5 Ways To Keep Your Surveys From Being Boring

Its time for some truth to power. People hate filling out surveys, and it turns out there’s a good reason for that. There’s this lingering suspicion that surveys are a giant time waste and filling them out is a chore at best.

Fair enough. If this is how customers and the man on the street thinks, then perhaps its time to take a step back here and see it from the perspective of the survey makers? After all, if the company undertaking a survey can’t compel people to fill them at all, then what’s the point of this whole exercise in futility, right?

You’d be surprised how looking at things from another angle can help solve the issue of surveys being too boring or drab to fill out. Let’s view this all from the eye of the non-beholder.

Businesses think Surveys are Important

The suits think it important because they have been in use throughout history to get a peek into a consumer’s mindset. No arguments there.

However the new internet generation that has been seen consumers expressing their opinion more over social media and other new channels. Such a development has shown marketers that there has to be a shift from the way things were done traditionally while getting responses from surveys. The old ways don’t cut it anymore. There are certainly different rules and methods now to tap into if your online survey is to grow a loyal customer base.

Based on how people consume media in this wireless mobile era, a rethink was needed on revamping and reviving the way we do surveys in the modern age.

So without further ado, let’s take a look at 5 ways that can enhance the effectiveness of online surveys that are begging to be filled.

Tip 1: Short and Snappy Surveys are the way to go

You know what they say about today’s Twitter-obsessed tweens – their attention spans are now shorter than a gold fish generally.

Keeping this in mind, no one likes to stare blankly at long-winded and complex questionnaires. This aint the extended version of Lord of the Rings here. What you need is short and simple questions in your surveys. Research has shown that these type of quick-fire questions get solved and answered easily. And don’t forget to keep the questions relevant and up-to-the-point for the audience to make a decision quickly.

Tip 2: Keep your Online Surveys in one Place

There are people who just think that surveys running into a handful of pages are good, at least from an organizational PoV. Because people absolutely detest step-by-step multi-page surveys. People can grow uninterested half-way through.

This is why it’s prudent to keep your online survey questionnaire on a single page format only. It makes the act of filling a survey rather less daunting.

Tip 3: Take your Time when choosing a Title for your Survey

Titles are your one shot at generating intrigued and social media hits. A drab and ordinary title like ‘Survey for Customer Satisfaction’ is enough to make people hit a mental snooze-fest on you.

But what if someone renamed the survey ‘Customers, fill this out and get chance to win a mini-pool table.’ Now that, we’d like to discover and fill out the form.

Tip 4: Keep the Questions Easily Comprehendible

Simplicity is key here. Keeping the questions easy and short means that people will actually take out the time to fill an e-form fully. And that too at record speeds. A good rule of thumb is to keep the easiest questions on the top of the online survey.

Tip 5: Make your Surveys Mobile Ready

Smartphones and tablets are the preferred form of hardware to access the internet. Marketers are all too aware of the volume (7.3 billion mobile devices worldwide!) to the duration of use (8 hours of average usage time!). Mobile web browsers have come a long way in terms of speed, performance and features.

Taking advantage of today’s mobile OS capabilities and user behavior patterns, marketers need to tailor their survey so that they are easily rendered on mobile devices of varying screen sizes and resolutions.

Responsive web design is your best friend here. Or a mobile app for surveys would do so.

These tips go a long way in ensuring that people fill out the surveys and that too in minimal amount of time. The benefits of having access to market research and consumer preferences is of paramount importance to brands and businesses of today. Decision makers can also utilize this data to improve the standard of living. Asking the right questions is as important as how you ask them so be prepared to make your surveys more fun, engaging and short.