Online survey tools have made it easy for marketers to conduct their own research. But while it may be easy to create a survey, surveying requires careful planning if you want to collect meaningful results that you can act on.

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When crafting your survey questions, consider these Ten Dos and Don’ts.

5 Tips for Creating the Perfect Survey 4. Data from your surveys should provide transparency and be helpful when making business decisions, so it’s vital to get it right the first time! If your surveys do not address relevant points, your respondents may find them useless and may not take the time to complete them. Create customer profiles? Choosing a specific reason for creating the survey will help you create more targeted questions, which in turn will generate answers you can use to make better marketing decisions. Asking the right questions. The questions you ask in your survey have a direct impact on how many people will take your survey, complete your survey, and fulfill your Call to Action at the end of the survey. To get that done, you have to gather customer information, and surveys are just what the doctor ordered for that. When reaching out to gather customer information, it’s essential to get it right from the beginning. The types of questions you ask play an important role in creating a successful survey. 8 Tips to Creating the Perfect Email Survey for Customers Megan Totka. Megan is the Chief Editor for ChamberofCommerce.com. ChamberofCommerce.com’s platinum membership program helps small businesses grow on the web.

What Makes a Good Survey Question

Start with a clear survey goal.

DO: Stick to your goal

Only ask questions that pertain to your goal or an objective that will help you achieve your goal. No matter how nice it might be to know, don’t ask if it does not help you achieve your goal. Set a clear goal on what you want to achieve and don’t stray from it.

DO: Use the right survey question type

To get clean data, you need to use the right question type.

Qualitative questions are open-ended and are great for asking “why”. Use these when exploring an issue. Use them sparingly as they are fatiguing for respondents and subject to interpretation bias.

Quantitative questions are closed- ended. These are far less fatiguing and easy to measure. These offer easy answer options for answering how, what and when. They often appear as:

• Radio buttons
• Check boxes
• Drop down menus
• Rating scales (i.e. Likert scale or star rating)
• Ranking scales (drag and drop or matrix table)

A mix of both qualitative and quantitative questions is often a good way to go. Follow up quantitative questions comment box to learn more about why the respondent answered the way they did. Or use and essay question type at the end of your quantitative survey.

DO: Offer mutually exclusive answer options

When using a range, whether it be a date, age, income, etc.) make sure your ranges are exclusive and that there is no overlap. For example:

Q: How long have you been a club member?
1-10 yrs
10-20 yrs
20- 30 yrs
30+ yrs

Instead, your answer range should be exclusive like this:

Q: How long have you been a club member?
1-10 yrs
11-20 yrs
21- 30 yrs
31+ yrs

Nonexclusive answer options not only confuse respondents, but result in bad data.

DO: Be specific and direct

General questions will not give you good results. You need to clearly specify what it is you want answered.

For example:

Q:Do you read the paper?

Instead, ask:

Q:Do you read the Boston Globe on Sundays?

Use short and concise terms. Wordiness adds to confusion. Unclear questions lead to unclear results.

DO: Use balanced scales

When asking survey questions using a scale, each point should hold the same amount of weight with the same number of options on either side of the middle point so as not to skew the data.

Things to Avoid While Crafting Good Survey Questions

DON’T: Be fatiguing

Questions that are ambiguous, lengthy, or tax the respondent’s memory are fatiguing. Limit the number of qualitative questions to 2 since they require more time and effort to answer.

DON’T: Ask sensitive questions

Personal questions can be uncomfortable to answer. Give respondents the option to opt out of these. If you make these questions required, they are likely to abandon the survey. Consider providing a Prefer Not to Answer (PNA) option to decrease survey abandonment while not forcing an answer that might skew your data.

DON’T: Beg the question

Leading questions create biased results that lead to poor data quality. Subtle wording differences can significantly impact results. “Could,” “should,” and “might” all sound about the same, but may produce different results.

For example:

Q: Folgers is a popular coffee brand. What brand of coffee do you drink?

This question might imply that if they do not drink Folgers they might not be popular.
Avoid any wording that introduces bias or impacts the results.

Instead, ask:

Q: What brand of coffee do you drink?

DON’T: Use double-barreled questions

Combining two questions into one confuses respondents and impacts data quality.

For example:

Q: How satisfied are you with our buffet food and drink selection?

The respondent might love the food selection but are dissatisfied with the drink selection. Splitting the question into two separate ones, will give you better results that let you know what you need to improve.

Instead, ask:

Q1: How satisfied are you with our buffet food selection?
Q2: How satisfied are you with the drink selection?

DON’T: Force the answer

Requiring answers will give you results but not necessarily the best results. If you are going to require an answer make sure that you provide a comprehensive answer list.

