7 Steps to Hosting an Absentee Vote Online

Online voting offers many advantages for organizations and election managers who want an opportunity to gather input from as many voting-eligible members as possible.

Offering absentee ballots for board votes, local elections, and new organizational initiatives allows those in charge of major decisions to hear from members who are remote or unable to vote in person due to a prior engagement or disability. In fact, online voting for absentee or board members with disabilities can actually help your association or organization be more accessible and ADA-friendly!

Why Absentee Voting is Vital

The greater conversation surrounding voter rights in the US is a better fit for a political-leaning website, but there is some value in discussing member inclusion for organizational elections.

Federal oversight requires businesses and associations to offer some level of accessibility to employees or members with disabilities, however, for many elections paper ballots are still seen as a viable option.

Online voting can help voters with disabilities be more involved without the challenge of having to physically send in their ballot. With a system like ours, election managers can log in via their web or mobile browser to quickly create custom ballots and in a matter of minutes, share them with voters across the world.  

How to Host an Absentee Vote Online

To create an absentee voting program, work with fellow board directors and voting members to:

Establish a strategy for announcing new votes

Does your organization have bylaws or a constitution in place that outlines the process for running a new vote or adding new initiatives to upcoming ballots? If not, check out this great guide to establishing procedures for your upcoming elections. If you’re already one step ahead, use this opportunity to amend your voting SOPs to include absentee ballots.

Identify the voting solution that works best for your organization

Now that you’ve decided online voting will work best for your organization, take a look at our examples page to see which of eBallot’s custom-built online voting solutions offers the best election software for your industry or occupation.

Build ballots that can effectively convey the initiatives and measures being voted on

Need help trying to determine what to put on your ballots? Not to worry, eBallot offers 24/7 ballot support, concierge election management, and a collection of ballot templates for every kind of vote your association or organization needs.

Share campaign news, updates and key information with voters via email, web pages or other digital methods of communication

Chat or talk to our customer engagement team to learn about election engagement and voter outreach add-ons for your custom voting solution.

Send email reminders for ballot deadlines to all voting members

Keep your voters in the loop throughout the entirety of your campaign or voting period with automated email reminders and submission deadline announcements from eBallot.

Run your election, then tally absentee ballot submissions and live votes within a custom real-time results dashboard

No more paper ballots or manual vote counting thanks to the automated real-time live results feature in our e-voting solutions. Online voting also allows election managers to quickly audit or order a recount of votes in case of any discrepancies or voting controversies.

Announce the outcome and share key campaign/election highlights with your entire organization

Passed a new resolution for your organization or elected a new board member? Let your participants know that every vote was counted by sharing your election outcomes quickly and more efficiently either via email, social media, or your website. Our platform allows managers to view their election results and share outcomes as soon as their vote ends.

Ready to add online absentee voting to your organization? Check out who we help to learn more about the industries and sectors we serve, or contact a member of our customer engagement team to get a quote for online voting solutions today.