Buyer's guide ·
Choosing a public engagement platform for Canadian government
Most platforms can publish a survey. The differences show up in hosting, French, moderation, consent and what happens to the records after the consultation closes.
The short answer
- A one-off survey may need only a simple survey tool.
- A recurring consultation program needs planning and approvals, moderation, consented communications and reporting in one place, with records your organization keeps.
- Your hosting and language rules decide the shortlist before any feature comparison.
Data residency
- Ask where participant records, uploads and email lists are stored, and confirm it in the contract.
- Check every connected service as well: email delivery, analytics, identity and reporting can each run in a different region.
- Decide whether you want the platform in your own tenant or hosted by the vendor. Running it in your own tenant keeps records under your existing security and retention controls.
English and French
- Check that every public page, form, email and error message can be delivered in both languages, including moderation notices.
- Ask who provides and approves translations, and how a change in one language is kept in step with the other.
- Test the language switch on a real engagement page during the demonstration.
Accessibility
- Ask for the accessibility standard the public site is tested against and when it was last tested.
- Try the public pages with a keyboard only and on a phone. Surveys and maps are where problems usually appear.
Moderation, consent and records
- Moderation: who can hold, release or remove a contribution, and does the record keep the reason?
- Consent: are subscribers tracked with consent and suppression? Contacts imported from an older system need their consent checked before they receive messages.
- Approvals: can a second person approve a communication before it is sent?
- Results: can staff export participation and results for analysis and retention schedules?
The full cost
- Product licence or subscription.
- Platform licences and capacity for staff and the public site. These can recur yearly.
- Implementation, content setup and acceptance testing.
- Migration of past engagements and subscriber lists.
- Training and optional support under a written agreement.
Questions to ask any vendor
- Can we follow one fictional consultation from draft and approval through moderation to results?
- Where is each piece of participant data stored?
- Which features are in the release we would deploy, and which are demonstration only?
- What do we own at the end of the contract, and in what format?
Where Portage fits
Portage is public engagement software by Two Rivers Digital for municipalities, departments and public bodies across Canada. It runs in your own Microsoft tenant, with surveys, polls, ideas, discussions and events, plus planning and approval, moderation, consented communications and reporting. Canadian hosting and English and French delivery are configured for your program. Bring your next engagement to a demo, read Portage en français or ce guide en français, or email hello@tworiversdigital.ca.
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