The Overview page

Every Citizen Space activity will have an Overview page. This is your opportunity to let the public know all about what you're asking them and why.

Standard information that will always display is the open and close dates of your activity and contact details. The contact can be an email or phone number or both (you might want to consider a generic email or phone contact).

These details are important so respondents can get in touch with you if they experience any problems or have any questions. It also can give them peace of mind that there is a human behind the software.

What information you decide to include and how you present this information is key to the success of your engagement activity.

In this article we'll be discussing the following suggestions:

Our suggestions for what to include

Information about the length of the survey and estimated time to complete it

Letting respondents know how much time they need to allocate to your consultation or survey will ensure more thorough and detailed responses. You should know before going live how long it will take by testing it out.

Highlight the 'save and come back later' feature

Respondents are able to save and come back to their response anytime until the consultation or survey closes. You may want to consider highlighting this feature especially if your activity is complex and long with opportunities for qualitative responses.

Reference any privacy policies and add a link

Make sure you give respondents information on how their response data will be handled, in accordance with your organisation's policy. 

Manage respondents' expectations & provide clear guidance

Let respondents know what you want to hear about and who you want to hear from. The more they understand what you are looking for and what you need to know the more useful data you will collect.

Motivate respondents to participate by telling them why you need to hear from them

How will participating benefit them? Let them know to help increase your response rate.

Break up a wall of text with supporting images, graphs and rich media

Citizen Space allows you to use different forms of rich media to engage with respondents, so if there is a message you want to get across or information you need them to understand then consider adding media to support this.

Share supporting documents, links, and related activities

We need informed responses to help us change policy and make decisions, so ensure respondents know what the questions mean and where to find all the necessary information.

Remember to keep it clear, informative and easy to follow.