Product Surveys: The Do’s and Don’ts

1. Product Surveys: The Basics

Let’s form a steady foundation. 

This section will help define product surveys. Furthermore, we will see who uses them and to what end. Lastly, we will look at the key difference between product and customer satisfaction surveys. 

What Are Product Surveys?

As their name suggests, a product survey is a type of feedback survey whose sole focus is the product or service. Companies use them to see what their customers think about their products. 

They include various customer feedback questions that range from “How likely are you to recommend our services to your friends?” to “What features would you like to see in our products?”

In a nutshell, Julie Zhou, co-founder at Inspirit,  puts it well when she says, “To find ideas (about products), find problems. To find problems, talk to people.”

A product survey is the best way to talk to your customers about upcoming or ongoing products and services. 

Who Uses Product Surveys?

To create something you want to sell, you first study and research the market. Then you develop the product to the best of your ability. – Clive Cussler, The New York Times best-seller author.

Brands that truly care about their customers’ wants and needs use product surveys. 

They are committed to increasing customer experience and satisfaction. Thus, they conduct extensive research of the market that helps them pinpoint the exact problems their products or service should solve.

What Are Product Surveys Used For?

“Don’t find a customer for your products, find products for your customers” – Seth Godin, author and founder at AltMBA.

Consider the quote above. A product survey is the best tool to narrow down products and features that your customers want. 

By giving your customers a means to solve their problems and make their lives better, you increase customer satisfaction and customer experience. 

However, that is not all. As stated above, you can also use them for existing products. 

That means you can see which products are doing good and which aren’t. Thus, they give you a clear path towards improvement. 

Product Surveys vs. Customer Satisfaction Surveys

Simply put, a product survey revolves around the product, while customer satisfaction surveys are based on customers’ experience at a specific time.

The difference between the two survey types can be crystal clear when you see the questions asked in both surveys.

It is helpful to note that customer satisfaction surveys can also incorporate questions about the product and services, as shown in the last example. 

Let’s round up this section with brief do’s and don’ts.

Do:

• Think about product surveys as a feedback survey that tells you about the voice of the customer regarding your products.
• Use them if you are a brand that cares about increasing customer experience. 
• Think about incorporating them when introducing new products or upgrading old services.

Don’t:

• Make the mistake of thinking you know better than the customer about their wants and needs.
• Undermine the importance of product and researching the market.
• Think that product and customer satisfaction surveys are the same thing.

2. Benefits Of Product Surveys (For Your Business)

Now then, we have established a firm grasp of the basics of the product survey. However, we haven’t dug deep into its benefits. 

The following are the five major benefits:

1. Testing Usability
2. Adjusting Features
3. Understanding Customers
4. Generating Personal Recommendations
5. Making Better Business Decisions

This section will give you some examples of how these benefits add value to your business. We’ll look at:

• New Product Features
• New Logos
• Website Launching or Re-Designing
• Name Testing
• Package Testing
• Messaging
• Price Testing

New Product Features

Finding the right features for your next product is one of the vital parameters you need to consider. It’s far better to try out various features without committing a huge chunk of time and money.

A well-made product survey reveals what features your potential customers want, need, and value the most. Furthermore, it can help highlight gaps in the market where your product can slot in.

New Logos

Imagine you want a new logo that communicates your brand while being easy to understand for customers. You can use the hit and trial method on a target audience and pour countless hours and dollars into this project.

However, there is a better way. You can use product testing surveys to see how customers respond to the new logo. You will see whether customers pick up on the message you are trying to give and change it without committing to what your customers do not appreciate.

Website Launching or Re-Designing

Creating or renovating a website can be a daunting task. Besides capital, you also stake your reputation and relationship with customers.

Using a survey to share your design concepts is one of the best ways to interact with your customers with a survey on your website.

Furthermore, it makes them feel like their opinion matters. Moreover, you can get ideas and tweak your website to offer a better customer experience.

Name Testing

Customers form unique associations with the brand or product name. The product name is tied in with the brand image and impacts customers’ feelings related to the brand. 

Testing out various product names using a survey can be an efficient strategy to narrow down potential choices. It’ll help you develop something that attracts the target audience.

Package Testing

Product packaging is one of the customers’ first physical interactions with your product. 

A good packaging that entices customers from afar. In contrast, unpleasant packaging means that customers will most likely go to another product.

Using the right questions (more on that later) at the testing stage, you can design visually appealing packaging ideas that grab customers’ attention. 

