What is online community engagement?
Community engagement refers to the connections between governments, citizens and communities on a range of policy, program and service issues. It encompasses a wide variety of government–community interactions ranging from information sharing to community consultation and, in some instances, active participation in government decision making processes4.
Online community engagement is any form of community engagement that occurs in the online channel. Opportunities to engage online are shaped by the technologies available and community preferences for how they want to be engaged. Over the last few years, the online environment has changed to enable individuals to create, share and engage with web content rather than being a passive recipient of content. The evolution and popularity of social media has made available new techniques for online community engagement and additional avenues for consultation and interaction with citizens and communities in ways that can facilitate dialogue, creativity, collaboration and participation. Refer to the Online community engagement guideline for further information about how the online channel can complement your community engagement activities.
The Queensland Government has invested in a suite of online community engagement tools known as the Get Involved Online Consultation Toolkit.
Get Involved online consultation toolkit
The Get Involved Online Consultation Toolkit is a suite of tools designed to engage with the community on matters of public policy. The toolkit is comprised of online forum, poll, survey and other consultation tools which suit a range of engagement methods. The toolkit can be used in conjunction with social media and provides a trusted mechanism to capture the opinions of the community combined with the power to analyse the results. Refer to the Online community engagement policy for further information.
Contact Smart Service Queensland via email for guidance in setting up your online consultation.
4Introduction to community engagement, Department of Communities.
