Surveys are the key to understand what audiences are thinking. The insight gained from an online survey can right away empower a range of significant decisions. Research can influence changes to business strategy, employee engagement policy, product development, and add weight to medical study and analysis. You might completely understand the benefits that a well-designed survey can have and want to begin right now, but what is the best way to get started?
There are a few questions you need to ask yourself before you begin to design a survey. Online surveys are easy to create, but some initial planning will help you in gathering useful data that can help you achieve your goals. It is worth setting aside some time at this phase for planning and to cover all of the essential checkpoints to create a successful survey.
- Plan Your Survey
Here are a few easy steps to consider when planning to gather effective data that will help you to achieve your goals.
- Establish your goals – What do you want to learn? Are you conducting an employee satisfaction survey or a market research survey? Your survey will differ depending on what you are trying to achieve. You will need to select questions that provide you with the data you need. Therefore only ask appropriate questions; don’t ask for anything that you do not need.
- Choose your audience – Who do you want to survey? Targeting the right audience will help you meet your goals. The number of people you want to survey? The larger the sample size, the more precise the reflection you will get from your target group. What are the main demographics (gender, age, job, industry, etc.) of the audience sample?
- Check for Survey Relevancy
Relevance is the key, so only ask your respondents to answer questions that apply to them, are clear and cover a subject that they understand easily. Use advanced logic features to ask questions based on pre-established information such as gender, location or product use. This can boost completion rates, as users are only asked relevant questions.
- Promote Your Survey
Think about where your respondents are likely to be when they answer your survey. Are they likely to be on the move, at home or work?
There are now numerous ways to share your survey and gather information. Multiple channels can be used including SMS, email, weblink, QR code or a kiosk; you can now even collect data when respondents are offline.
- Report on your Survey
Your online survey tool should give you several reporting options. Fast results and real-time insight means you can make changes rapidly by acting on the respondent data you gathered.
You can convert your results into custom graphs and charts or easily export the survey data to CSV for further research. You can share results with colleagues by sending a password-protected link so that they can view the results.
Set up a plan to export your results repeatedly. You can run exports daily, weekly, monthly or on a one-off basis. This can then be sent to multiple email addresses of your choice. This well-organized approach to reporting will make sure you always have the data you require on hand.
- Identify Key Issues
- Low response rate – Think about how you are distributing your survey, is it reaching the right people?
- Low completion rates – Are you asking appropriate questions? Do you establish expectations at the beginning by telling respondents how long it will take to answer the survey? Try to keep your survey as short as possible so as not to take up too much time.
- Poor outcome – Go back and look at the possible responses to your questions to see if you are asking the right questions to get the information you need.
- Unfair responses – Some respondents who lose interest in the survey might just select random answers or even choose a set pattern for answering. To tackle this you can apply page and question randomization to rotate the options.
Start creating impressive surveys with Ambivista
The process of creating and sending successful surveys continues to develop and become more productive and cost-effective. Results can provide useful information to help organizations make informed business decisions. Technology has greatly enhanced the capabilities for businesses to be nimble and innovative, always improving and streamlining the way to gather data.