Messaging

A feedback survey isn’t limited to questions about the products. It can also help you finalize the messaging and story around the product. 

If you want to engage customers, you need to ensure that the messaging communicates the value of your products and services.

You can use surveys to test out various messaging ideas that develop a clear narrative that allures customers.

Price Testing

Pricing is one of the crucial aspects of a product that you can’t overlook. However, how would you decide the ideal price of the product?

An exceptional survey can help you know the mind of the customers while making them feel at ease. You can have open-ended questions that allow you to dive deep and see how they value your products and how much they think they should pay for them. 

Doing so efficiently will allow you to position your products at a price that will hit the sweet spot and increase sales. 

So what have we learned in this section? Well, we can summarize it using some helpful tips.

Do:

• Utilize product surveys to find out the wants and needs of your customers about the products and their features.
• Incorporate them to test various aspects of your business (branding, logos, websites).

Don’t:

• Limit yourself to using them for only new or only old products.
• Waste customers’ time by asking them the wrong questions. 

On that final point, let’s look at some of the best questions to ask.

3. Best Product Survey Questions (Before and After)

There are many product survey questions that you can ask your customers about the product. Before we begin, it will help to keep in mind some general rules about questions regarding a product survey.

1. Short and easy to answer questions will maximize engagement and response rate.
2. To get an accurate result, you must stray away from biased questions. 
3. Avoid using first-person like “we, ” our,” or “us.” Rather talk about “the product” to encourage honest answers.

Following those rules, here are some of the best product survey questions.

• How likely are you to recommend this product to others?
• Who else could find these products useful?
• What important features did the service miss?
• How frequently do you use the product?
• How easy was it to use this product?

Now that we have covered some general rules and examples let’s see these questions being used before and after product development. 

4. Questions for Product Development Surveys

1. Demographics

Demographics are vital to segment your customers and make effective ‘buyer personas.’ Doing so helps you take key characteristics into account and pursue leads with a high chance of conversions.

Not every customer will give out their personal information. Thus, it can be helpful to give the option to omit these questions in your product survey. 

Proactive questions like the following are examples of demographic questions:

• Which area are you located in?
• What is your level of education?
• What is your marital status?
• What gender do you identify as?

2. Product Usage

In the product-developing phase, customer opinions related to current product usage helps identify common pain points with existing options in the market. 

With this information, you can create products that help eliminate these problems. Furthermore, product usage questions help hone in on the customers’ wishes about the features they want or do not want in the products. 

Some questions you can ask about product usage are:

• How often would you like to use the product or service?
• If there was one feature you could add, what would it be and why?
• What alternative solutions are you using to tackle the problem?
• How long do you think this product should last?

3. Competition Comparison

These questions are the bread and butter for viewing your business with others in the market. 

Asking customers why they prefer your products and services can help you understand your strengths compared to the competition. Thus, it can lead to unmatched confidence when launching a new product or improving existing services. 

One of the best ways to do that is by comparing the NPS scores (to be explained further). However, the following questions also help:

• How would you rate this service compared to the competition?
• Does our product offer better value for money/features/build quality than the market?
• What made you choose this product?
• What problems does this product solve that similar products in the market don’t?

4. Product Dislike

Getting to know why customers like your product is helpful. However, getting to know why customers don’t like your product holds a special place for product managers.

When developing your product or services, having customers tell you what they don’t want in your offering can help save you lots of time and money. 

A very recent and famous example is the latest generation of Apple MacBooks. Apple got rid of MagSafe five years ago and introduced USB-C for charging. Furthermore, they got rid of the HDMI and SDXC ports. 

Clearly, the customers were not pleased with this turn of events. Lo and behold, the latest MacBooks feature MagSafe charging along with HDMI and SDXC ports.

The above is a clear example of Apple listening to their customers about what they don’t like in their products and fixing mistakes in their new product line.

Some questions that can help you figure out what your customers don’t like are:

• What features would you like to see in the product?
• How can the product better suit your needs?
• What features would you not like to see in the product?
• If you could choose other options in the market, who and why would you choose that product?

5. Product Improvement

Lastly, we can talk about product improvement. Customers use your products the most. Thus, they have a pretty good idea about improving it too. 

Asking customers about product improvement gives you valuable insight and helps them feel more engaged.

Furthermore, listening to customers’ voices shows that you truly care about the customers.

Following are some examples of product improvement questions: 

• Would you describe the various features you would want to see in the product?
• If you could, how would you change the design of the product?
• How can our team be of better service to you?
• What was your biggest roadblock when trying to use the product?

