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Emailing your subscribers is a great way to let them know when you post a new survey or poll on Polco. Polco makes it easy to let them know you need their input. There are two ways to email your subscribers on Polco: 1) when creating a survey or poll and 2) when you want to share a survey or poll you’ve already published. When creating a new survey or poll, you’ll see this feature as part of the publishing process. Once you get to the Outreach page of the publishing process, you’ll see the toggle to “email all subscribers” along with the ability to send a survey invitation to your email lists. When you want to share a survey you’ve already published, or remind your subscribers to take the survey, click on your survey and click “Share and Manage Access.” Scroll down to “Email to Subscribers and Invitees.” Edit the email to say whatever you’d like. Then toggle on “email to all subscribers.” This will send an email to all of your subscribers inviting them to take your survey.
Emailing your community is an important way to let them know about your survey on Polco. Previously, Polco sent an email to all subscribers every Thursday letting them know about local governments requesting their input. This Thursday email included links to surveys in the jurisdictions to which they had subscribed. In this way, subscribers got a reminder each week to respond to surveys currently open on the city’s profile. Recent changes replaced the Thursday email with a new form of email outreach. Instead of reminding subscribers each Thursday to answer open surveys, subscribers will receive an email as soon as your survey is published. You can toggle this feature on or off on Polco for each survey. Subscribers will only be notified by email of surveys they haven’t voted on yet. To use this feature, create a survey or navigate to a currently published survey. If using a currently published survey, click “Share and Manage Access.” Scroll down and you will see the option to email all
Your survey is complete. What’s next? There are several ways to effectively use your survey results to make informed decisions with confidence. Collecting data is only half the battle. Once results are in, it’s important to create and execute a plan. Below are six strategies to help your organization use resident input in long-term planning. Your next steps will partly depend on the type of survey you conducted. For example, how you use The National Employee Survey insights will differ from how you use The National Community Survey insights. Your city’s next steps may be to update a comprehensive plan, ask residents or employees further questions about critical focus areas, or make a policy decision. No matter which survey you’ve administered, keep the following “6 Es” in mind as you engage with your community and fellow leaders after the results are in. Envision Results inform how officials can take action to move their communities forward. For instance, Pearland, Texas’ survey resu
Our survey science experts are always adding new surveys to the Polco Library for you to use in your community. These surveys range from just a few questions (2-5) to many questions (10-15). For the most part, you’ll find that surveys in the Polco Library tend to have 5-10 questions. We’ve intentionally included more questions in these surveys to give you a more extensive range of question options to choose from. You can always edit a survey from the Polco Library. Navigate to “Library”, select a relevant survey, and click “Save to Drafts” at the top or bottom of the survey to save it to your profile. Navigate to the Polco LibraryClick “Save to Drafts” Navigate to Overview or Content and click “Edit and Publish”When you navigate back to “Overview”, you can click “Edit and Publish” and simply delete any inapplicable questions before publishing. Choose the questions you’d like to useClick the trash icon next to any questions you’d like to delete When you’re finished, save and publish you
Here’s what we’re hearing from cities like yours: We want to follow up our scientific survey with short surveys for ongoing resident engagement, but we don’t know where to start. We’d like to write our own questions, but we don’t know how to make sure the questions are neutral and unbiased. Our staff doesn’t have time to conduct more than one survey a year. Introducing: Quarterly Quick Surveys! This set of surveys and polls, developed by survey scientists at Polco’s National Research Center, focus on the heart of livability in your community. If you cannot find these in your profile yet, feel free to save them from the Library! Your Customer Success Manager will be happy to help you review customize, and schedule them if you’d like assistance.Community Identity Neighborliness Customer Service Community Highlights & Challenges Alternate Interaction #4 - Safety Your CSM will also share best practices in engagement and outreach to communicate about these surveys with your com
In a changing world, it’s crucial communities are resilient enough to overcome the unknowns. Some of the most worrisome predictions include cyberattacks and mass migrations from climate change. More optimistic voices suspect life will be more efficient and clean, and technology will work for us versus against us. Regardless, change is imminent, and government leaders must consistently build relationships with residents to create community resilience and a society that works together.Transparent two-way communication, follow-through, and adjusting the plan as needed cultivates trust between local government and constituents.Community surveys enable leaders to execute these trust-building steps. Surveying collects residents’ opinions on quality of life in their communities. With insightful data, officials can make a plan, communicate the reasoning behind that plan, and demonstrate how that plan is working by comparing reports over time. Building Trust Results in Fast Action Consistent e
Polco loves to spotlight jurisdictions that have conducted surveys or polls to better their community engagement! We have a plethora of great case studies that highlight these stories. Check them out and more on our blog! See all case studies by clicking here. Here’s a snippet from a recent case study on Palm Coast, FL: Palm Coast Transforms Community Livability Through a Commitment to Community Development"We take pride in being one of the best places to live in America," said Denise Bevan, Palm Coast's Interim City Manager. "This is a reflection of the hard work and dedication of our residents, City staff, and public officials." Polco presents to Palm Coast the Voice of the People Awards for "Transformation in Foundations of Livability" award in conjunction the International City & County Management Association (ICMA).The Transformation in Foundations of Livability award recognizes and honors communities that have improved the overall quality of life for their residents and the
“How do we know that we are only hearing from our residents, and not the residents of another jurisdiction?”In some situations, you’ll want to ensure that you’re hearing only from your residents. In other cases, you may want the input of those who work in your jurisdiction but don’t live there (i.e. commuters), or those who regularly visit your jurisdiction (tourists, college students, people who visit businesses in your downtown, etc.). While we don't currently block non-residents from taking a survey, there are various ways on Polco to see only the results from your residents.When local leaders want to ensure that they are hearing ONLY from residents of their jurisdiction, they’ll want to use the features built into Polco to filter for these results.There are a few ways to do this, and in this document we will walk through each one. Registration & Voter File Verification The default setting on Polco attempts to match respondents with public voter registration records when they in
It’s not common to change the visibility settings on a survey after it has closed; however, customers are still able to edit this by putting /share at the end of any closed survey and change survey access to “only people with the link”. If Polco finds this to be a common trend among administrators, we can have our Product team add a button, so clients don’t have to do the /share trick. If you would like to see this feature come to life, feel free to share your feedback in the Ideas tab! If it is already there, give it an upvote. We appreciate your input!
For Immediate Release[Date] Contact: [Name][Title, Organization][Email][Phone] [City/Town] Measures Resident Satisfaction with The _________ Survey [City/Town] recently surveyed residents to better understand the community’s needs and perspectives. The _______ Survey was developed to assess measures in community livability (or other topic) according to residents. It captures opinions on the natural environment, inclusivity, engagement, and more (or other topic). The results give a comprehensive look at [City/Town’s] strengths, areas of improvement, and residents’ priorities. The results show that residents give high ratings to ______ and ________, among other findings. “[Quote from City/Town leader. Include general sentiments about importance of surveying your community, why it was conducted, and how residents will benefit.]”This is the ___ time that [City/Town] conducted a survey on Polco. Tracking changes over time help leaders measure progress and make data-driven decisions. [Add
Quick question does Polco have a QR code option for surveys?
Many municipalities used our Community Equity and Inclusion (CEI) survey to gather feedback from their residents. What steps are you planning to take after your initial CEI survey?
Can I determine the order that respondents will see polls in a poll set? For example, say that I created five polls (questions) in a poll set. Will respondents see them in a random order (different for every respondent) or can I set the order so respondents see the questions in a certain order?
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