Surveys are an essential part of running a business. Whether you’re looking for insight from customers or honest opinions and suggestions from employees, asking for feedback is the best way you can improve operations and offerings.
But sometimes you don’t get the results you were hoping for? Why? Well, there are a variety of factors that could come into play, but before you risk getting a poor response again, make sure you aren’t making any of these major survey mistakes:
1. Mandatory answers
Have you ever been frustrated because you can’t submit a form, poll or digital document because you haven’t filled out one of the mandatory fields? Chances are your respondents feel the same way when they don’t want to or can’t answer one of your questions, but can’t move forward without doing so. Not only does this frustrate people, it can throw off the accuracy of your results because people may just select the most convenient answer, not the one that reflects their experience or opinion.
2. Not enough response options
Your survey participants are unique individuals – your survey response options should reflect this. If you’re hoping to get a clear view of what your customers or employees are really thinking, you need to have enough options so they’ll be able to give you real insight. Don’t assume everyone’s opinions fit into the same broad categories – provide an “other” choice with an option for them to expand on why they selected this answer.
3. Un-branded surveys
Your customers may think a survey that isn’t specifically branded for your company is spammy or untrustworthy, and this will lead to poor response rates. If it doesn’t clearly state your company name and have relevant logos and corporate messages, there may be confusion as to where it’s actually coming from. As a rule of thumb, if you wouldn’t answer a survey yourself, don’t expect your clients to either.
4. Too many questions
Your respondents are doing you a favour by responding to your poll, so don’t take advantage and expect them to spend endless hours on it. Keep questions short and sweet and ensure no one has to click through a dozen pages to complete the task at hand. Remember, people have short attention spans – if they think something is taking too long, they’ll probably just close the browser window.
5. No follow up
Don’t forget to thank your participants! They’ve just spent a valuable portion of their day helping you, so they deserve a little recognition for their assistance. But don’t stop there – take all of their responses seriously and consider every suggestion for improvement. This shows survey respondents, be they employees or customers, that their opinions matter and their time was well spent. If these individuals can see positive change based on their feedback, they may be more likely to help out in the future.
Request a free demonstration to learn more about the importance of surveys and how your organisation can benefit from conducting them.
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