Imagine you’ve just hosted an amazing corporate event – one with various networking opportunities and engaging activities to show your participants how much you value them. Now that the event is over, it’s time to look ahead to the next meeting or incentive travel program. But where do you start?
You might want to turn to your attendees and ask what they thought of their experience. Not only is completing post-event feedback crucial for event hosts, but providing this information is also beneficial for attendees because it will be used to enhance their event experiences in the future.
When it comes to understanding the attendee experience at your corporate event, all you have to do is ask. Yes, it really is that simple. And, if done right, those answers can help you build an even better experience the next time around.
Quick Links
- Why Post-Event Surveys Are Important
- How to Deliver Post-Event Surveys
- Using Event Tech to Execute Surveys
- Tips for Getting More Survey Responses
- Tips for Writing Your Questions
- Post-Event Survey Sample Questions
- Gather Information Using Effective Post-Event Surveys
Why Post-Event Surveys Are Important
For event hosts, post-event surveys and feedback are crucial for determining the overall success of your event. You’ll want to be able to gauge your net promoter score, overall enjoyment, value, and the other significant takeaways your attendees had.
Additionally, you’ll also want to survey any volunteers, sponsors, vendors, presenters, and speakers. Surveying each of the attendees, regardless of their role, will be vital to the planning process for your next event, which will focus on improving the experience and increasing your success.
How Post-Event Surveys Help in a Cookieless Era
In order to make progress in any industry, there is one vital feature: data. As an internet user, you’re likely familiar with cookies, or the information that is saved to a web browser, according to the Federal Trade Commission. While these cookies are excellent at granting access to consumer data, they’re not going to be around forever.
The information gathered via cookies shares insights about visitor behavior, which tells businesses what their audience is likely interested in. If we’re heading toward a cookieless world, what does that mean for event planners who value participant data?
Fortunately, there are other ways to gather data. Post-event surveys provide event planners with important insights regarding the quality of events and the perceptions of participants. With this data in hand, event planners will be able to enhance their offerings and provide an experience that is tailored to what the audience is looking for.
Read Our Guide: THE IMPORTANCE OF HOSTING EVENTS IN A COOKIELESS FUTURE
How to Deliver Post-Event Surveys
One of your primary goals with post-event surveys is to get a statistically significant return from attendees – enough feedback to help you truly measure the success of your event. However, it’s important to keep in mind that a secondary goal should be to collect those surveys in a timely manner.
The longer respondents take to reply, the more likely they may be to forget essential details that will be useful in understanding quantitative scores, event reflection, and future planning. Further, you may get more detailed, qualitative data with specific examples and experiences if attendees receive and respond to the survey promptly.
With those two goals in mind, you want to deliver your survey request on the day the event ends, preferably before the end of the day. This can enable attendees who are traveling to respond during layovers or downtime before departure.
Finally, send your survey via email and via your event app with a push notification. Essentially, you want your post-event survey to be easy to find and easy to access, so ensuring it’s mobile friendly will also be important. And, if you have an event website, reminders or links to the survey should feature prominently.
Using Event Tech to Execute Surveys
Using surveys is one of the easiest and most cost-effective ways to understand your attendees’ thoughts about your event. By sending the survey out in an email, having kiosks set up around your event, or using other technology like chatbots to measure real-time experiences, it doesn’t take an army to understand what your attendees are feeling and thinking.
This idea of using technology, such as chatbots and kiosks, also provides an opportunity to address any problems or concerns your attendees are having during your corporate event. By understanding and fixing any problem or concern in real time, you’re boosting attendee enjoyment and event success before everything ends.
Here at Bishop-McCann, we’re dedicated to providing innovative event planning solutions for our clients, including exciting advancements in survey technology. In the past, we’ve utilized technology such as Immersion, a neuroscience company for live events and brand experiences with decades of field and lab-based neuroscience that measures people's emotional journey.
When choosing a technology for post-event surveys, consider factors such as budget, ease of use, integration capabilities, mobile responsiveness, and the ability to analyze and visualize survey data effectively. Additionally, it's crucial to select a platform that aligns with your specific event and audience needs.
Tips for Getting More Survey Responses
In addition to sending surveys quickly and via multiple channels, there are other ways to ensure attendees complete your survey.
1. Keep Your Post-Event Survey Brief and Break It Up
Remember being handed multi-page tests in school? They were overwhelming. If your attendee just had an amazing experience, few things will put them off like an exhaustive (and exhausting) list of questions that look time-consuming.
Keep it short and simple. That may mean breaking up questions into chunks or categories and asking only two to three questions per category.
2. Incentivize Engagement for Your Survey
Add in rewards for completing surveys. Consider entering respondents in a drawing with a grand prize or awarding points for survey questions answered and allowing attendees to use those points for additional swag. This is also a great way to handle surplus swag.
3. Send the Survey Early and Remind Attendees in Closing Events
It may seem premature to send the survey on the final day of your event, but the sooner you get surveys in attendees’ hands, the sooner they can respond.
Further, if you send it the morning on the last day, any final session presenters can direct attendees to the survey and encourage them to respond.
4. Make Your Survey Accessible
Asking event attendees to complete a survey requires you to ask them for their time. At the end of a long day – or multiple days – of events, your guests might not be interested in completing a survey. That’s why it’s important to enhance accessibility so that completing the survey is as easy and convenient as possible.
As your attendees leave the event, post QR codes that link to the survey near the building exits. Additionally, you should include a link to the survey in all post-event emails. While you’re at it, don’t forget to thank attendees for taking part in the survey!
5. Collect and Verify Your Data
During registration, be sure to collect contact information for all attendees. This is key, but so is verifying that data is accurate and has not changed.