The five types of questions mentioned above are not set in stone. However, they provide a good starting point for doing a survey that gives you precious insight. 

Get feedback today by signing up for a free trial and seeing the effect of impactful survey questions yourself. 

5. Questions for Product Feedback Surveys

So, you created an amazing product and now want to know how your customers feel about it. Product feedback surveys can help you do that. 

However, what questions should you ask on a product feedback survey? Should they be open-ended, close-ended, or something else? Let’s find out.

Open-Ended 

Allow your customers to talk

These survey questions help customers explain themselves fully. However, keep in mind that these questions need ample time and thought. So, ensure that you don’t overwhelm customers with these questions. 

• How do you feel about our product?
• What was the best feature of the service and why?

Close-Ended 

Limit the responses while aiming for maximum engagement

Close-ended survey questions can be answered without taking much time. However, they don’t do much to unveil something you didn’t previously know. A product survey with close-ended questions is easy to answer and analyze.

• Would you rebuy this product?
• Does the product fulfill your specific needs?

Rating

Ideal for quantitative analysis

Rating survey questions offer an effective way to compare various products. These questions ask consumers to give your product or service a rating. Hence, they are easy to answer. However, they don’t offer much insight as some answers may be exaggerated.

• What rating would you give this product?
• How would you rate this feature?

Likert Scale

For an in-depth comparison

Likert scale survey questions are quick to answer as they require selecting a number from a premade scale. They can be ideal for diving into a deep comparison of different products. 

• How would you rate the value of this product compared to its price?
• Do you agree that product x is better than product y?

Multiple Choice

Give the customers a choice, make their life easy

Customers appreciate multiple-choice questions (MCQs) because it lays out various answers for them. They don’t have to think too much rather than choose an option. 

• How frequently do you use this product?
• Which price range would justify the value of this product?

Picture Choice

Increase customer engagement, get valuable data

A product survey that has picture questions catches the customers’ eye. Using the example above, you can show various product packaging styles and ask customers which one they would like.

Knowing the different types can help you create effective survey questions.

Let’s sum up this into what you should and should not do when asking questions in a product survey.

Do:

• Ask short and simple to understand questions.
• Use data to highlight key factors and improve product/service during the testing phase.
• Analyze customers’ opinions after product launch to see how well it performs.
• Use various questions to get to the full picture of your customers’ voices.

Don’t:

• Use first-person in your survey questions.
• Introduce bias in your questions or avoid asking what your customers don’t like in your products.
• Overwhelm the customers surveying by overloading on open-ended questions.
• Use low-resolution images when offering an image option in surveys

By now, you should have a good idea about doing your product survey. But do you know which survey types you would use? 

6. 8 Survey Types to Use 

In this section, we will look at some popular survey types. You might have heard of some of them; some of them are specific to products. We’ll be looking at the following types:

1. Net Promoter Score (NPS)
2. Customer Effort Score (CES)
3. Custom Satisfaction Score (CSAT)
4. Market Research Surveys
5. Product Market Fit Surveys
6. Product Research Surveys
7. Product Feedback Surveys  
8. Product Road Map Surveys

1. Net Promoter Score (NPS)

What is NPS?

The net promoter score is based on the simple question, “How likely are you to recommend this product to a friend or colleague?”

The survey type helps you distinguish people who will promote your product from those that will detract it. 

Subtracting the ‘NSP detractors’ from the ‘promoters’ helps give you the NPS score. 

Here’s a comprehensive guide for a better understanding of NPS.

2. Customer Effort Score (CES)

The customer effort score is based on the energy users put in to make the product work. The question that helps measure customer effort is along the lines of, “How easily did the product solve your problems?”

CES’s distribution helps you focus on outliers and cater to their specific concerns.

3. Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)

The customer satisfaction score, as mentioned above, covers customer happiness about a particular experience, product, or service. 

You can use various survey questions such as those shown previously to gauge customer experience regarding a specific event. 

4. Market Research Surveys

Marketing is all about providing the customer base value and satisfaction. However, to know what you need to do to offer that, you need to know the mind of the customer.

Hence, you need a survey to research the market. These surveys have many forms, which include:

• Market Description Surveys
• Tracking Surveys
• Market Profiling Surveys, and more.

For a more detailed description, check out our Ultimate Guide To Surveys.

5. Product Market Fit Surveys

If you want to know whether your product is right for the market, opt for product-market fit surveys. It helps you discover the key benefits people get from your products. 

