Background
Epping Forest District Council instructed BECG to provide public consultation and engagement support ahead of the ‘preferred approach’ consultation stage of the Local Plan.
How we assisted
Our brief was to use more innovative online and offline consultation methodologies to encourage a much wider participation including hard-to-reach groups.
Social media was critical to unlocking these hard-to-reach groups and engaging with as broad a demographic as possible. To generate engaging content, we created a website, produced videos to easily explain the Local Plan process and distributed a questionnaire that was far more user-friendly and intuitive than those generally deployed for such consultations.
We also kept members updated through agreed contact channels and protocols throughout, whilst managing community engagement initiatives such as canvassing at stations around rush hours and taking engagement to youth groups and the hard to reach.
We delivered the project website, and produced visual and video content throughout to generate and maintain momentum.
Results
We were successful in reaching a significantly broader demographic than any previous Local Plan consultation, whilst increasing the total number of responses.
We delivered 3,177 direct Twitter engagements, 1,211 Facebook engagements, 1,233 people attending six exhibition events and a 29% increase in feedback submitted online rather than in paper form.
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