Planbox Imaginatik

Define Forum Topic & Categories

The sponsor of an Ask the Audience forum should define a topic or subject area to be the basis of the forum. For example, it can be dedicated to teams, functions, or areas of expertise – like technical support, a specific Six Sigma effort, Marketing, chemists, patent attorneys, etc. Specific topics are better because they are more relevant and meaningful to the audience monitoring and responding to the questions.

Once the topic is identified, then the sponsor creates corresponding categories. Categories are selected by question authors to organize their request, and they also correspond to email alerts.

Ask a Question

Any member of the Innovation Central community can post a question to the audience. Often they know someone within the organization can help answer their question or solve their problem, but they don’t know whom to ask. By posting their question in Ask the Audience, they can ask a large pool of people at once.

Answer a Question

Participants who subscribe to categories are alerted when new questions are posed within the categories they follow. These email alerts prompt them to visit the forum and suggest an answer.

Accept an Answer & Close Question

When the question owner receives a satisfactory answer they can accept it and close the question – indicating to the audience which answer was the best. An email is automatically sent to the answer author notifying them of its acceptance.

Earn Reputation Points

Reputation points are a rough measurement of how much the community trusts a member. A participant’s reputation in an Ask the Audience forum increases by posting good questions and useful answers. Points are awarded for posting questions (5), answers (3), comments (1) and to the author of accepted answers (10).

It’s recommended you use the defaults point values. Points are updated approximately every 10 minutes. They are cumulative and do not degrade over time.

Email Notifications

Real-time email alerts keep discussions moving quickly. Experts can be assigned to specific categories and alerted when new questions are posted within their area of expertise.