We identified Zoho as being the right CRM system to meet our needs.

During my time here, it’s fair to say that I’ve used Zoho extensively. The system has a very impressive arsenal of functionality, and every time I use it I end up finding some new feature. I use it for a large portion of each day and I estimate that I’m only using around 15% of its full functionality.

However, no matter how extensive and accomplished a piece of software is, sometimes things go wrong…

Last week Delib and Rubber Republic came-a-cropper with Zoho and hit a brick wall. And when you’re trying to do something and you simply can’t do it, we all know how frustrating things can be.

However, on Thursday Zoho called us at Delib and helped us round our problem. They weren’t able to fix it then and there, but they were able to understand our needs and offer a workaround for the time being.

All software goes wrong sometimes, and the measure of a solution can sometimes be how well it is supported. Hopefully the way we approach our Citizen Space support helps us understand the needs of our clients and gives them the confidence that they can rely on us.

I wonder if anyone else uses Zoho and what their experience is with them? Is there something else that people out there use?

The questions from delegates focused around the obvious issues of getting data out there, although the discussion developed into making open data useful, accessible and engaging for the public. In essence, this theme revolved around creating context around open data, something that all three of the Media Sandbox projects aimed to do.

This notion was driven home further when I attended a later panel focusing on ‘Online journalism and open data’. As Paul Bradshaw summed up perfectly; “releasing data isn’t enough – to make it meaningful for an end-user you need to give it context”.
The example he gave was that through open data Birmingham City Council was shown to have the highest number of CCTV cameras in the UK. Yet without the information alongside that data to show that Birmingham is the UK’s biggest Council, that data has no framework to tell the whole story.

Delib's 'I Heart My City project'

Data rarely comes in a meaningful format, you always need to do something with it to make it more meaningful (in this case linking data together). Technology developed needs to act as a bridge to not only provide data, but also build context. This is something that the impressive OpenlyLocal site has at its fundamentals.

Going back to Delib’s ‘I Heart My City’ project, the recommendations we put forward feed directly into the notion of providing context. At a basic level, authorities need to provide contextual internal spending data as well as straight-spending – e.g Salaries of staff involved in providing a service, cost of service ground rents etc. It’s not a case of releasing all the data available, but more a case of building a framework to provide valuable insight.

Since the Bristol Media Sandbox, Delib have been using our insights into open data in our work with local authorities to ensure that the appetite for releasing council data is matched by providing usable, accessible and engaging stories.

We have an active user-group providing feedback and can continue to make requested improvements and upgrade our users.

The latest round of new features are designed to increase response levels to consultations, whilst improving community engagement practice. They include featured consultations, social media toolbar and admin alert emails.

You can read more about the other new features included in our latest upgrade here – http://www.citizenspace.com/blog/2011/03/17/citizen-space-1-4/

Unlike other systems that require you to pay a yearly license fee (often more expensive than the one-off price of Citizen Space), all our current clients will benefit from this upgrade at no extra cost.

We’ll carry on listening to our community of users and developing Citizen Space in a way that allows organisations to consult the public using an engaging and cost-effective system.

Making efficiencies also extends to the way that consultations are created. Using one online system increases visibility and ensures that work isn’t duplicated.

Citizen Space has been built for Government, with Government and is a cost-saving move to run an effective, comprehensive consultation programme.

You can read about how London Borough of Sutton improved their consultation activity, whilst achieving cost-effectiveness by using Citizen Space:

http://www.delib.co.uk/case_studies/london_borough_sutton

2. Make use of social media

Collaboration is a key theme of running an effective consultation programme. Online mechanisms of response are key for enabling people to share and extend the reach of your
engagement activity. This cuts the costs per response and increases overall participation.

An example of this is Delib’s Dialogue App, which now allows people to Tweet or share their ideas to Facebook.

See the link below to read about the range of public sector organisations who have used Dialogue App to increase engagement with the public online:

http://www.dialogue-app.com/info/clients

3. Learn from what has worked

E-consultation has been around for a while now, and thus so, best-practice examples have had their time to emerge. In order to improve, its important to understand what other organisations are doing.

Delib have helped hundreds of public sector bodies run their engagement activities online. In addition to having a bank of case study documents for projects we’ve ran, we also have
videos and best-practice documents aimed at helping Government organisations improve their participation.

You can look at our bank of case studies or alternatively, get in touch to get advice on the best tool to run your engagement activity online.

They’ve since benefited from Citizen Space being used universally across the organisation, being able to identify what consultations were being ran at what time, and by whom. The system has enabled Sutton to maintain a high standard of engagement.

We’ve produced a case study that you can read here, or downloaded the PDF for free.

If you’d like to learn more about running cost-effective consultations online please get in touch – adam.cardew@delib.co.uk | 0845 638 1848

www.citizenspace.com

Delib built them a tool that tied in with their campaign’s branding, was simple to use and had a spending target to collect relevant responses residents’ spending priorities.

Receiving large engagement levels from local residents, Delib have produced a case study to explain how Budget Simulator’s design helped achieve this.

You can read more about Gloucestershire’s Budget Simulator here, or download the free pdf.

If you’d like a free demo of Budget Simulator, or just to discuss running budget consultations online, please call on 0845 638 1848 or email adam.cardew@delib.co.uk

Gloucestershire Budget Simulator

You can read a bit more about the London Borough of Sutton and Cumbria Partnership upgrades here, or alternatively take a tour around Citizen Space.

