Understanding and creating Town Hall sessions

Understanding and creating Town Hall sessions

Understand Town Hall   

Town Hall in Zoho CommunitySpaces helps you host and participate in live engagement sessions. These sessions are designed to encourage interaction, collaboration, and community building among members.



Open the Town Hall dashboard   

  1. Click Town Hall from the left apps menu.



  2. Review your sessions from the Dashboard across Upcoming, Ongoing, and Completed.



  3. Use the dedicated views in the left navigation panel to open those session lists directly.
  4. Use the shortcuts for Bookmarked questions and Followed Posts when you want quick access to saved Town Hall activity.

 

Create a Town Hall session   

  1. Click + New Town Hall at the bottom of the left navigation panel, or click the + icon in the top-right corner on the Town Hall page. Both entry points open the same creation window.



  2. Enter the session name and a short description.
  3. Choose the session Type.
  4. Set the session details based on the selected type.
  5. Click Schedule to publish it as an upcoming session, or click Start to launch it immediately, where applicable.
          

Choose a session type   

Town Hall supports two session types:
  • Q&A- A text-based session where members can post questions only after the session starts.
  • Live Broadcast- A video-based session where members can start posting questions as soon as the session is scheduled, even while it is still listed as upcoming.

 
For a Q&A session:
  1. Set the start date and time.
  2. Set the end date and time.
  3. Choose who can attend the session:
    • Everyone in the community
    • Members of a specific space
    • Selected members or spaces for a private session
  1. Add Panelists.
  2. Add Tags.
  3. Enable Allow all participants if you want participants to answer questions. If you leave this disabled, only hosts and panelists can answer.

 
For a live Broadcast session:
  1. Select when you want to start the session- Start Now or Schedule for later.

     

    If scheduling, set the start date and time.
  2. Select who can attend the session and add some panelists if required.
  3. Choose whether to record the session.
  4. Optionally, you can add tags.
  5. If scheduling, click Schedule to publish it as an upcoming session or click Start to launch it immediately.


InfoIn a Live Broadcast session, only the host and panelists can answer questions by default. 

Next: Continue with Understanding upcoming sessions and managing Town Hall settings in Zoho CommunitySpaces to learn how upcoming sessions behave and how session controls change by role.