What is the typical response rate for a survey?
Online survey response rates vary widely and are affected by a number of factors. For a survey in which there is no prior relationship with recipients (the blind date of online surveys), response rates can be as low as 20% to 30%.
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Factors that can affect the response rate include:
The target population – Are you are trying to obtain responses from a hard-to-reach population (e.g. 18- to 24-year-old males who play video games)?
Your relationship with survey respondents – Are the potential respondents customers or employees?
The survey invitation – Can you personalise the email invitation to include the potential respondents’ names? How much can you share with respondents about the nature of the research?
The survey length – Will your survey take respondents five minutes or 15 minutes to complete? Longer surveys may see lower response rates and completion rates.
The complexity of the survey questions – Will you be asking respondents to simply answer straightforward questions; or will they be required to perform multiple tasks, such as uploading a file or visiting a web site and then providing their impressions?
The survey topic – Will your potential respondents have a vested interest in the topic (e.g. improving employee benefits)?
Incentives – Will you be able to incentivise potential respondents to take your survey by offering them some form of financial reward, material goods or information?
Reminder emails – Will you be able to send a reminder to respondents who haven’t completed the survey? Use survey email templates to expedite the process and increase survey response rates.
Finally, it’s worth remembering that if you don’t have access to your target audience, our survey panel, SurveyMonkey Audience, can help you specify and access your target audience, compose your survey invitation and administer the survey incentive. This means that you’ll achieve the response rate that you want from the people whose opinions you’re looking for, guaranteed.
