Online Community Engagement

Free Stuff: 100 Ideas to Help Engage your Community Online

100 Ideas to Help Engage Your Community Online Ta da! After nearly 3 years in business and hosting something like 200 consultations for over 80 organisations, we decided it was time to give something concrete back to the new and burgeoning praxis – look it up – of online community engagement. The BtT team have … Continue reading →

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Vlog: Introducing Don Day – Our new NZ Partner

For our second vlog we are very pleased to introduce Don Day; Bang the Table’s brand new New Zealand distribution partner. Don has lots and lots of experience working in and around the NZ local government sector and a passion for good community engagement. Here, Tam talks with Don about community engagement in NZ and … Continue reading →

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10 Tips for Great Video Content

Think about your spacing and framing. Placing your subject in centre of frame isn’t always the best solution, frame the shot so that your subject’s head is in the top third of frame and that they’re facing towards the centre of the shot. This will make them seem and feel more engaging and not quite … Continue reading →

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Hornsby Housing Strategy Heats Up Online

The Hornsby Shire Council attracted a large amount of visitors and opinions when it consulted its community online for Stage 1 and Stage 2 of its Housing Strategy.  Tamara Shardlow spoke to the Council’s Corporate Manager and Town Planner to find out more. Hornsby is one of the largest shires in Australia.  It boasts a … Continue reading →

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Six Risks of Online Consultation & their Mitigation

Risk perception and demonstrable mitigation strategies are the biggest challenges we face as a new industry. Online consultation has opened up a world of new opportunities for reaching new audiences and enhancing community involvement in public life. However, with new opportunities come new risks. This will be an ongoing series of blog posts. To start … Continue reading →

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Seven random thoughts about online forums and communities of practice

A query popped into my inbox yesterday that I thought might be relevant to anybody trying to build an online community from scratch. An Australian state government agency established an online community of practice some six months ago. Over the six months some 200 people have signed up to the portal but not one has … Continue reading →

Posted in Better Practice, Online Community Engagement, Opinion, Water Cooler | 2 Comments »

Tick a box for Online Dialogue Development

It’s been a while coming but last month we introduced a new piece of functionality to our forums.  Visitors leaving comments now have the option to tick a box asking them whether they’d like to be notified if another visitor leaves a response to one of their comments.  To regular users of online forums, this … Continue reading →

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Social Media drives Participation

According to the 2010 Neilson Social Media Report, Australians are rapidly increasing their rates of social media participation and content sharing is leading the way in popularity.  The report found that nearly three quarters of Australian Internet users (who make up around 90% of the population) sent or shared a link in the past year. … Continue reading →

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Online Discussion Trio Leads way in Public Art Consultation

Congratulations to Yarra Ranges Council who threw open their doors to an online public so they could have their say on Public Art from May to July. In a progressive move, the forum discussion was enhanced by a trio of discussion leaders; artist and Coordinator for the Graduate Certificate in Public Art at RMIT – … Continue reading →

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Wanslea & St Vincent de Paul

Bang the Table’s Dr Crispin Butteriss was very pleased to join Councilor Elizabeth Re from Stirling Council in presenting $500 donations to the wonderful people from Wanslea Family Services and St Vincent de Paul on a recent visit to Perth. Councilor Re was the winner of Bang the Table’s lucky draw at the Local Government … Continue reading →

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Let’s Talk Richmond Launched

Go Canada! We’re wrapped to launch a new site in conjunction with our lovely Canadian distribution partners, Sustainet, for the City of Richmond in British Columbia. The site can be found at http://letstalkrichmond.ca and has been released with two discussion forums to kick things off. First up is a conversation about Richmond’s 2041 Community Plan … Continue reading →

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Vlog: Yarra City’s Safety forum

In our very first vlog, our evaluation and continual improvement guru, Tamara Shardlow, chats with our associate, Andrew Crowley, about Yarra City Council’s first steps into online engagement with their Safer Yarra Community Forum.  Thanks to the Blue Bird Cafe for allowing us to film in their oh-so-cool location.  You rock!

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Job Op: Director of Online Engagement @ AmericaSpeaks

In a great sign that online community engagement is further embedding itself as part of leading edge practice the lovely folk at AmericaSpeaks are looking for a new Director of Online Engagement to work out its Washington DC offices. The Director of Online Engagement and Participation will lead AmericaSpeaks’ initiatives to design, facilitate and organize … Continue reading →

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100 Ideas is now a wiki!

@craigthomler, of eGov fame and one of the leaders of Gov20 in Australia, has embarrased me by taking our little book, 100 Ideas to Help Engage your Community Online, and turned it into a wiki! Why didn’t I think of that? What a marvellous idea. Craig has created the site to allow us all to … Continue reading →

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Interactive Community Engagement for the Public Sector (Training)

Your’s truly is looking forward to playing host at an upcoming forum on Interactive Community Engagement for the Public Sector in Sydney on September 13th and 14th. The one day forum and one day workshop has a terrific program including a great list of speakers from a wide range of sectors and agencies including the … Continue reading →

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Dialogue, Deliberation and Public Engagement Training

An email popped into my inbox this week from Dr Lyn Carson of the University of Western Sydney. Lyn is, in my humble estimation, one of a handful of leading thinkers in Australia on the subject of Community Engagement.  Developing the practice of both on and off-line community engagement is something I am very committed … Continue reading →

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