Which platforms support anonymous questions during company town halls?
Slido, Mentimeter, Microsoft Teams, Zoom and VersyNow all offer anonymous question options. The right choice depends on your meeting format, identity settings and how you want to manage the questions.
Consider a town hall about a restructuring. An employee wants to ask whether their team will absorb the work of a role being cut. They can take the microphone, type into a chat that displays their name, or leave the question unasked.
Anonymous Q&A gives them another route. Before inviting them to use it, you should be able to explain exactly what the organisers can see.
Five platforms to compare
| Platform | How anonymous questions work | When to consider it |
|---|---|---|
| Microsoft Teams | Its Q&A module lets organisers enable anonymous posts and review questions before publishing them. Replies and reactions to anonymous questions are not automatically anonymous. | Your town hall already runs in Teams and you want to start with the built-in option. |
| Zoom | Zoom Webinars lets organisers allow questions without providing the author’s name to hosts, co-hosts or panellists. Q&A is also available in certain Zoom Meetings plans. | You already broadcast through Zoom. Check your licence and Q&A settings before inviting employees to submit anonymous questions. |
| Slido | Participants can submit anonymous questions and upvote those they want answered. Privacy settings include anonymous participation by default and an option that requires everyone to remain anonymous. | You want a question queue alongside your video platform, with audience votes helping set the order. |
| Mentimeter | Q&A questions are anonymous by default. The tool combines Q&A with presentation slides, polls and other interactive activities. Identity settings can change the default behaviour. | You want leadership updates, polls and employee questions within the same presentation. |
| VersyNow | Participants can submit anonymous questions from a phone or laptop through a link or QR code. Question collection can stay open before and after the meeting. | You want to collect questions from employees in the room and online, including those who cannot attend live. |
When comparing plans, check participant capacity, moderation and the exports you need. A successful rehearsal with a handful of colleagues does not establish what your plan supports for a company-wide meeting.
What does “anonymous” let the organisers see?
Hiding a name on the shared screen does not, by itself, establish anonymity.
VersyNow, for example, treats collecting names and displaying them to participants as separate settings. A configuration can hide names from the audience while still letting presenters see them in the results. Conversely, work-account login can restrict access while keeping responses anonymous, depending on the settings.
Before the town hall, run through the complete experience with a colleague:
- Submit a question as a participant.
- Check the moderator view and the shared screen.
- Test comments and reactions separately.
- Inspect the exported report, if your plan provides one.
You can then explain the specific behaviour you have verified. Avoid promising that identification is impossible: a question describing a unique role or a recognisable incident can identify its author through the wording alone.
Moderation needs to make room for difficult questions
Agree on the rules before the meeting. Removing a personal attack, protecting confidential information or grouping duplicate questions serves a clear purpose. Removing a question because leadership would rather avoid it undermines the reason for offering anonymous Q&A.
Upvotes can help you decide what to answer first. Leave room for an important question affecting a small team, though. The ranking reflects votes received; it is not a representative survey of the workforce.
Also decide what happens to questions you cannot reach. Assign someone to own the follow-up and set a date for publishing answers. If a decision is still pending, say so and give employees a date for the next update.
Test the setup before your next town hall
If Teams or Zoom already meets your needs, start by testing its Q&A module. If you prefer question collection through a link or QR code alongside your broadcast, rehearse with a dedicated tool.
You can try VersyNow free for 28 days, with no credit card required and five sessions included. Use the first to check the participant experience and question handling before your next company town hall.