MarketTools Blog

This post was adapted from the MarketTools Zoomerang blog.

I attended a large conference in San Francisco on web optimization recently. As I walked into each of the many sessions, I was vigorously handed a sheet of paper and asked to fill it out. 

The purpose of the sheet was to get feedback on the sessions and the speakers. The only problem was, just about everyone who politely took the paper left it on their seat, on the floor, or just stuck it in their bag without filling it out. It made we wonder how many of those sheets actually get filled out and turned back in.

This post was adapted from the MarketTools Zoomerang blog.

When designing a survey questionnaire, it is almost always useful to include a few open-ended questions. An open-ended question is designed to encourage a response that is spontaneous and unstructured. (Of course, this is the opposite of a closed-ended question which encourages a brief or single-word response usually answered with a simple yes or no.)

Don’t overdo it, though: having too many open-ended questions in your online survey can confuse and sometimes annoy your respondents. Start off with closed-ended questions and interlace open-ended queries throughout the form to keep your survey takers on point. 

With that being said, here are six open-ended questions to consider when building your online survey questionnaire:

This post was adapted from the MarketTools Zoomerang blog.

The best way to find out what your customers think is to ask them. But sometimes you need a quick answer to a question in order to make a quick decision – and online polls are a great way to get fast market research data or to supplement a more formal customer feedback program.  For example, market researchers could use an online poll to get a snapshot view of preferences (which new breakfast cereal flavor would you want to try?) or a sense of upcoming trends they might want to investigate more deeply (will you be spending more or less on gifts this holiday season?).  Polls also provide a fast and easy way to interact and engage with your website audience: easier than commenting, easier than chiming in on a discussion thread, and easier than blogging.