For example, if someone registered for your event six months ago, contact details may have changed, so provide an opportunity to update or verify this important information. You can do this during registration or during an intro session when you encourage guests who have not downloaded the event app to do so.
6. Personalize Your Survey
As with many elements associated with your event, personalizing your surveys will boost engagement. Attendees may feel that they don’t have to respond because they assume everyone else will, so personalizing the request or survey can make guests feel valued while causing them to realize their response matters.
Tips for Writing Your Questions
So if you’re keeping it short, what are the best methods to ensure you get responses and data that has value? The best way to do that is to consider the questions you’re including in your survey.
1. Separate Your Surveys
If you’re trying to adhere to the “keep it short” guideline, one of the best ways to do that is to tailor your survey to the right audience.
For example, you need to ask attendees different questions from your vendors, so rather than having guests sort through questions, create separate surveys to obtain the pertinent data from the correct source. In this way, you are shortening your surveys for each group, which will result in more feedback and more accurate results.
2. Mix Up Your Questions
To get a complete view of attendee experience, you want to mix the questions up, asking both quantitative and qualitative (open-ended) questions.
While quantitative responses will get you clear data, qualitative questions can provide more concrete information about those experiences. For example, if someone gives a 7/10 score for a specific session and you haven’t asked an open-ended question or follow-up, it’s difficult to know what could be improved.
3. Capture the Net Promoter Score or Overall Impression First
Prior to asking any other questions that may influence your guests, ask for their overall impression of the event or how likely they would be to recommend the event to others. Essentially, you want to capture their initial impression before you may remind them of one particular experience, which might skew results.
4. Use Multiple Choice or Ranking Questions
These question formats are generally considered less taxing as respondents simply need to check a box or pick a number. Remember to be clear about the rating scale (10 for best, 1 for worst), so you get accurate data.
The easier you make the questions, the more likely you are to get responses; you can always offer the opportunity to provide more information in addition to the rating.
5. Know What Data You Need
In short, cut the excess. You may want to begin by writing an exhaustive survey, then whittle it down to a more manageable size that focuses on the answers you really want and need.
Length is one of the major determinants of whether your attendees complete your survey, so keeping it short while still receiving essential information is crucial.
Post-Event Survey Sample Questions
With those tips in mind, what kinds of questions do you want to ask? How do you write them in a way that provides accurate, constructive information? The phrasing of survey questions is important to get valid information, so even multiple-choice questions must be created in a way that allows all possible answers.
Below are 29 sample questions you could potentially ask your attendees, speakers, presenters, or vendors. Remember, these are just sample questions—be sure to use these as a starting point when determining which questions are most relevant for you.
Sample Questions for Attendees
- How would you rate your overall event experience? (Ranked)
- Would you recommend this event (or similar events) to friends, colleagues, or customers? (Yes or no)
- How likely are you to recommend this event (or similar events) to friends, colleagues, or customers? (Ranked)
- What motivated you to attend this event? (Open ended)
- What were you hoping to learn or gain from this event? (Open ended)
- How did you hear about this event? (Multiple choice)
- Which sessions were most valuable to you? (Multiple choice)
- Which speakers were your favorite/most influential/most engaging? (Multiple choice)
- How satisfied were you with the following?
- Venue (Ranked)
- Food (Ranked)
- Session variety (Ranked)
- Entertainment (Ranked)
- Activities (Ranked)
- Communication (Ranked)
- Were there any sessions that did not meet your expectations? (Yes or no, but leave the option for more information with an open-ended section)
- How would you rate networking opportunities to speak with other guests? (Ranked)
- How useful was the event app? (Ranked)
- How well-organized/scheduled was the event? (Ranked)
- What could we include or improve to make the event better? (Open ended)
- Is there anything you would have liked to add to the event or your experience? (Open ended)
Sample Questions for Speakers/Presenters/Vendors
- How would you rate your overall event experience? (Ranked)
- Would you recommend this event (or similar events) to friends, colleagues, or customers? (Yes or no)
- How likely are you to recommend this event (or similar events) to friends, colleagues, or customers? (Ranked)
- How useful was the event app? (Ranked)
- How did you hear about this event? (Open ended)
- How would you rate communication and information provided? (Ranked)
- How well-organized/scheduled was the event? (Ranked)
- How would you rate support from event/venue staff? (Ranked)
- Was there enough time to interact with guests, other speakers, and attendees in a non-formal setting? (Yes or no, but include an option to add more feedback)
- What was the best part of the event [in your role]? (Open ended)
- What could we have done to improve the experience? (Open ended)
- Did you receive any direct feedback from attendees? (Yes or no; if no, tailor the survey skip the sub-question below)
- If so, was the feedback positive or negative? (Multiple choice, including a follow up section that is open ended)
- How satisfied were you with the following?
- Venue (Ranked)
- Food (Ranked)
- Session length (Ranked)
- Entertainment (Ranked)
- Activities (Ranked)
- Was the audience at this event relevant to your business? (Yes or no)
- Were you successful in meeting your goals for the event? (Yes or no)
Gather Information Using Effective Post-Event Surveys
Many of the questions above can be tailored to the target audience to assess their experience based on their role. The primary goal of a post-event survey should be to gather useful information in gauging the success of your event for all attendees (regardless of role) and to help you plan better for your next event. When parsing through responses, look for trends and patterns – anything that can help you make data-driven decisions for your next event.
Are you ready to plan a corporate event that returns amazing post-event survey results? Want to work with a team who can help you execute that plan? Get in touch with the Bishop-McCann team, and let’s get started today!