Do you know how to create online surveys? In this article you’ll learn the steps to follow in order to carry out an effective survey that guarantees the best results for all your projects.
Create online surveys the right way:
Getting to know your audience or potential customers is one of the most important actions you can take to get your business to the next level. This is possible, of course, thanks to the possibility to create online surveys.
Online surveys will become your best friends as soon as you start understanding your clients’ behavior and learning more about what your target audience expects from your products or services.
This information will allow you to improve and increase the practices you’re currently taking to generate customer engagement and retention. But, how can you create online surveys?
How to create online surveys the right way
With online surveys you will be able to collect information from your customers, obtain data on how consumers react and have a clearer idea about what steps to follow and what modifications you will carry out to satisfy your market, and much more.
Can you imagine getting a new packaging for your product and consumers reacting in a negative way? These types of situations can be avoided by creating an online survey where you share proposals for new packaging designs with your audience so that they can help you decide which one is the best.
But before starting a survey, you should consider several factors that will help you make your project successful.
Steps to create online surveys
Here are the steps you must follow to create a survey to help you collect the insights you need:
1.- Determine the objectives of the survey
First, we must determine the objectives of your survey, that is, the reason why you decided to do it. For example, we could conduct a survey to:
- Determine the profitability of starting a business.
- Evaluate the feasibility of bringing a new product to the market.
- Know the level of satisfaction of our consumers
- Discover the level of work environment within our company or organization.
2.- Define the required information
Once we determine the objectives of our survey, it is necessary to define what information we are going to collect, this will be the one that allows us to meet the objectives of the investigation.
For example: if we have decided to learn how to create online surveys to evaluate the feasibility of releasing a new product, it is necessary to collect information about consumer tastes and preferences regarding the type of product we plan to launch.
Knowing the opinions of our clients, receiving feedback from them, is an example of good practices. If we want to achieve customer satisfaction we must then know them in detail, make them happy to achieve their loyalty to our brand.
3.- Design of the survey
Survey design consists of formulating the appropriate questions that allow us to obtain the required information.
For example: If we need to know what are the preferences of consumers with respect to a certain product.
The usual thing in a survey is that it allows us to obtain different types of information, for this it is necessary to include different types of questions.
Look for your surveys to be attractive and preferably not very long surveys. Do not forget to make them accessible to other online devices, such as cell phones or tablets.
A well-designed survey will keep the respondent attentive, willing to collaborate. Without a doubt, having our objectives well established contributes to creating unnecessary questions for the investigation.
4.- Determine the demographic segment to study
The next step in how to do a survey is to determine who will be the people we are going to survey, and from whom we are going to obtain the information we need.
For example, we may need to obtain information from our customers, consumers in general, our workers, people who do not consume our product, etc.
Find out what market segmentation is and how it helps you implement your research.
5.- Determine the number of surveys to be carried out
Use the formula to define the sample size and find the representative number of the group of people you are going to study. In summary, the sample formula is as follows: n = (Z²pqN) / (Ne² + Z²pq)
n: It is the representative number of people that we want to study (population) and, therefore, the number of surveys or microsurvey that we must carry out, or the number of people that we must survey.
N: Population: It is the group of people that we are going to study, which could be made up, for example, by our target audience.
z: Confidence level: measures the reliability of the results. The usual thing is to use a confidence level of 95% (1.96) or 90% (1.65). The higher the confidence level, the more accurate the results will be.
e: Degree of error: Measures the percentage of error that may be in the results. The usual is to use a degree of error of 5% or 10%. The smaller the margin of error, the more valid the results will be.
p: Probability of occurrence: Probability of the event occurring. The usual thing is to use a probability of occurrence of 50%.
q: Probability of non-occurrence: Probability that the event will not occur. The most common is to use a probability of non-occurrence of 50%. The sum of “p” plus “q” must always give 100%.
Learn how to use all these elements in our article on how to calculate the sample size or if you prefer you can use our sample size calculator directly and for free.
6.- How to create online surveys submissions
After the survey is designed, run a pilot survey to see if there are any errors or some kind of change is needed, for example, without the questions they are well formulated and clear.
You can send your survey by email, offer promotions or incentives to participate in the survey. This depends on the campaign you want to implement, but certainly the rewards are always attractive to respondents.
You can also add a survey link on your website or generate a QR code that directs to the survey, or simply share it on social media or on your blog.
7.- Counting and analysis of results
With QuestionPro you will have an analysis of results in real time, saving time, money and effort in relation to traditional surveys.
You can generate your reports, for example through infographics or download and share them. Take into account the importance of this information for the correct decision making of your company.
8.- Conclusions
Once the results have been recorded and codified, we proceed to analyze them and draw our conclusions from the investigation and establish an action plan for correct decision-making.
