High Audience Voting Participation Is As Easy As 1-2-3
When it comes to real time audience voting and ballot automation, not all audience response systems are created equally. This seems simple enough, but without a clearly defined vetting process election planners may find themselves with an audience voting system that misses the mark. These three planner best practices can help with avoiding this fate.
1. Demo each audience voting feature
Though every audience response system promises ease of use, that is not always the case. Delegates must be able to place their votes without any friction in order to ensure high participation rates.
Single-click voting and automated voter verification were both essential factors for the U.S. Soccer Federation’s multi-round election, which achieved a near perfect 99.75% participation rate. Depending on whether you are conducting sensitive ballots, you will need an audience voting system capable of undergoing third party monitoring or hiding display results.
2. Consult audience response system technicians
Election organizers bound by stringent voting regulations should always share vote counting and collection requirements with audience voting providers. With a defined set of electoral system rules, audience voting technicians can ensure the integrity of the system by configuring voter verification and vote counting requirements to match the given specifications. Very minimal administrative oversight is required of election organizers partnered with top audience response system vendors that provide advanced features and account management support.
3. Prep meeting moderators and attendees
On the day of the vote, meeting moderators are often tasked with communicating the audience voting process to members. The confidence of event moderators in the system will have an impact on voters’ willingness to participate.
To ensure things go smoothly, event moderators should be debriefed on how the audience voting process works and provided an explanatory slide to present during the meeting. Many election organizers also choose to run a demo voting round to familiarize delegates with their audience response keypads or mobile voting access link.
