A successful survey begins with good planning. Make sure you understand what you want to achieve (goals) and what data is relevant to collect in order to achieve those goals.
Creating a survey with EasyQuest is easy. We have listed a few points that we think will help you with your questionnaire design:
- Be clear and specific. Clear and specific questions are perhaps the most important aspect of a survey. It is vital that the wording is simple and precise. Make sure there is no doubt about what question the respondent is answering. It is also important to include all possible responses, so that the respondent does not feel forced into choosing one that is not quite right. Nor should the questions be too long.
- Avoid asking more than one thing at a time. Only ask about one thing in each question. This also avoids the respondent becoming confused and not knowing what to answer. One example of a question you should not include would be “What do you think about the premises and the food service at the conference?” Split this into two questions so as to ensure much better quality in the data you collect.
- Avoid leading questions. It can be easy to ask leading questions without meaning to. You should absolutely avoid questions that steer the respondent towards any of the possible responses. Try to keep the tone of the questionnaire balanced. One example of a leading question to be avoided would be ”Many people think that…. Do you agree with this statement?”.
- Clearly structure the questionnaire. The structure of the questionnaire should be clear. A good idea is to start with questions that the respondent can answer easily. The most important questions appear in the main part of the survey, and it is vital that these are formulated clearly and specifically. In the concluding phase of the questionnaire, you can ask demographic questions, such as gender, place of residence and age.
- Time taken to answer the survey. Do not make the survey any longer than you have to. Only ask questions that are relevant to achieving the goals of the survey. It is also a big advantage to tell the respondent how long it will take to complete the survey before they start.
- Remember to test. It is easy to overlook spelling mistakes or to forget possible responses. So remember to thoroughly test the survey before you distribute it. Ask a colleague or friend for feedback. You can also download the test-responses to Excel, to check that the information is easy to analyse or use for reports.