When doing a survey, take into account that the results obtained or the actions to be implemented must be shared with clients, or where appropriate with employees, if, for example, you carried out a work environment survey.
Socializing the information will earn you points, since those who participated in a survey will feel valued and will know that their opinion was taken into consideration.
9.- Decision making
Finally, the last step of how to do a survey is to make decisions according to the conclusions obtained.
If, when creating a survey, for example, we have come to the conclusion that new needs, preferences and tastes are being presented in consumers, we proceed to make the decision to redesign our product in such a way that it is in charge of satisfying said needs, preferences and tastes.
There is no point in taking a survey to get valuable information if we don’t do anything with it. The important thing here is to collect this data and act accordingly, always seeking to improve.
Use the right tools
There’s survey software that allows you to do all the above steps easily and effectively. Consider these features when choosing the best survey software:
- That allows us to ask different types of questions and validation to collect accurate data and minimize the effort of cleaning the data.
- Intuitive design, easy navigation and the ability to integrate with other tools
- That you can export data and share the results with your team.
- Attention in your language
How to create online surveys with QuestionPro
The survey is one of the most used tools to obtain information and useful data to know the needs, tastes and preferences of consumers, discover the level of customer satisfaction or measure the happiness of employees through a work environment survey to find the timely solution for each situation.
Creating surveys is very simple using QuestionPro, if you already have a QuestionPro account, just enter the platform with your username and password to start, if you still do not have a license you can create your first survey for free and start using our platform without obligation.
You can start by choosing from a huge number of pre-designed surveys that are in the platform’s library on various topics, or start carrying out a survey from scratch, you can even import a survey that you already have created previously, for example in Microsoft format. Word.
Even if you choose one of our survey templates, you have the option to edit it according to your needs.
When creating a survey from scratch, the first step will be to name your project. By doing so your survey will be created and saved.
QuestionPro is a very intuitive platform, it has various menus that are divided into other submenus where you will find various functions.
For example, in “Edit” you have at your fingertips all the submenus that have to do with the survey, such as design, language, completion options and all those variables that directly affect the measurement instrument or your survey.
In the “Distribute” menu, everything related to QuestionPro’s survey distribution methods is available.
As for the “Analytics” menu, you will be able to see all the data that you collect once you have created the survey and decided which distribution methods are best for you.
You can modify the survey data, download the information and preview the data as such in the “Manage data” section of the “Analytics” menu.
In the “Mobile” menu you have the possibility to generate all the necessary changes when using the QuestionPro App for offline surveys.
Take advantage of the use of mobile devices to collect data. Mobile surveys are very useful as they are usually short and can be easily distributed to a large number of people.
Create the questions for your surveys
On our platform you have access to different types of questions, from basic to advanced. Choose the one that best suits your needs.
Before adding each question to the platform, you can hover your cursor over them to see a preview of each of them.
By creating a survey with QuestionPro you will have access to the different families of questions, making it easier for you to find the one you need, for example, within the “Multiple selection” section, you will be able to find questions to “Select one”, “Select several” answers or use a “Dropdown Menu” question.
If you are interested in the “Graphic Rating” questions, you can use questions such as “Star Rating”, “Video Rating”, “Smiley Face – Rating”, “Thumbs Up / Down”, “Send to Social Networks” , “Text slider bar”, numeric slider.
In the “Settings” section you can modify the nature of each of the questions, change the format for its display and give it the format you want.
We invite you to explore the various functions that you can find to make your survey more attractive and easier to answer.
When adding each question you have the option to edit it, add answer options, and even enable or not the option to ask that mandatory question, that is, that the respondent cannot advance to the next one unless they have given you an answer.
You have the option to “Duplicate” your survey and create some kind of “Logic” to make your survey smarter, for example skipping questions, making extractions, and many more.
Remember that you can see how your survey is looking in the “Preview” section to see how the people who will answer it will see it.
In the “Edit” section, “Design” submenu, you will find all the elements to change the design of your survey, from the colors, to choose within the predefined colors or to customize the colors according to your brand.
Add headers, logos, change font types, size, etc. Also edit how the survey will look on all devices.
Remember that you also have the option to print your survey or download it in various formats, such as Word, HTML, see the criteria you have used in your logic and generate random test responses so that you can see in the Survey Reports section how they will look. the results.
Do not forget that you can create a survey in the language you want, enter the “Edit” menu, “Languages” submenu and add the language you need to use. Once selected, manually add the menus that you are going to use in your survey.
If you want to put into practice and learn more about how to create a survey, you can create a free account or request a demo of our platform on the QuestionPro website.
Don’t forget that knowing what satisfies your customers can lead you to achieve the success you want.
