User engagement top tips

Policy details

User engagement is about building a sustained and ongoing dialogue with those who use our statistics to ensure they continue to meet society’s needs.

As part of the User Engagement Strategy for Statistics, we have developed ten top tips to help improve user engagement. These build on the themes set out in the Office for Statistics Regulation’s guidance on user engagement.

1. Understand your users

Identify your users

Find out who your users are and consider who could use your statistics:

• read our identifying stakeholders guidance
• write down a list of users that you are aware of
• remember to consider secondary producers who may reuse or republish your statistics and potential users you’re not yet in contact with
• create a stakeholder map
• ask users you know to suggest others who may be interested in your work
• hold a workshop with colleagues to share ideas and work together — think about whether you have different users or whether there common users

Find out what your users need

You run a discovery workshop with groups of your users to establish their needs. Consider:

• how would they like you to engage with them?
• discover what your users want to hear, rather than what you want to say

Conduct user research

You could create user stories based on research to help tailor your engagement. You may find the ONS Service manual page ‘understanding your users’ helpful for what to consider during this process. For example, you could use the format – “As a [type of user], I want to [goal], so that [benefit or outcome].”

• “As an academic, I need to know when the datasets are released, so that I can analyse the data myself” — you might engage with these users more frequently to keep them updated on when the data is available
• “As a parent, I need access to headline figures so that I can know how my child’s school is performing” — you might send an annual newsletter to these users when new data is published

2. Engage early

Set up regular meetings with stakeholders to build sustainable relationships and understand each other’s priorities, perspectives, and requirements.

Stakeholder maps or user journeys may be useful for planning your engagement.

A stakeholder map identifies your stakeholders and how much contact they are likely to need. 

A user journey identifies the steps users take to reach your product and highlights potential points of contact and ways to gather feedback.

3. Listen to users

Listening to users is vital for meeting their needs. There are several methods you can use to get feedback from your users. 

Run workshops, focus groups, or survey different groups of users

Make sure you reach as many types of users as possible, not just those with the loudest voices. Identify the ‘quiet’ users and try to discover what they need to become more engaged.

Use data about how users interact with content

Set up Google Alerts. These help you monitor how your statistical publications or linked phrases are being used in Google.

Use social media to listen to what others are saying about your statistics. You could use social media listening tools to gain high-level information on who is engaging with your content. Examples of these include:

• analytics.twitter.com
• Tweetdeck
• Facebook’s sharing debugger
• CrowdTangle 
• Google Trends
• Brandwatch
• Buzzsumo
• Meltwater
• Hootsuite
• Pulsar

Some of these are paid-for services, so check before using them.

4. Work with others

Speak to others who are working towards the same goal of understanding users’ needs. 

Hold information sharing events

Discover how colleagues and other analytical teams currently engage with different groups of users. This might include using the expertise of others, such as your communications department, press office, or policy colleagues.

Speak to other statistics producers 

Statistics producers who work on a similar topic to you are likely to have similar user groups. Speak to them and find out where you may be able to work together or learn from each other on engagement activities. 

Identify networks and user groups 

Identify any established stakeholder engagement networks or statistics user groups and discuss how your activities link. They may be able to help promote your work and connect you with more users. 

Look for opportunities to join up your engagement activities and share user intelligence and any lessons learned.

Contact the Engagement.Hub@ons.gov.uk  or your user engagement champion for support. 

5. Tailor the engagement to your users

Be consistent, but not uniform in how you engage with users of your statistics. Different forms of engagement are likely to be needed to reach different audiences and to understand their different needs.

Use what you have discovered about your users to tailor the content and format of your statistical products so they target the different audiences. The Office for National Statistics’ user personas are a helpful guide to different audience types and the Government Digital Service Standard provides a useful framework for ensuring our work is supported by user needs.

6. Be proactive about communicating with users

You should actively seek users’ views, update them regularly, and stay alert to patterns which are emerging when users contact you or discuss your work. This will ensure you can address them where needed.

To communicate with users, you could:

• build a mailing list
• send regular updates and communications based on users’ preferences
• ask for feedback from your users to make it easy for them to engage with you
• join online user forums like StatsUserNet to connect with users and producers
• review and respond to feedback or requests that you receive
• run information sessions

To identify what you may need to communicate with users about, you could review:

• analytics tools like Google Analytics and survey paradata
• social media views, posts, reposts and reactions
• trending tags and news online
• freedom of Information requests your organisation receives
• parliamentary questions
• assembly questions
• ad-hoc requests

You should consider the most appropriate way to address users based on their needs and the context of their involvement with your organisation. For example, you may wish to address them using mailouts, webinars, newsletters, or by reviewing your products. Your communications teams should be able to help you with this.

7. Build trust

Concentrate on building lasting relationships with users through regular contact and having open and honest discussions to help build trust.

Adopt a ‘you said, we did’ approach. This means seeking feedback at regular intervals and ensuring the user knows their feedback is welcomed and valued. Report back on what has been done as a result of their contribution.

Recognise and build on the engagement you’re already doing. Regular calls, emails, newsletters, and webinars are all forms of engagement. Consider how to get the most value out of these for both your organisation and users.

8. Be realistic

Realise that you cannot do everything. Embed and build on your current engagement activities in a proportionate way to uncover additional user insight.

Be realistic about what is achievable and honest with users about what is not.

Ask questions in user surveys that you can act on and be specific about the options and scope for change. Offer alternatives when requests cannot be met.

Explain why you are gathering feedback from users. Plan questions so the answers you gain are relevant and actionable.

For example, by asking an open question about what users would like to have measured in your health statistics you may get answers which are out of scope. Instead, you could ask which of the current measures they find most important for their work, or provide a short list of options for new measures for them to choose from.

9. Be inclusive

Accessibility is always important for making sure your content is usable. You should always:

• use simple English — the average reading age in the UK is 9 years old
• use conversational language with a professional tone and avoid jargon
• make your messaging as clear and concise as possible
• apply accessibility guidance and standards in all communication
• one approach will not suit everyone — consider the best ways to reach each audience
• be open to new approaches and technologies for engaging with users
• use a range of communication channels to reach users
• add contact details so users can get in touch for information or support

Useful resources for accessible communication:

• an introduction to making your service accessible on GOV.UK
• guidance on understanding accessibility requirements on GOV.UK
• Hemingway app to check the reading age of your writing
• guidance on writing for users in the Office for National Statistics service manual
• the Government Digital Service (GDS) style guide 

10. Learn and reflect

Your communications activities should be based on objectives. You should plan how you will measure your success so you can learn from your experiences.

Regularly complete retrospectives and review your processes to reinforce successful behaviours and activities. This will help you identify what you can improve. Often engagement techniques are inherited and may not always be as effective as they could be.

For example, ask yourself, “what is going well?” and “how can we improve this?”.

Regularly review and update your user lists and keep adding to these as you continue to identify users of your statistics.

Seek feedback during and after engagement activities from your statistics users and producers.

Regularly check for guidance, case studies and events about user engagement where you can learn from others and gain new techniques.