It’s Good to Talk, but Better to Listen

Several years ago when IOM was asked to pass life-saving messages to a widespread population of a poorly connected developing country, we found ourselves stumped. The choice was between traditional media outlets which were expensive, unreliable and not trusted and one to one communication. It would have taken years to achieve our goal with individual communication. Commercial media was prohibitively expensive. So we designed a digital based solution that combined social and traditional media with powerful tools to collect and visualize feedback from the population.

Community Response Map (CRM) was developed by IOM to bridge the gap between the aid givers and receivers. It provides an easy to use workflow that facilitates direct feedback from beneficiaries. Once a project is underway, CRM helps track and analyse the feedback being collected, whether one to one or across different digital and traditional communication channels.

There are numerous ways to generate feedback, some very simple and effective like using a social media survey. Ensuring that the feedback informs project design and delivery is more of a challenge. Community Response Map simplifies feedback collection, aggregates the data gathered from the communities, and visualizes it on maps, making it easier for multiple stakeholders to identify and respond to alerts and issues as they arise.

IOM supports “collaborative responses” conducted in close cooperation with the United Nations system and other organizations and with due respect for individual mandates and expertise.