, add collaborators – create polls with friends, neighbors, classmates or co-workers, 

Surveys with style, use your photo or logo and the Forms will choose the right colors to create a unique form for you. You can also choose one of the pre-made themes.

Free version, creating surveys or polls is simple and costs nothing.

we recommend: https://www.google.com/forms/about/

Participatory HUB Planner SMS system

(messaging сonversations to quickly inform citizens)

It’s important for citizens to stay up to date about what happens in their communities. With a single mass text comprised of a few words, representatives can send notifications to hundreds of people at one time. This standardizes communication and minimizes delays, allowing citizens to access the information they need quickly, right from their mobile devices. For example, citizens may need to be notified right away about city-related schedule changes and public safety issues. Municipalities organization can make sure their citizens receive accurate information in a timely manner with the help of SMS texts.

Advantages of the Planer SMS system

A text message is an effective alternative that allows the message to break through the information noise

Citizens are the VIP customer for your community, automatic notifications are considered the basic and one of the most important elements of customer service

Message is a great opportunity to build relationships with citizens. Choose the right tone and create compelling content.

Quickly and efficiently report on progress in the implementation of decisions or public services. In addition, the transparency of information reduces the stress associated with delays or other problems.

Automated notifications are useful at every stage of the process of quickly informing citizens. 

Useful during limit the possibilities of meetings and  mobility restrictions. The message can inform  about: new regulations, scheduled public consultations, emergency information, etc.

Easily automated notifications, set your own shipping conditions and create templates that will allow you to personalize your content.

Independence from internet access, what makes text messages an ideal channel for instant notifications, as long as the user is within range of the cellular network, they will be able to read your message.

CONSULTATION & COLLABORATION

ZOOM

(A video and audio communication tool for everyone)

It is an intuitive tool that allows you to conduct online meetings, webinars and videoconferences from anywhere in the Georgia and world.

Advantages of the Zoom solution:

Joining a meeting at Zoom

The participant does not need an account. All they have to do is click the link to the virtual room they receive.

Screen sharing option – allows you to conduct effective presentations. 

Recording of webinars / presentations / meetings.

Free version – two people have unlimited time. Meetings for groups of 3 to 100 people can be conducted for a maximum of 40 minutes. It also has additional functionalities, e.g. the ability to change the background.

Three extended versions: Pro, Business, and Enterprise. They allow for unlimited meetings in a larger group. They have additional functionalities.

Using Zoom from the browser

The zoom is very intuitive and has many useful functionalities that allow you to conduct online meetings, webinars, presentations and videoconferences. The picture and sound quality is good. Of course, it also depends on the device we use (laptop, computer, smartphone, tablet) and the internet connection.

Zoom helps businesses, organizations and communities bring their teams together in a frictionless environment to get more done. Our easy, reliable cloud platform for video, voice, content sharing, and chat runs across mobile devices, desktops, telephones, and room systems.

we recommend  https://zoom.us/

CONSULTATION & COLLABORATION

Simple Participatory tools

(Ideas generation, Interactive Q&A, Voting / prioritization, Decision-making)

LOPI ASK 

LOPI is a tool dedicated to decision-makers responsible for dialogue with residents and conducting public consultations. Information collected through LOPI ASK and LOPI TALK directly contributes to improving the quality of life in cities and increasing the confidence of citizens in decision-making.

we recommend http://Lopi.io/