Customer Feedback is an important part of any business as it showcases the organization’s intent to improve customer satisfaction consistently. Customer Feedback not only provides you with the information about whether the customers are satisfied with your products/services or not but also acts as the key source to improve Customer Experience.

There are multiple ways to receive customer feedback. One of the most popular and trusted channels for taking feedback is via Email Survey. With the advent of technology, emails have replaced traditional offline/ on-paper survey forms. Theoretically speaking Email surveys reach the potential respondents on email and all they have to do is click on the link and submit their feedback.

But do you think collecting responses from customers is that easy? Not really, especially when almost every company is sending out email surveys to customers flooding their inbox daily. The chances of your email getting lost in the crowd are hence quite high.

Getting customers to respond to your surveys is the prime goal of any survey exercise, which might seem futile if the customers do not share their feedback with your organization or ignore the request.

You will be surprised to know that the average response rate of email surveys is only 24.8% .
Source: Fluid Surveys

This is because most people overlook their email surveys in their inboxes and if there is a survey email, most people tend to ignore taking it to be spam or a non-useful email. Sometimes the email survey or its subject line includes certain words that trigger the spam blockers and the mail doesn’t even reach the targeted customer. 

How to Maximize Response of Email Surveys 

Despite multiple hurdles that stand between your email survey and customer response there are some steps you can take to increase and optimize your email surveys better. We’ll discuss some of them here:

1. First Impression is the Last Impression

The saying ‘First Impression is the Last Impression’ fits perfectly in the context of an Email Survey. For example, If your target audience does not find the subject line or the content of the email to be interesting enough they will simply ignore the request.

The chances of survey completion or submission hence rest heavily on your ability to motivate the reader to open the email and take the requisite action. Spend some time in coming up with the perfect subject line, you can also beta test 2-3 subject lines and execute the survey with a smaller sample size to test which ones work better. Keep the contents of the email short and crisp and make sure that the tonality of the message is motivating enough for the respondent to initiate the next step.

2. Set Clear Expectation Regarding Time

Many times we see that the potential respondents start the survey but do not complete it. This is mostly because many surveys seem to be very simple, to begin with, but turn out to be extremely time-consuming/boring after a point, which leads to poor completion rates.

To avoid this issue communicate the approx time that might be required to complete the survey in advance to the respondent and set clear expectations. Mentioning the expected time to complete the survey like 2 minutes or 5 minutes will let the user know how much time he would need to dedicate to the exercise and she’ll most likely approach it when she can allocate that time to the activity. You can also number the pages of the surveyor show a completion bar on top to help users ascertain how many questions/pages are left. 

Send your Email Surveys with Zonka Feedback

3. Use Simple Language

The questions in the survey must be written in a simple language that can be easily understood by the respondents. Do not use jargon, complex words, acronyms or technical terms that might be readily used in the industry and the respondents might not be aware of the same and might leave the survey in between unable to comprehend your questions.

4. Follow-Up Regularly

Many people ignore the first email survey request due to paucity of time or other commitments but when they receive a reminder or a follow-up email there is a high chance that they will take notice of your request or make a mental note to get back to it when they are free. Regular follow-ups hence are necessary to increase the chances of getting responses on your survey email.

5. Motivate your Respondents

One great way of maximizing survey responses is by incentivizing the respondents for completing the survey. Incentives don’t necessarily have to be huge but can be in the form of gift vouchers, redeemable credit points, loyalty benefits that on your product and service. This is a very effective method to get a high response rate from your audience.

6. Assure the Customers of Being Heard

Building the customers’ trust is the most important aspect of a business which also applies to get a good response rate of surveys. If the customer believes that her opinion is valued and can make a difference she feels highly motivated to share her feedback. It is hence important to make the customer feel that the time and energy that they are going to invest in this process will not go to waste. It is not a one-time process but should be a regular practice to pay heed to the customers’ advice and opinions so that the customers feel valued and heard.

7. Optimize your Survey Emails

Before expecting a response from the readers, it is necessary to make sure that the email survey is reaching the customers in the first place. In many cases, spam blockers do not let the emails reach the inbox of the recipient by flagging certain words or due to the subject line of the email. You mustn’t use words like Amazing, Free, Win, Lottery, Prizes, etc. as it may trigger the spam blockers making all your hard work go in vain.

Also, make sure that the link to the actual survey is bold and visible to the reader the moment she opens the mail. Try to embed surveys in the email itself and if that’s not possible to ensure that the link to the survey does not take too much time to open or load. So always ensure that the survey link opens within seconds.

Also Read: How to Embed Survey Questions in Email

Executing any form of survey or feedback campaign takes a considerable amount of time and resources hence it is extremely important to ensure that you take all the necessary steps to make it a success. Taking note of small errors that can reduce open and completion rates are hence crucial. So before you send the hit button on email survey email make sure that you have optimized your campaign for best results. 

Learn more about the Email Surveys

• Email Survey: Send Your Surveys Via Email With Zonka Feedback
• How to Send Surveys via Email?
• 5 Best Email Subject Line Strategies to Increase Response Rate
• 5 Benefits of Email Surveys
• Embed Survey Questions in Email