Wouldn't it be brilliant if your customers told you what they liked and didn't like about your website? How would you like to have people share their ideas of what you should stock as product or what services they'd like to hire you for?
Surveys are an excellent marketing tool with too many uses than I can discuss and with Survey Monkey, you can administer your own survey easily and for FREE. The really great benefit is that you can allow people remain anonymous which, for the most part, means true responses.
To set up a basic survey, just follow the prompts along. It's pretty straightforward.
But are there any other considerations to make besides the questions themselves? Yes.
Here are 10 tips on how to write a great survey:
Don't let it drag on too long. People will complete a long survey if it's enjoyable but they don't know if it's enjoyable until they do it and they won't do it until they know how long it's going to be. That's why most surveys say in advance how much time they will take to complete. 10-15 minutes is standard. 20 is pushing it, in my opinion. I like doing surveys but even 20 minutes for me starts to get tiresome.
Use less introspective questions and more multiple choice. You can get more info faster if you anticipate the most likely responses and provide them as options, allowing for "Other" to be a choice. (You can always ask them permission to follow up if you found an answer confusing.) If you ask them a lot of questions where they have to type, the survey will take longer and you may not even get that much info. Not everyone is a speedy little typist.
Keep it simple. Very simple. If you make people think hard at all, they will simply click on that red X in the corner of their browsers.
Keep your questions categorized by their topics. Finish a topic before moving onto another one.
Let your questions flow. Let your first question naturally lead to your next question and so on. Don't ask how they like their fake vomit before you ask if they even bought fake vomit in the first place.
Ask easy questions first not last. Everyone who starts a survey wants it to be over pretty soon. They're doing you a favour, after all. If you put easy questions first they will think, "Well, this is no big deal. Easy to do. I don't mind this." Then, if you put your open-ended questions, the ones that ask for opinions and feelings, in the middle, not only are people thinking that they've already invested X amount of time into the survey by now, but they're also warmed up.
Ask personal questions at the end. You don't want to turn people off at the very beginning. By the end, they'll have already invested time and there's no fear of "If this is what they're asking me now, what will they ask later?!"
Ask one question at a time. If you ask, "Did you find our website quick loading and easy to navigate?" and only allow for a "Yes" or "No" response, that doesn't help you much if the respondent's answer is "Yes, then No".
Ask unbiased questions. Are you basically telling them what they can and can't answer? Stop doing that! If you want an honest response, allow for negative answers. Instead of asking, "What do you like about my website?" ask "Was there anything that you liked about my website?"
Thank your respondents and consider giving them a coupon or other token of thanks. It will make them more likely to complete your next survey too.
