BallotReady Questionnaire Process
BallotReady helps partners draft questionnaires, send them to candidates, and display them on their voter guide.
Read on for an overview of our process.
1) Questionnaire display
Before sending your questionnaire, you’ll want to decide on whether or not you’d like to use the questionnaire matrix or our classic display. The matrix necessitates a yes/no question structure. If you opt to use the matrix display, you will still be able to click through to candidate profiles and see our classic view (as seen below on the right).
2) Question submission
Partners submit their questions via Google Sheet template provided by BallotReady. You can create different questions for different races, and BallotReady will create one central Google Form. You can assign custom category headers to questions (“Immigration”, “Economic Development”), or BallotReady can assign them for you.
3) Questionnaire form creation
BallotReady creates a form for partners to send to candidates. Through the form, candidates are shown their relevant race and associated questions.
4) Questionnaire form dissemination
BallotReady provides emails of candidates to partners to send out the questionnaire form. We have found that it is more effective for questionnaires to come from the organization candidates are familiar with and trust in order to solicit as many responses as possible. Questionnaire answers populate in a Google Sheet.
5) Answer upload
After the deadline for submissions, BallotReady bulk uploads candidate answers. We bulk upload answers whenever you feel we’ve reached a critical mass - typically between 25-75 responses.
You can view candidate responses through the CivicEngine platform, and you can update or add additional responses to CivicEngine as needed.