Blockwise

Zencity’s Blockwise survey is a recurring survey intended to measure a community’s sense of safety and trust in law enforcement agencies and deliver representative, ongoing results through your own live dashboard.

This article will cover the process from start to finish, the technology that powers our survey, and how you can use the data breakdowns you’ll find waiting in your survey dashboard to inform your performance review and benchmarking.

Process overview | Survey technology | Survey dashboard

Blockwise process overview

When you run a Blockwise survey with Zencity, here’s the process you can expect:

1. Approve the questionnaire, define a custom question you’d like to add, and select a survey cycle cadence

2. Zencity digitally distributes the questionnaire to your residents, using census data to reach a representative sample of your community

3. Question scores are aggregated on a regular basis into Safety, Fairness, Respect, and Voice scores.

4. Results are also presented within a report at the conclusion of each survey cycle, either on a monthly or quarterly basis

5. The cycle repeats to continuously provide you with fresh feedback

Blockwise survey technology

Built upon our merger with Elucd, our cutting-edge survey technology enables the following:

1. Continuous data collection: We distribute your survey throughout the year to reach a large sample size and place the most current data in your hands.

2. Cross-platform digital distribution: We deliver the survey via ads, reaching residents on the devices and platforms where they already are. Learn more about our distribution methodology here.

3. Free-text analysis and classification: Our algorithms, built specifically to process large swaths of law enforcement-related content, allows us to surface common threads in conversation for you to quickly get a sense of top residents’ comments and concerns.

4. Organic discourse cross-referencing: If you’re a user of Zencity organic discourse, you can add context to your results with insights from the organic discourse in your community and identify new focus areas as conversations develop.

Survey dashboard

Your results are presented within an interactive dashboard, divided into four tabs: Summary, Map, Analysis, and Feed. The video below provides a walkthrough of each tab to show you the available data and how to utilize it:

Summary tab

The summary tab displays all your key metrics over time. This tab is your go-to to track your KPIs and get a quick insight into data and how it's changing. You can also see demographic and geographic breakdowns for each metric.

Map tab

The map tab gives you a more in-depth look into your geographic breakdowns and understand how different geographic areas perform on each metric. Here you can select which question you want to see and the area you want to focus on. Note that, for some clients, you can double-click on a geographic area to see a more detailed breakdown of the area. To exit a selected map area, double-click anywhere outside the highlighted area.

Analysis tab

This tab gives you an easy way to break down the data however you want. Results from all quantitative questions are presented here, and you can click on the filters above to select a subset of the population to focus on.  Notice that across all of our tabs, you can also pick which cycle to focus on and which you would like to compare to. 

Feed tab

This tab presents your open-text responses as they come through. Each open-text question currently in your survey is presented on the left, and the responses coming through can be seen in the center, along with key demographic data about the respondent.

As they come through, the responses are categorized using our AI model, and the summary of that categorization can be seen in the far right “leading topics” section. You can also click on the three dots next to each comment to see all the other responses provided by that respondent - giving you additional context.

For more nuance and insight, responses are also assigned a sub-topic. For example, if you are interested in seeing what respondents in a specific geographic area are saying about the use of drugs in public, simply select the relevant area in the geographic filter and then click on drugs and drug use in public through the topic filter. 

As with the previous tabs, you can use the geographic and demographic filters to select which responses you would like to see, or you click on a topic of interest and see the specific responses included within it. You can also filter by topic using the filter on the left to see just one or several topics.

Found the data you're looking for?

Once you have found what you are looking for in the dashboard, you can go to the ‘Reporting’ section on the left-hand side menu. This page contains all the reports that are currently available for you to view and download. Simply click on a report of interest and view it on the platform, download it as a pdf, or share it with your colleagues.  

For more on Zencity Report Builder, click here.

Questions?

For questions that arise as you use your dashboard, or about the survey materials or methodology, please contact your dedicated Customer Success Manager or send us a message below.