How to Create Effective Business Surveys That Draw Responses

Previously, we discussed business surveys and why companies should take advantage of them. In this article we’ll dig deeper and show you how to create and deploy effective business surveys.

Without the right survey creation tools, you can spend days and weeks creating surveys that your customers or prospects ignore. So, whether you want to collect feedback about your customer support or ask buyers to rate the usefulness of your products/services, we’ve got you covered.

5 Survey Creation Tools You Should Explore

Here’s a list of survey creation tools you can use to create compelling surveys for your B2B company.

SurveyMonkey

SurveyMonkey is one of the most popular survey creation tools in the marketplace. It is also one of the simplest survey creation tools for all types of businesses. You can use the free version to create surveys with up to 10 questions and 40 responses for each survey. There are different paid business plans if you are looking to create longer surveys (up to 50 questions per survey) with more than 40 responses. You can also get discounts if you are purchasing business plans that include more than three users.

SurveySparrow

SurveySparrow is a survey creation platform for education platforms, non-profit organizations, startups, and B2B companies. You can make the most of the free plan to create surveys with up to 10 questions and 100 responses every month. If you want to create longer surveys, look at their paid plan options. Some interesting SurveySparrow products for surveys include Enterprise Survey Software, NPS Software, Offline Survey, and 360 Assessment.

TypeForm

TypeForm allows you to create custom survey designs. You can add your brand colors, logo, and more. You can also simplify the creation process with a pre-built survey template. The free version provides 3 TypeForms, 10 questions, 100 responses, built-in templates, metrics, reporting, and more. If you want to collect more responses, look at the paid plans — Essentials (1,000 responses per month), Professional (5,000 responses per month), and Premium (10,000 responses per month).

Google Form

Google Form is another easy-to-use survey maker; you may already be familiar with it. You can create unlimited surveys and collect as many responses as you want. You can also add photos, skip logic, and include collaborators. You can download the responses as Excel sheets or Google Sheets and analyze them per your requirements. The best thing about this survey maker is that it doesn’t have any paid plans. All the features of Google Forms are free for Google users.

FreeOnlineSurveys

FreeOnlineSurveys is one of the coolest survey creation tools available for small businesses. It is powered by artificial intelligence (AI). As you type questions, AI suggests questions and survey designs for you, enabling you to create surveys quickly without any hiccups. Other interesting features include A/B testing, page logic, text piping, and more. The tool is free; you can explore the Business Plan for enhanced features.

Best Practices for Creating Effective Business Surveys

Here are some best practices and quick tips to help you create the best surveys for your company:

• Define a clear objective; use it as a reference to prioritize your questions.
• Identify your target audience; prepare a list of potential respondents.
• Maintain a conversational tone; keep the more personal questions toward the end.
• Write an introduction to the survey to help respondents understand why they should complete it.
• Keep the survey short; shorter surveys get higher completion rates.
• Add a survey progress bar; respondents love to know how many questions are left when they’re short on time.
• Add as many close-ended questions as possible; these include yes/no questions, multiple-choice questions, and ranking-based questions. Avoid or limit open-ended questions as they require the respondents to write answers and that may cause some recipients to bounce.
• Pair the survey with an incentive, such as a gift card or discount on your products or services.
• Review your survey before sharing it to avoid design errors or typos.
• Test the survey internally before sharing it with a larger audience.

Finally, even if the survey-creation tool you choose doesn’t provide a preview, preview and test the survey on mobile devices, laptops, and desktop computers. If it doesn’t render correctly on all major devices, making it easy to complete, all of your hard work may go to waste.