Good ideas can come from anywhere – staff, customers, community members, or experts in your field. The challenge is hearing from all of them, and then making sense of what they’ve said.

1000minds’ new Ideas surveys make both easy. Simply ask people a question – e.g. “How could we improve our service?” or “What should our city do about rising sea levels?” – and collect their ideas online. 1000minds then helps you sort the ideas into themes and, when you’re ready, take the best ones forward for evaluation.

Whether you’re running a staff suggestions scheme, consulting your community or gathering input from experts, Ideas surveys give everyone a voice.

Hear from everyone

Participants add ideas in their own words. Importantly, at this stage, each person sees only their own ideas, not anyone else’s.

This matters because people tend to latch onto, or “anchor” on, the first ideas they hear. In meetings, that often means the loudest or most senior voices end up shaping the discussion. With an Ideas survey, everyone contributes independently, so you hear a much wider range of ideas – including from people who might never speak up in a meeting.

Participants can also come back and add more ideas while the survey is open. After all, good ideas don’t always arrive on cue!

Make sense of what people said

Reading through dozens, or even hundreds, of ideas can be daunting. 1000minds’ AI can be used to do the heavy lifting by suggesting themes for the ideas and merging near-duplicates.

Of course, in keeping with 1000minds’ human-in-the-loop approach, you stay in charge. The AI’s suggestions are just a starting point, which you can adjust however you like, and participants’ original ideas are always preserved.

The result is a clear picture of what people are saying and how many are saying it – valuable in its own right, e.g. for reporting back to your stakeholders.

From ideas to a decision

Often, though, collecting ideas is just the first step. Which ones should you actually pursue?

With one click, your ideas – or your themes – become the alternatives in a new 1000minds decision model or survey. From there, you can prioritize them using the award-winning PAPRIKA method, or ask a wider group of people to rank them or tell you their preferences.

Thus, you can go all the way from an open question to a well-founded decision in 1000minds – with every step transparent, and every original idea on record.

Give everyone a voice today

Curious about how Ideas surveys can help you? Try them for yourself by signing up for a free trial or book a demo with our friendly team today.