In this video and article you'll find the basic steps to create your first projects. We'll cover using a timeline, creating the phases in the timeline and choosing the right participation methods in these phases.

If you want to be sure what a project looks like, you can use the CitizenLab Project Blueprint on our Community Platform.

When you're ready to launch your project, make sure to go over our Project Launch Checklist, to make sure you didn’t miss any important steps you can take upfront.

Add projects and set timeline

You can put an unlimited amount of projects on your platform. We recommend to communicate about the process of your decision-making process. You can use your project pages and timelines for this. On every dedicated project page you can set the different phases and events linked to this project.

A timeline allows users to grab at a glance the chronology of your participation process. Phases are the different steps of the process, usually going from broad crowdsourcing of ideas through refining and to the definition of end proposals. Events allow to link between your process and events happening outside the platform, for instance a launch event, offline participation sessions, theme-related events, or the release of final conclusions.

After you have created your "project", you can access its settings: go to Settings > Projects > [click the relevant project] > click the "Timeline" tab.

You can add and edit as many phases to a project as you wish. Pick the desired number of phases for your process. 

In every phase you can pick the participation method, i.e. chose what exactly you want your visitors to do during this phase: post ideas, comment or vote. Change this setting for every phase separately by (un)checking the boxes:

Events are displayed in a card view under timeline and separately in a tab on the project page.

Need help or support? Don’t hesitate reaching out using the support chat in your admin panel.