How to improve a survey: 7 steps for better responses

Administering a feedback survey to learn what people love about your business (or think could use some improvement) provides extremely useful insights, no matter your organization’s size or industry.

The information you get from surveys can drive innovation, improve decision-making, identify buying trends, and increase customer loyalty and retention rates. Plus, surveys are simple to use, easy to create, and cost-effective.

However, to gain actionable insights (as well as a high response rate) from your surveys, you need respondents to actually fill them out in the first place — accurately and completely.

A better survey isn’t simply one that gets more responses. Building a better survey means creating something that produces useful, reliable answers you can act on. A survey with a high response count but confusing questions or a frustrating layout can give you data, but it may not be trustworthy. 

If you want to improve your surveys, follow these seven simple steps:

If you’re starting from scratch, our guide on how to create a survey covers the basics. Now, let’s unpack our seven steps for better responses and more insightful data. 

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5 Ways to Improve Your Online Surveys

1. Define the decision your survey needs to support

Before you write a single question, decide what you’ll do with the answers. Are you looking for data to guide a product update or change one of your service processes? Do you need information from your consumer base to set your team’s priorities for the next sales cycle? Start with that decision, then work backward to get the information you need. 

Use your objective or decision as a filter for every question you draft. The responses you receive should affect your actions moving forward or guide your next steps. Inserting curiosity questions just makes surveys longer and adds noise to your results without improving your ability to make a decision. 

Though great surveys are thought-provoking, aesthetically pleasing, and easy to use and understand, they should first be focused, well-planned, and purposeful.

2. Write questions that return useful answers

If you’re asking junk questions, you’re going to get junk data. Here are a few habits that can make a difference when writing unbiased survey questions:

• Ask one thing at a time and split into two questions when necessary
• Keep your wording neutral and be aware of leading questions to avoid in surveys
• Use direct, plain language and skip industry jargon whenever possible 
• Make sure answer options don’t have overlap, as that can make things confusing for survey participants
• If you are using rating scales, offer an equal number of positive and negative options
• Add other or not applicable as answer options when appropriate so participants aren’t forced to choose a response that doesn’t fit

Your questions should be similar in length, type, and formatting. For example, if you’re going to ask a question requiring a rating scale to answer — like a Likert scale question — each scale should use the same number of points to avoid confusing your respondents and skewing your results.

3. Make the survey easy to complete

Even well-written questions won’t help if people abandon your survey halfway through. Reduce the effort it takes to finish, and you’ll get more complete and more thoughtful responses. 

You can also reduce the risk of survey fatigue. When left unaddressed, survey fatigue impacts the quality and accuracy of your results while increasing incomplete rates. 

Keep it as short as it needs to be

The longer your survey, the less time respondents spend on each question, and the higher survey abandon rates climb. 

Don’t aim for a fixed time limit. Instead, tell people up front how long the survey will take. You could say, “This survey takes about four minutes.” Then support that estimate by removing every question that won’t inform a decision. If you’re unsure where the line is, see our guide on how many questions a survey should have. 

Use conditional logic to hide questions that don’t apply to a given respondent. Someone who didn’t use a feature shouldn’t have to scroll past five questions about it. That will get annoying in a hurry and lead to increased abandonment rates. 

Design for readability

Here are a few ways to make your surveys easier to read and complete:

• Mobile first: Many people will open your survey on a phone, so make sure it displays properly in that format 
• Clear visual hierarchy: Make questions stand out from answer options and leave enough space to keep the page from feeling crowded 
• Accessible contrast: Use text and background colors with enough contrast for people with vision deficits
• Visible progress: Add a progress bar or indicator so people know how far along they are 
• Concise instructions: Say only what respondents need to know up front 

Also, if your questions are simple and straightforward, you won’t need to provide a long list of instructions on how to answer them, meaning you’ll take up less of your respondents’ time.

Add your branding

To draw in your respondents, it’s important to make your survey look appealing and engaging. Not only do well-designed surveys tend to receive higher response rates, but they also make respondents feel valued and appreciated for their feedback and time — and more connected to your brand. 

Using your company’s logo, colors, and typography in your survey — as well as fun images and videos when appropriate — can make the experience more enjoyable for your respondents and encourage them to fill out another survey for you in the future.

4. Put questions in a logical order

Create a logical flow for the survey, with an introduction, then questions and answers, and finally, a simple “thank you” and possibly a request for contact information. The order you choose for your questions will impact how easy the survey feels and how honest the answers are. Some ways to make the entire process feel smooth and logical are

• Start with easy, relevant questions that connect participants to why they are there
• Group related topics together, especially for longer surveys
• Place sensitive demographics near the end, such as questions about age or income
• Use open-ended questions sparingly, as they take more effort to complete and can cause fatigue if there are too many 

Our guide to open-ended survey questions explains when they pay off. 

5. Test the survey before you send it

Rushing to publish your survey without testing it is one of the most common reasons they go wrong. Run a small pilot with a few people who mirror your real audience. Don’t rely on teammates, as they have a deeper understanding of the questions and project, meaning you might not get reliable feedback regarding potentially confusing topics. 

Ask your pilot participants to complete the survey as they normally would. Then ask for feedback regarding the following issues:

• Unclear or confusing wording
• Missing answer options
• Whether conditional logic works as intended
• Whether the actual completion time matches the estimate you plan to share
• How the survey works on desktop and mobile
• Whether all links, buttons, and redirects work

Fix any issues you uncover along the way, and retest the survey if you made major changes. 

6. Send the survey to the right people at the right time

Even a well-built survey can fall flat if it reaches the wrong audience or arrives at the wrong moment. Our overview of survey distribution methods covers the channels in more detail, but here are some tips to get you started:

• Send the survey to people who can answer your questions from real experience
• Seek feedback close to the experience so it is more accurate and detailed
• Add a sentence or two on how the feedback will be used so people have a reason to respond
• Set a realistic deadline that is long enough for people to fit it into their schedule
• Send reminders thoughtfully, as one or two well-timed nudges can help increase completion rates

See our proven ways to increase survey response rates to learn more tactics that you can add to your survey strategy. 

7. Turn responses into action

Collecting responses is only part of the process. To unlock value from your survey, you need to use the data you gather to make meaningful changes. Planning for that before you send the survey is part of good design. Here’s what to do with your responses:

• Analyze survey data to look for themes across responses
• Share your findings with stakeholders and decision-makers
• Decide what will change, but don’t try to address everything all at once
• When appropriate, tell respondents what you learned and what you’re doing about it

When you close the loop, people are more likely to participate in your next survey. 

Build, share, and analyze better surveys with Jotform

Without surveys, it’s difficult to know how customers feel about your products or services. More importantly, without a concise, well-organized, and consistent survey, the feedback you do receive won’t be nearly as insightful as it could be. 

Jotform Surveys gives you what you need to put these steps into practice without starting from a blank page. Here’s how it works:

• Start from a template
• Use conditional logic and test it before you send
• Make your survey mobile-friendly
• Share or embed
• Manage responses in Jotform Tables
• Use Jotform Report Builder to visualize your data

With these seven steps, you can build surveys that people are motivated to finish and that give you answers you can act on. Whenever you build a survey, you can use it as a chance to see what works best for your audience, notice which questions and formats perform well, and apply it all to the next one. As time passes, your surveys will become a reliable way to understand your customers and make better decisions.