Sending Polls

During Sametime meetings, the Moderator can use polls to gather feedback from meeting participants. The Moderator can send a question to the meeting participants and view participants' responses. For example, the Moderator might ask participants to vote on which job applicant to hire. As participants respond, the Moderator sees which candidate the participants prefer.

Note It is not possible to prepare poll questions in advance. You must create the poll questions during the meeting.

When sending a poll, the Moderator can also:

• Share the tallied responses with other participants. Normally, the Moderator is the only person who sees the poll responses. The Moderator can choose to share the tallied poll responses so that all participants see the responses in the Poll Tab. Once you share the responses, they are visible to everyone for the rest of the meeting. You cannot stop sharing the responses.

  Note When the Moderator shares the responses, participants see only the tallied responses. Participants do not see individual answers to the poll.

• Allow anonymous responses. By default, the Moderator can see each participant's response to the poll question. (These individual responses cannot be shared with other meeting participants.) The Moderator can preserve participants' privacy by allowing them to respond anonymously to poll questions.
• Mark correct answers. The Moderator can specify correct answers for poll questions. When the Moderator shares the poll responses, participants can see if they answered the question correctly.

Note Only the Moderator can send polls. During broadcast meetings, audience members can see poll questions, but they cannot respond. Only presenters can respond to poll questions during broadcast meetings.

Sending a Poll

1. Click New on the Poll Tab, or choose Tools - "Poll the Meeting Participants."
2. Select the type of question from the drop-down list. Depending on the type of question you select, some answers might be filled in automatically. For example, if you select a True/False question, the answers True and False automatically appear. You can edit these automatic answers if you like.
3. Enter your question in the "Question text" area.
4. If necessary, enter the answers to the question.
5. (Optional) If you want to mark the correct answers, select the check box or radio button next to the correct answers. You see the answers marked as correct when you view or share the poll responses. Participants do not see the correct answers until you share the poll responses.

   Note By default, you can select only one correct answer. If you want to select multiple correct answers, you must complete step 6, and then return to step 5 and select the correct answers.

6. (Optional) By default, participants can pick only one answer per question. To allow participants to select more than one answer per question, select "Allow participants to choose multiple answers."
7. (Optional) If you want participants' answers to remain anonymous, select "Responses are anonymous."

   Note If responses are anonymous, you cannot see the names of the respondents when you view individual poll responses.

8. Click Send. A new window containing the question and answers appears on the other participants' computer screens. (You cannot respond to polls that you send.)

Tip To resend a previous question, select the question from the "Questions asked" drop-down list in the New Poll dialog box. The question and answers automatically appear. You can send the new question and answers right away by clicking Send, or you can edit them first. If you resend a question, the new responses are tallied separately from the original responses to the question.

See also:

• Responding to Polls
• Viewing and Sharing Poll Responses
• Viewing Poll Responses Shared by the Moderator
• Sending Information to Participants