Need some help using (platform name)?
We've answered some frequently asked questions about using the platform here.
If you're looking to speak to someone, head to our Contact page.
This platform is a space where people can connect, find support, and get involved in their community. It brings together local services, events, volunteering opportunities, and community activity in one place.
You can:
- Discover local services, groups, and activities
- Book onto events
- Find volunteering opportunities
- Respond to requests
- Offer to help
- Join groups or teams to collaborate
- Access helpful guides and resources
Activities are the main pieces of content on the platform, similar to posts or updates on social media. They bring together everything happening in your community, including:
- Events and sessions
- Volunteering opportunities
- Community group activities
- Requests and offers of help
Activities make it easy to see what’s available, get involved, and connect with others.
Select 'Register' on the platform homepage and follow the steps to register. Once signed in, you’ll be able to access all features available to you.
You can use the search bar to browse through different types of content like:
- Directory listings (services and support)
- Events
- Volunteering opportunities
- Collections (information pages)
- Guides
Filters and keywords can help narrow down results.
Yes, this platform is open for groups, organisations and charities to promote what they offer locally. Use the 'add an activity' link in the main menu to post your information.
Your username, email address and password can all be updated in your settings page.
This feature connects people and businesses looking to volunteer with those in need of their help. As someone working with volunteers, you can promote your volunteering opportunities, sort through pledges to volunteer and record completed hours.
As a volunteer, you can choose opportunities from across your region and make direct arrangements with the individual or organisation. You can also see your volunteer hours logged within your social CV.
- Make sure you are signed in.
- Select 'Add an activity'.
- Select ‘Look for volunteers’ and follow on-screen instructions.
- Please provide as much detail to your activity as possible.
- View your volunteer listing on the activities stream.
This platform is designed specifically for community support and local connections, so it works differently from social media.
Key benefits include:
- No adverts - You won’t see ads or promotional content competing for your attention.
- Hyperlocal information - Content is focused on your local area, making it more relevant and useful.
- Easier to find support - Information is organised into clear sections like services, activities and opportunities.
- Stronger search visibility - Content is structured in a way that helps it appear more easily in search engines, so more people can find the support they need.
- Purpose-driven content - Everything on the platform is there to help people connect, access support, or get involved.
You can use the platform to quickly link people to the right support or services.
A simple way to do this is:
- Search for relevant activities, services, or opportunities
- Add them to your favourites list
- Build a personalised list of support options
- Share the list digitally or print it for someone
This makes it much easier to give someone clear, tailored options without overwhelming them.
If you’re having trouble signing in, try the following:
- Double-check your email address and password
- Use the “forgot password” option to reset your details
- Clear your browser’s cache and cookies
- Try a different browser or device
If you’re still unable to access your account, contact your platform support or administrator for help.
The platform is built to ensure that information is reliable and community-led.
- Directory content is added by community groups and organisations themselves, so it comes directly from the source.
- Moderators review content before it goes live, helping ensure accuracy and quality.
- If the platform includes timebanking, members are background checked before joining, adding an extra layer of trust.
This approach helps make the platform a safe, reliable place to find support and information.
Completing your profile will enable you to customise your account, connect with others and make searching for things much quicker and easier.
- Visit your platform's home page.
- Click 'sign-in' on the top right hand side.
- Your dashboard will tell you what your next step is to complete your profile.
- Click 'My Profile' (or similar) and select 'Edit my profile'.
- Follow the on-screen instructions to add details to your profile.
- Select a profile picture that is approximately 200px wide and 200px high.
Timebanking is a way of spending one hour of time helping someone out, or sharing skills and experience. For every hour spent, you earn an hour in return. This can be spent on receiving an hour of someone else’s time. No money is exchanged. Everyone’s time is valued equally; one hour of sharing skills or helping others is recognised by giving that person one hour as a time credit – a community loyalty point.
Project teams are collaborative spaces for you to work together and manage community projects. Anyone can be invited to join a team and you can choose to keep the team private if you like. Project teams collate really useful tools, such as Trello boards and Google document sharing, which makes it easy to chat together and assign tasks.
The directory is a place for communities and practitioners to share information about their own services, support and social events. It's easy-to-search and you can quickly share listings via social media. You can add and manage your own listings, which will be reviewed and approved by an admin. You can save listings to your favourites and connect online with the listing owner.
Challenges enable people to ask others to share their ideas about how to respond to a particular social issue or challenge. Your community can rate ideas with emoticons and endorse ideas they support. It's an engaging way to collect public opinions and harness the creativity of the hive mind.
A conversation is a simple way of posing a topic or question to the public for discussion. You can ask others to share their views about a particular social issue or challenge. It's an engaging way to collect public opinions and harness the creativity of the hive mind.
Polls enable communities or colleagues to share their opinions, set their own challenges and vote for their favourite ideas. You can quickly and easily see what others think in a fun format. You can enable people to feel valued for their opinions and you can use polls to gather data to provide evidence for your idea or a decision. You can ask others to answer via a single choice or through a ranking-based poll.
- Make sure you are signed in.
- Visit the activity stream to view all volunteering opportunities.
- Click on the opportunity you are interested in.
- Press the 'Volunteer to this' button.
- Complete the pop-up form and include a message about why you're interested in the opportunity.
Community badges verify and identify the trusted members of a community. The badges will differ depending on your platform and are awarded by the administration team using their own application criteria. You can apply for a badge through your admin team by contacting them directly or by following the application process detailed on your platform.
Community campaigns unite members and their activities around one cause. You can be part of something bigger by supporting community-wide initiatives. Tag your activities and profiles to campaigns and connect with other campaign supporters. Visualise the impact you can have together and keep up-to-date with the campaign's progress.
Guides are an easy way for online communities to access information, processes and online learning. You can download free learning tools and contribute your own tools and resources for others. It's simple to navigate through a guide and mark sections as complete. You can rate the usefulness of content and leave comments to connect with both subject experts and your peers.
- Make sure you are signed in.
- Select 'My dashboard'.
- View navigation options on the left-hand side.
- Select ‘settings’ and ‘close my account’.
- Click the button to ‘close my account’ via an email window.
- Choose whether or not to request a copy of your data. Sign out.