SurveysThe title here is actually a bit of a misnomer. I’m not sure if surveys all on their own could generate more traffic for you. However, surveys are an invaluable way to ensuring that you keep in touch with your customers which can in turn lead to additional traffic to your website. Here’s how to use them effectively:

Why Surveys?

At first glance, this seems to be totally backwards. Who wants to be bothered with surveys? Your customers aren’t going to be particularly interested in filling them out and you probably don’t relish the thought of crunching all that data. However, if you do it correctly, surveys can be good things. And of course, ultimately, surveys can provide you with a wealth of information. For example:

Find Out What Your Customers Think of Your Products

These days, few people bother to say anything unless they want to complain. Even then, they’re more likely to do so on Twitter or Facebook than to you, where you can control the damage they cause. Therefore, it’s in your best interests to find out what people think. I’ll go over how to do a survey that works shortly, but just know that this is your chance to get into your customer’s heads.

Find Out What They Want

The other thing surveys are great at revealing is what customers want. Crowd sourcing of ideas means that you are more likely to come up with innovative concepts that you might not have thought of on your own. Using surveys is the perfect way to get that information easily and quickly.

How to Do Surveys

The first thing to realize with a survey is that you won’t get more than about 10-20% of people to fill them out. That’s just the nature of the beast – most people can’t be bothered. However, that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do them. You should and here’s how you can make it more likely you’ll get real answers:

Keep it Short

No one likes those long surveys that they have to spend twenty minutes in front of the computer for. People want to get in and get out as quickly as possible. In order to make it more likely that your visitors will complete the survey, try to keep it to under 6 questions if possible. One or two may seem a bit short to some people while anything over six is going to begin to feel like a chore.

Have Space for Comments

Most survey respondents won’t bother writing anything, however those that do will provide you with invaluable information. Be sure to offer a place at the end of the survey for comments then. Also, if you have an “other” option in your survey questions, be sure to leave a space for people to fill that in.

KISS

I’ve written about this principle before and it’s still appropriate to use it. KISS stands for Keep it Simple Stupid. Don’t offer 12 different options to your survey respondents. They’ll likely as not just click straight down the middle to finish, or they’ll even decide to close the survey before they finish.
On the other hand, where appropriate, do include the chance to choose from a scale (how would you rate our customer service should not be just “good,” “bad” or “no comment.” There should be a scale). You can usually use anywhere from a scale of 1-6 or 1-10. Just make sure it’s easy to follow.

Implement What You Learn

Finally, be sure to implement everything you learn from these surveys. That’s how you ultimately will generate traffic to your website from them.