Below is some example text to describe the participation process to your participants. This could be included in an invitation email or in a 'heads-up' email sent prior to the invitation. Feel free to copy the text and edit to suit your needs.
Participation messaging:
We're using a new tool called ThoughtExchange to gather your input. You'll be asked to answer one open-ended question with as many responses as you like and then move on to the Rate Thoughts step. In the Rate step, you'll see your responses and those shared by others and assign 1 to 5 stars to each idea depending on how strongly you agree or disagree with it.
ThoughtExchange keeps confidential who shared each thought and who assigned what ratings. You can rate as many thoughts as you'd like before moving on to View Results where you can see all the thoughts sorted by average star rating, a summary of the different topics that have arisen in the Exchange so far, and (if you are logged in) a summary of your own activity.
You can also navigate by using the menu on the left side of the page (or at the top of the page on mobile devices) to go back and share more ideas or star some more thoughts at any time while the Exchange is open.
Introductory Video:
Also feel free to share this video that outlines how a ThoughtExchange works: