Engaging Survey Respondents – 5 ways to go about it

In the market research industry, panelists are the key to derive authentic data. They give their valuable time in completing the surveys and for that, they demand our utmost respect and gratitude. One way of showing that is keeping them constantly engaged to ensure a positive experience. But how do we engage such a diverse panel? Read on to find out.

 

1) Keep it short and simple, silly: According to a study conducted by a leading national daily, 56 % of the survey respondents are likely to drop out if the survey is too long or if the questions are difficult to understand. The solution to this problem is keeping the survey short and questions crisp and to the point. Also, testing the survey for programming errors and redundant questions will go a long way in ensuring a smooth experience for the panelists.

2) It’s all about the money: Incentivizing the surveys is another way to ensure better response rates. This approach also provides a well rounded, satisfied and diverse panel pool while adding to the panel base and retaining old survey respondents.

3) Put yourself in respondent’s shoes: Before you make a study live or post a survey, put yourself in the respondent’s shoes and think from their perspective – Are you engaged throughout? Are the questions too complex for understanding? Are the survey’s few questions too long? When reading through it, you might notice some ways to improve your questions or wording to engage your survey respondents even more.

4) Ask opinions not questions: Adding some opinion-based questions in the survey will help in tapping into the panelist’s mind and extracting their preferences, perspective and thoughts. This will not only keep them engaged but also make them feel that you value their opinions.

5) Measure respondent satisfaction: You have done all you can for engaging the respondents. But how well have your efforts fared? Measure it by various feedback and satisfaction surveys, frequency of acceptance of invitation, diversity of incentives and the grievances respondents share with you.

 

At Solugo, our central focus is on respondent satisfaction and we deploy every measure to best engage our carefully curated and diverse panel pool. Our high survey response rate and retention rate speaks for itself and if you ever need a helping hand, feel free to reach out to us.​ Know more...