Crowdsourced Mapping for ArcGIS StoryMaps—Easy as 123

ArcGIS StoryMaps + ArcGIS Survey123 = 😄

Have you ever wanted readers to contribute to your story? Follow along to learn how you can incorporate crowdsourced data in your next story.

This workflow requires an ArcGIS online subscription account. You can try it for free  here .

Here are the five basic steps to add a crowdsourced map to your story.

1. Develop an idea for a story that uses crowdsourced data and start building it in ArcGIS StoryMaps
2. Create a new survey in ArcGIS Survey123 (be sure to have a GeoPoint question)
3. Publish your survey and create a web map using your survey results
4. Add the web map and survey to your story
5. Publish your story, distribute it, and watch the submissions come in!

With these simple steps you can get a basic crowdsourced map up and running in a matter of minutes.

Step 1: Craft your story idea 🤔

Crowdsourcing can be a useful tool for any storytelling project. In fact, it can lead to increased engagement and increased support for your organization. In the new ArcGIS StoryMaps it's easy to embed a web map that will update in real time. These live maps will keep your story evergreen as readers continue to monitor and submit content.

Here are a few ideas for inspiration:

• Teachers: Have your students collect photos of important landmarks, nature encounters, or points of interest during a class field trip.
• Non-profit organizations: Engage your audience by having them submit points related to an issue that's close to your mission.
• Governments: Create a survey that asks citizens to submit public comments related to specific issue like safety or infrastructure.
• Commercial organizations: Have consumers submit photos of them using your product at home or in the field.
• Journalists: Have readers submit reactions to a recent event or photos of an ongoing storm or natural disaster.
• Every-day authors: Create a map that shows pets around the world (like  this  example).

Step 2: Create a survey 👩‍💻

 ArcGIS Survey123  is a web application that allows authors to generate forms that are geolocated. One of the most powerful parts of the tools is the Location question field (map or address). This allows readers information to be added to a map. If you're just getting started with ArcGIS Survey123 try watching this  short video .

Step 3: Publish your survey and make your map 🗺

Once you've created the questions for your survey click publish. You'll need to update your sharing settings to enable the public to submit responses to the survey. Test the survey and submit a point or two. It's important to seed your crowdsourced effort with a few sample submissions to encourage others to join it. It will also provide examples of the types of submissions you're after.

Now, go to your ArcGIS Online account. A new item from your survey should appear within your organization page. Try opening it in the Map Viewer.

You should see a map with any points you submitted to the survey. Now customize the map and style the points. You can also try adding these points to a scene instead of a map. This may fit your story better and yield beautiful  results .

Step 4: Add the web map and survey to your story ✅ ✅

ArcGIS StoryMaps makes it easy to add a map to your story. Add a new map block and pick your survey web map.

Next, take the sharing link for your survey and add it to your story using the embed block. You can adjust the width of the embedded survey to your liking with the toolbar that appears above it on hover. Or, you can embed the survey with an iframe code and set the width and height of the block that way—this is especially useful if you want the entire form to appear, rather than having form scroll within the block.

If you'd rather, you can point readers to the survey from your story using a button, too.

Step 5: Publish, distribute, and monitor 📬

Once you're done with your story map it's time to send it out to your readers. It's best practice to monitor the results for sensitive content and to make sure the technology is working properly. If needed you can always edit the submissions if it needs to be moderated.

Now comes the most thrilling part of the process—watching the points appear on your map.

Note: If you're interested in customizing your interactive map, particularly adding photos in your pop-ups, check out this  blog post .

There you have it, one easy ways to add crowdsourcing to your next StoryMap project. We can't wait to see what you come up with!

This story was created by the StoryMaps team using the new ArcGIS StoryMaps. Learn more about this next-generation storytelling tool—and try it yourself— here.