Promoting OpenGov Citizen Engagement Efforts

On This Page:

• Suggested text to describe engagement
• Graphics and Buttons for Open Government Citizen Engagement Tool
• Ways to Promote Your Agency's Open Government Citizen Engagement
• Examples of other Outreach Plans
• Moderator workflow diagram
• Press Links

Suggested Text to Describe Engagement

Suggested text for you to put on your website/outreach efforts to encourage users to participate in the OpenGov Citizen Engagement:

• Got an idea? We want to hear it! (Link to agency tool/site)
• Share your good ideas to make government more open and transparent! (Link to agency tool/site)
• Have ideas about how we can improve what we do? (Link to agency tool/site)
• Vote on ideas for making government more open and transparent. (Link to agency tool/site)

Text describing the OpenGov Citizen Engagement Tool:

The Open Government Directive issued by OMB in December 2009 requires federal agencies to gather citizen input in developing their Open Government Plans (due April 7, 2010). GSA developed the OpenGov Citizen Engagement Tool to provide agencies with a mechanism to collect that input. This tool is one of several being used by federal agencies to host online citizen engagements and public dialogs. 

Graphics and Buttons for Open Government Citizen Engagement Tool

To place the source and graphic into your web page: Select one of the images below to use on your website and save it to your images directory. Generally, you can save the image by right–clicking on it and selecting your browser's "Save Image As" or "Save Picture As" command. Please copy the graphic to your website and change the IMG SRC address to use it from your web server. In the examples below, the image was saved in the '/images/' directory. Some graphic options for you to choose from:

• Got Ideas?
  (GIF, 4 KB, 139x79 pixels, February 2010)
• Share Your Ideas, Version 1
  (GIF, 4 KB, 225x79 pixels, February 2010)
• Share Your Ideas, Version 2
  (GIF, 2 KB, 226x49 pixels, February 2010)
• We're Open to Your Ideas
  (GIF, 4 KB, 237x55 pixels, February 2010)
• Share Your Idea /Open Gov
  (JPG, 12 KB, 200x200 pixels, February 2010)
• Open Government Website Graphics
  (ZIP, 96 KB, February 2010)

Ways to Promote Your Agency's Open Government Citizen Engagement 

• Great tips on creative promotion of your Open Government Tool
• A quick PowerPoint presentation you can show to your staff/stakeholders.
  Open Government Talking Points
  (MS PowerPoint, 479 KB, 9 slides, February 2010)
• 13 Best Practices for Open Government Webpages
• A superb promotional presentation by NASA of their Open Gov sites

Examples of Other Outreach Plans 

• GSA Outreach Plan for "Your Voice Matters"
  (PDF, 72 KB, 4 pages, December 2009)
• USA.gov's 2008 GovGab 1st Birthday Communications Plan
  (MS Word, 44 KB, 3 pages, July 2008)
• USDA OpenGov Outreach Efforts
  (MS Word, 25 KB, 1 page, January 2010)
• Outreach Strategic Plan (NOAA Fisheries)
  (PDF, 391 KB, 20 pages, June 2005)
• Independent Police Review and Citizen Review Committee Community Outreach Plan (City of Portland)
  (PDF, 204 KB, 17 pages, January 2009)

Moderator Workflow Diagram 

A workflow diagram showing how an idea moves from public submission to incorporation into the agency Open Government Plan. (MS PowerPoint, 126 KB, 3 slides, January 2010)

Press Links 

Buzz about Open Government Dialog tools in the press