Creating Questions

Questions are used when there are various possible answers to a question. For example, when canvassing, we are tracking who a voter plans to support. This can change over time so we want to be able to track what they said and when. The great thing about Questions is that they indicate when a response has been applied to a record so that you can track what answer was most recently applied. This way, you can track who may have been marked as a Labour supporter in the past but are now supporting the Lib Dems.

This guide will show you how to add a Question to Connect for use for local canvassing. You may wish to create questions on local issues or particular local elections. You can then use these questions in your own local scripts and forms. You can find the Questions section in the lower left hand menu of the Main Menu screen, in the ‘Tags • Questions • Scripts’ section.

Creating a Question

Most Questions that you will need have been created centrally. This means that all your data can be reported on centrally, improving your reporting and data accuracy. You should always check that there isn’t an existing national question that meets your canvassing needs before creating a new question

When creating a new question, you should first identify what the use of the data you are collecting to your campaign will be. It is not good practice to record data that has no campaigning purpose on Connect.

You should also not create questions for the sole purpose of segmenting or administrating records with Bulk Upload, that should instead be done using saved lists and saved searches. Question data will be removed if used in this way
 

Question list

1. Choose the My Voters or My Campaign database

• There are different Questions on the My Voters than on the My Campaign side of the database.
• Make sure to select the correct database to search for or create a new Question.

3. Finding Questions

• Here you can use filters or the search box to find a particular question.
• Click the Refresh box to display the results of your search.
• The Question name will display a the bottom of this page.

4. Editing Questions

• The name of the Question and the text will appear at the bottom of the page.
• Click on the name of the question to edit it.
• Note that you cannot edit questions created by someone else that is not in your organisation.
• Questions can be shared with My Campaign. If shared, they will be listed as ‘Both’ in this column.

6. Adding Responses

• Once you have created your Question, you will need to add all the possible answers.
• A section appears below the question settings where you can add the Responses.
• Type the response in the first box. The Medium and Short responses will automatically fill, though you can edit them to avoid ambiguity.
• Once you have clicked Add the new answer will appear in the list.
• You can do this repeatedly for all the answers you need.
• You can then edit individual answers or reorder them by clicking on the arrows. The order set here is the order they will appear in which they will appear in scripts and data entry screens.

Sharing Questions

You may wish to make your question available to a neighbouring Party Organisation.

If for example, you wish to create a standard local election question for a council that spans multiple Parliamentary Constituencies, you will need to share that question with all the Party Organisations.

To share a question, in right hand box of the Party Organisation Access section, simply click the name of the organisation you wish to share it with and click ‘Add’. If you have created a volunteer question, you may wish for it to be available in My Campaign as well as My Voters. This will make the responses to the question given in My Voters visible on any linked My Campaign records. To share with My Campaign, in the ‘My Campaign Access’ section, click on ‘Real Mode’ and click ‘Add’.

Enabling Questions for Fleet

If you want to use a question for a Fleet form, it will need to be shared to My Campaign and shared to the party organisation that your Fleet site is linked to. A question can be shared to a Party Organisation following the instructions in the section above. If your question has been initially set up in My Campaign, you can share it over in the State My Campaign Access section. Click Real Mode and select Add. That will move it to the Databases with Access section. Once Real Mode is in the Databases with Access section, it will be accessible in My Campaign, and in Fleet. 

Master Questions and Canvass Analysis

If you create a local Party or Candidate question, in most cases you will want this to affect the Master Party ID and Canvass Analysis. This will not happen automatically. To get your question updated, please send an email to connect@libdems.org.uk with the name of the Question.

A Regional or National Administrator will then make your question correctly affect the relevant Master Question and/or Canvass Analysis. There are several Master Questions, including Party ID, 2nd Pref Party and Important Issues. There is no need to delay entering your canvass results. Any changes to how a question affects Master Party ID and Canvass Analysis will retrospectively affect all answers to the Question.

Please note that it will take overnight for new entered or newly mapped data to appear in the Master Question.