In Part One, I explored ways to encourage survey responses, but there are additional ways to increase the number of submissions. These methods could help people overcome potential reluctance to complete surveys. However, some approaches do have potential drawbacks.
Be Thoughtful About Personal Information
Questions about personal information could be avoided, since although such questions can be beneficial and you could provide incentives for answering them, personal questions could result in a lower response rate.
An alternative could be asking for ranges instead of specific numbers, when asking for personal details. For example, when asking about ages, survey respondents could choose one of several age ranges (i.e. – 18-30, 31-40) instead of writing their exact age. These answers could still provide valuable information and make it easier to analyze survey results.
Consider Making the Survey Anonymous
Making a survey anonymous could increase the number of respondents. People might not be honest in their survey answers (or might not want to take the survey) if the survey administrator could learn their identities.
However, an anonymous survey could have drawbacks:
- People could lie on survey responses to distort survey results. There would be no way of tracking this to a person. It could difficult (if not impossible) to fix errors.
- The same person could skew results by completing the survey in the identical way multiple times. The survey administrator would have no way of knowing if the same results came from one person or multiple people. The administrator could delete what they think are duplicative results, but those results could be the responses of multiple people.
- It could be hard (if not impossible) to provide incentives.
Prioritize Going Online
Conducting a survey online can increase the survey response rate, as people prefer to complete online surveys. There is a greater chance of people finishing online surveys on Thursdays and Fridays between 7 a.m. and 1 p.m. PST.
However, not everyone is computer-savvy and/or has access to the internet. In addition, it may be easier for people to complete a survey, such as an evaluation of an event, on paper after the event. A paper survey also prevents bots.
Advertise Survey in Multiple Ways
Advertising the survey in multiple venues may increase survey responses. The link to or a QR code of the survey may be included in e-mails, newsletters, websites, and social media sites.
Send a Personal E-mail
Sending a personal e-mail to distribute the survey may increase the number of responses. A personal e-mail may include the recipient’s name, state the importance of the survey, and link to it.
Follow Up
Following up with survey respondents may increase the number of responses to the next survey. A report of survey findings may be posted on a website and summarized in personal e-mails to people who responded. Thus, survey respondents see that their views are appreciated and make a difference.
Conduct Surveys at a Reasonable Frequency
The frequency of surveys is important. If surveys are conducted too often, many people will not complete them.
Miriam Edelman, MPA, MSSW, is a Washington, D.C.-based policy professional. Her experience includes policy work for Congress. Miriam’s undergraduate degree is from Barnard College, Columbia University, with majors in political science and urban studies. She has a master’s in public administration from Cornell University, where she was inducted into the national honorary society for public administration. She has a master’s of science in social work (focusing on policy) from Columbia University. She is a commissioner of the DC Commission on Persons with Disabilities. Miriam aims to continue her career in public service. She is especially interested in democracy, civic education, District of Columbia autonomy, diversity, health policy, women’s issues, and disabilities.
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