Its nice to get good work done just before a break at Christmas – well done all involved.

In 2010, 16 councils used Budget Simulator, meaning over 10% of all UK local authorities have used the simulator since it was launched. We also saw more Police Authorities running budget consultations too, with 4 opting to use Budget Simulator.

If you’re going to consult, you have to consult meaningfully, and this meant that many local authorities had to consult on just spending cuts, rather than any spending increases. In order to meet this challenge faced by councils, we introduced functionality to the Budget Simulator so that residents needed to achieve their council’s required saving before they could submit their budget preferences. This option was taken on by most of the 16 councils who used Budget Simulator in 2010 and meant that they could then act on the proposal submitted by the public.

However, of those using the Budget Simulator to gather feedback on how which areas to cut budgets, we witnessed varied approaches (as highlighted in this blog post). One thing that stood out was the public’s appreciation for being consulted when service provision is at risk, with lots of positive feedback coming in through the simulator.

No authority’s budget is the same as that of its neighbour, and this has been a recurring theme as to why people opted to use Budget Simulator. Being able to tailor a tool to suit their authority’s needs is important; whether that is tying in the branding with an existing consultation project or adding in customised demographic forms to collate with corporate priorities. We’ve got quite a list of customisations that can be easily added to the simulator now to meet a wide range of scenarios, and 2011 looks like it’s only going to bring us more.

With local authority funding settlements having just been announced in the UK, the conversation about spend and services can take a more definite shape. Involving the public in a consultation that is specific to their council’s situation is essential, and providing that information in a simple and engaging format is the key to achieving this. That’s why Budget Simulator has been the platform that tens of thousands of local residents have used to voice their budget priorities during 2010.

Roll on 2011!

1. Can Citizen Space be used amongst partnerships?

Working in partnerships can bring about greater savings, and the same can be said for Citizen Space.

We’ve developed an interface that allows different organisations using Citizen Space to display all of their consultations on one homepage, whilst maintaining the security of managing their own individual systems. We recently did this for Cumbria County Council, bringing together all councils and public sector organisations across the county.

There’s no need to worry about getting a consultation partnership setup before getting on board, we can quickly add the partnership functionality into your Citizen Space at a later date for a very small additional cost.

2. Are there any limitations on usage?

Some people have asked if there are any limitations on the number of users, consultations or responses that Citizen Space can have, and the simple answer is no. The system is yours to use entirely how you wish.

You could even let other organisations, like local voluntary groups, use the system for no additional cost.

3. How difficult is it to move from an existing system?

For many people, buying Citizen Space is cheaper than just one year’s ongoing license fee for the current system that they’re using. However, costs of moving across can often be hidden and substantial.

This is why we’ve built a simple consultation import program, so that we can move all of your existing consultation records into Citizen Space with just the click of a button.

Hopefully this will have cleared up a few common questions about Citizen Space. If you have any other questions you’d like to ask or would like an online demo of the system, please feel free to get in touch – adam.cardew@delib.co.uk

We’ve been working hard to make some enhancements to the Dialogue App. You can either watch the embedded video or read below to find out about them:

Tweet button
If you use Twitter, you can now share a good idea with your followers by clicking the “Tweet” button on that idea. A “Share this on Twitter” window will appear where you can customise the text of your tweet and then send it.

Facebook Like button
Similarly, if you use Facebook you can share your support for a good idea with your friends by clicking the “Like” button on that idea. A link to the idea will appear in your feed where all your friends will be able to see it and visit it to read more.

Locked Ideas
Moderators can now lock an idea for commenting. Locked ideas are visually distinct from other ideas so that you can see at a glance whether a given idea is open for discussion.

Rejected comments visible to moderators
Moderators can reject an individual comment from an idea if it is offensive. Rejected comments are clearly marked. Ordinary users are no longer able to read the contents of rejected comments, however Moderators can still them and can reinstate a comment if it was rejected by mistake.

Improved WYSIWYG
When you add an idea to a Dialogue, you can format the text of your idea using an interactive editor that is built into Dialogue App.

For instance, you can emphasise a specific sentence, create a bulleted list, highlight a block of quoted text or paste pre-formatted text from a program such as Microsoft Office or OpenOffice.org.

We have improved the interactive text editor in Dialogue App to make it easier to use and more accessible to people who use assistive technology such as screen readers

Admins and moderators comments highlighted
Comments made by administrators and moderators are now visually distinct from comments made by ordinary users. Moderators and administrators can upload a profile picture which is displayed on any comment they make.

RSS
You can subscribe to a feed of the ideas on a discussion using an RSS reader such are Mozilla Firefox’s Live Bookmarks or Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. An RSS button appears on the “All Ideas” page for each discussion.

Ideas will appear in the RSS feed only once a moderator has reviewed them and deliberately approved them. This ensures that ideas containing offensive content will not be published to RSS subscribers by mistake.

Welcome e-mail to users after sign up
When you register an account for a Dialogue, it now sends the user a welcome email. This helps them get started and gives them a reminder of where to go so that they can track on top of the discussion.

So those are the latest updates to the Dialogue App. If you have any suggestions as to how we can make it better, or you’d like to discuss using one, get in touch: adam.cardew@delib.co.uk