Beyond Linear Surveys: A Better Way to Engage Communities

Most online surveys follow a simple, linear structure: you start at question one, click “Next” repeatedly, and move through a fixed sequence until you submit. Tools like SurveyMonkey, Survey123, and other traditional survey platforms are built around this step-by-step model, and for simple questionnaires, it works well. But planning projects are rarely simple. And that’s where this linear survey format starts to break down. 

Linear Surveys Don’t Match How People Think

In this format, every participant follows the same path, answers the same questions in the same order, and submits a single bundled response… but community members don’t experience places and planning topics in a straight line. They don’t have just one favorite location, one concern, or one idea. Yet most survey tools force participants into a rigid structure:

• One map question captures one location
  
  
• One pass through the survey equals one response
  
  
• If you want to add another place,you must start over

The result is predictable. Participants simplify their input, skip questions, or abandon the survey altogether.

Planning Engagement Isn’t One Activity, It’s Many

In a typical workshop or open house, engagement doesn’t happen in a straight line. Participants move between stations, watch a short presentation, study a map, place dot stickers on priorities, leave sticky notes, and have conversations with staff. They choose where to spend their time and how deeply to engage. Real engagement often includes:

• Big-picture visioning questions. Asking residents about long-term goals, values, and tradeoffs that shape the overall direction of a plan.
  
  
• Location-based feedback. Gathering site-specific insights about streets, parks, parcels, or corridors that matter to people personally.
  
  
• Prioritization or ranking. Understanding what initiatives, investments, or policy options the community sees as most important.
  
  
• Open-ended comments. Creating space for nuanced perspectives that don’t fit neatly into predefined answer choices.
  
  
• Learning before responding. Allowing participants to review maps, policies, or data in context so feedback is informed rather than reactive.

Trying to force all of that into a single linear survey creates fatigue and limits the quality of feedback. Konveio takes a fundamentally different approach.

Pages with Multiple Activities, Not One Endless Form

Instead of forcing participants through a single, linear survey flow, Konveio allows teams to design pages that bring together multiple engagement activities in one place. This mimics the structure of an in-person workshop while remaining flexible and intuitive online, similar to an agenda page of a digital workshop. Those activities can include:

• Forms with structured questions for collecting consistent demographic or policy-related input.
  
  
• Maps with interactive spatial tools that allow users to comment directly on specific locations.
  
  
• Discussions and threaded conversations where participants can react, build on ideas, or see what others are saying, mirroring the presentation boards used at open houses, complete with digital sticky notes and dot voting to prioritize options.
  
  
• Embedded content such as charts, graphics, or policy summaries that provide context before feedback is submitted.
  
  
• Videos or recorded presentations with explanations that replicate the clarity of in-person workshops.

Participants can move through these activities in a guided but flexible way, more like a digital open house than a questionnaire. This “choose your own path” structure mirrors how in-person workshops actually work and gives people control over how deeply they engage.

Multiple Places Per User, Without Repeating Everything

One of the biggest limitations of traditional survey tools is that map questions typically capture only one place per response. If someone wants to comment on three sites, they either can’t, or they have to repeat the entire survey.

Konveio’s mapping activities are designed for multi-place input. Participants can:

• Add as many locations as they want, dropping multiple markers without having to restart or repeat the entire experience.
  
  
• Comment on different maps tied to different questions, allowing each map to focus on a distinct issue, such as housing, transportation, or parks, without forcing repetition.
  
  
• React to or build on existing comments instead of duplicating them, helping reduce redundancy while making areas of consensus more visible.

All of this happens without forcing users to resubmit demographic or high-level information over and over again.

Everything Connected Through User Tracking

Behind the scenes, Konveio tracks responses through a session-based user ID, so multiple activities feel intuitive and seamless to the participant while remaining structured for analysis. That means:

• Multiple forms, maps, and activities are connected to the same participant without requiring user registration
  
  
• Planners can analyze patterns across engagement activities
  
  
• Data stays linked even when engagement is non-linear

For participants, it feels simple. For project teams, it unlocks a much richer understanding of community priorities.

From Surveys to Experiences

Traditional survey platforms are effective when the goal is structured, one-time data collection. Konveio is designed for something broader: engagement experiences that combine learning, exploration, and feedback. By moving beyond linear surveys, Konveio helps teams collect more nuanced input, reduce participant fatigue, and better reflect how people actually think about their communities. In planning, flexibility isn’t a luxury, it’s essential.

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