For example:

Q: What is your gender?
Male
Female

Instead, ask:

Q: What is your gender?
Male
Female
Transgender

Good Survey Questions Take Time

Surveying takes careful planning. Doing the hard work up front will save you time and effort later. Good survey questions lead to good results!

Whether you’re testing out a new product or want feedback about your customer service, there comes a time when every small business and non-profit can benefit from a customer survey. By asking your customers and donors to answer a few quick questions, you can gain valuable insight.

One of the best ways to conduct a survey is through email. In this post, we’re going to show you how to create a meaningful survey online and compose an invitation email to get customers to participate. Ready to get started?

First things first. Let’s talk about your survey.

1. Define your goals

What do you want your customer survey to accomplish? You need a well-defined goal before you start creating survey questions. Do you want to improve a particular service? Do you want feedback about your new website? In two to three sentences, write down what you want to learn from a survey.

2. Select an online survey tool

There are many online tools that can help you create a customer survey. You can use VerticalResponse’s Survey Creator to create a survey and email it to your target audience with ease.

3. Select a template

Most online survey tools offer a variety of pre-made templates based on your needs. You’ll be able to edit questions to suit your business and customer survey goals, and you’ll be able to get on with your day quicker if you’re not starting from scratch.

4. Add your own branding

Include your company logo in your survey, and use the colors that are in your logo as well, so your survey is consistent with your brand.

5. Create clear questions

Now you’re getting down to brass tacks. It’s time to create a set of survey questions. Here are some tips to make sure your questions are efficient and on topic.

• Revisit your goal. All of your questions should be geared to meet the goal of your survey.
• Ask about one thing at a time. Don’t try to combine several elements into one question. It’s too difficult to decipher answers in the end.
• Don’t try to sway your audience. Ask straightforward questions that are free of opinions.
• Be specific. For example, a question like, “Do you regularly order office supplies online?” is vague. “Do you order printer cartridges from ABC Office Supply at least once a month?” is more specific and gives you more detailed information.
• Ask between 5-10 questions. You don’t want the survey to be too long or recipients may stop in the middle of it.
• Select question types. With most survey tools, you have a variety of question types to select from. You can set up multiple choice, comment boxes, drop down menus and sliding scales. We suggest sticking to one or two question types per survey. You don’t want a hodgepodge of question types; it can be confusing to the participant.
• Cover all possible answers. If you’re asking multiple-choice questions, make sure there’s an answer that fits for everyone.

6. Review it

Before you send your survey to your recipients, ensure you proofread it, and take a trial test. Have a co-worker do the same to catch any errors. Make adjustments if necessary.

With the customer survey complete, you can now create an email invitation to encourage participation.

7. Create an enticing subject line

In your email subject line, tell recipients that you’d like their help with a survey. The subject line should be concise and use active language. Here are a few examples:

• We need your help. Take our 3-minute survey.
• Tell us what you think & win a gift card.
• Help us by completing our quick survey.
• Have 2 minutes? We’d love your feedback.

8. Write an effective invitation

The body of your email invites the recipient to take the survey. Think of a birthday invitation. It’s friendly and offers vital details like whom the party is for and how long it will last. A survey invitation is similar. We’ll use the email below as an example of how to write your survey invitation.

• Warm greeting. This survey is personalized and thanks the customer for using their service. Try something similar. The point is to begin the email on an appreciative note.
• Who and what the survey is for. Tell recipients whom the survey is for and what its purpose is. Explain why this survey is important like the example does.
• Commitment time. How long will the survey take? This piece of information is a must. Your customers are busy, so if you don’t explain the time commitment they will likely ignore it. To get the best results, shoot for a survey that takes 3-5 minutes to complete.
• Possible incentive. You could include an incentive. Enter participants in a drawing for a prize, for example. This is especially helpful if your survey is on the longer side. If you plan to do this, mention it in your email.
• A quick close. Bring your email to a close by thanking the customer, or if you’ve designed the invitation in a letter-style like the example above, a quick signature line works.

9. Create a call to action

8 Tips To Creating The Perfect Email Survey For Customers Will

The call to action should be clear. In the example above, the clickable red button takes recipients right to the survey. Make the process as seamless as possible.

10. Segment your list

Who should your survey go to? In some cases, you may want to send the survey to your entire email list. However, you may want to send it to specific segments, or parts of your list like those who recently purchased a product, or those who live in a specific area of the country. Segmenting your list will give you the most relevant responses.

11. Review and send

Review your email. Test the links and double-check your copy. When you’re happy with it, schedule it to go out when you want your recipients to get it. After a few days, consider sending a reminder email to those who haven’t completed the customer survey.

8 Tips To Creating The Perfect Email Survey For Customers Using

12. Collect and review responses

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Collect your responses. Then, take the time to analyze all of the data and use it to make informed business decisions moving forward.

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