These surveys ask questions like:

• How would you feel if you could no longer use product X?
• What are the three main advantages of using Y?
• Who do you think would benefit most from using Z?

These surveys help strengthen a company’s priorities. For example, suppose people say that your product is irreplaceable. In that case, it’ll be a good idea to develop and invest in that product.

However, if they say they don’t like it, that’s a good indication of changing direction.

6. Product Research Surveys

Product research or product testing surveys allow you to test your product before launching it. They give you an understanding of your customers’ likes and dislikes.

The questions in product research surveys are:

• What rating would you give to the first reaction to the product?
• What do you like/dislike most about this product?
• If the product was available now, would you buy it?

One of the best examples of a leading brand using a product research survey is Starbucks. They allow customers to use their My Starbucks Idea platform to submit creative ideas for products. 

Source:

7. Product Feedback Surveys  

The product feedback or product satisfaction surveys tell customers that you care about their fulfillment when using your product. 

It is one of the best tools for enhancing brand loyalty, customer relations, and ultimately, sales. A product feedback survey will have questions like:

• Do you like the new feature X?
• What is missing from service Y to fully serve you?
• What more should X do for you?

Failure to listen to customer feedback on products can lead to increased churn rates, negative product reviews, and creating redundant features.

8. Product Road Map Surveys

Would you like to know what direction to push your products and services next? Product road map surveys are an ideal choice. 

Product road maps are a structured plan for incorporating features and changes. You must consider the customers’ needs when taking the product to another level. 

Asking questions like the following can help you make a clear path:

• What new features would you like to see?
• Which of the following features is most attractive to you?
• Are we missing a key element?

Let’s end this section with a list of do’s and don’ts related to survey types.

Do:

• Keep in mind that some surveys offer quantitative data while others provide qualitative data.
• Let your customers know their feedback will be used to better the product and, by extension, their experience.
• Use various types of survey questions to create a survey that offers deeper insight into customers.

Don’t:

• Use only one type of survey and expect a complete picture of your product.
• Rate one survey type higher than the other. Each one has its uses.
• Sit on huge amounts of collected data. Analyze it and put it to use.
• This section covered the various survey types. By now, you can probably make remarkable surveys yourself. But how would you send them to your customers?

7. Best Channels to Send Product Surveys

This section will cover five of the best channels to use for sending surveys. We will look at the following options:

• Email
• SMS
• Phone Call
• On Website
• Face to Face

Phone Call

A phone call allows a personal touch. Some customers prefer this mode of surveying as it enables them to discuss their thoughts more openly. 

On Website

Website surveys can be incredibly creative. You can incorporate branching and other techniques to make the survey interactable. Furthermore, websites allow you to survey your customers at unique points in their journey. 

Here’s an article that will help you gather website NPS effectively.

Face to Face

The tried and tested, old-school way of surveying. Many people still prefer face-to-face questioning as it allows them to interact fully. 

Email

Emails are a widely used tool to send surveys. You can include surveys with many questions. Furthermore, you can increase your outreach by sending one survey to several users.

SMS

SMS messages can be considered the little brother of emails. They can be sent to several customers simultaneously. However, it’s best to use only one short question when sending surveys over SMS.

Speaking of emails, SMS, and websites, would you like to know the latest and greatest softwares that helps you create and send a stellar product survey?

8. Helpful Softwares for Doing Excellent Product Surveys

The following software helps you create customizable surveys. Some of these options offer a breathtaking user interface, while others allow you added functionality. Let’s look at some of the options you have at your disposal:

• Trustmary
• SurveyMonkey
• Voxco
• Pollfish
• Qualroo

Trustmary

Trustmary is one of the best softwares for creating customized surveys. Furthermore, they can help you distribute those surveys over various channels and gather feedback efficiently. However, that is not all. The real value of Trustmary lies in converting survey responses into testimonials that work as social proof to drive up your sales. 

Book a meeting by clicking here.

SurveyMonkey

Source

SurveyMonkey allows you to set up custom surveys in an easy and time-efficient manner due to its simple user experience. It also allows you to pay people to take part in your survey. They offer a free version that has many features. However, customizations like logs, fonts, footers are behind a paywall.

Voxco

Source

Voxco gives you the flexibility to create and manage all surveys within a single system. It offers powerful tools that can be used to send surveys over various channels. Its user experience allows for simplicity and cohesiveness.

Pollfish

Source

Pollfish helps you create survey templates that are tailored made for mobile users. It has a simple-to-use interface that makes data collection easy. Furthermore, you can target a specific customer base. Thus, you can focus on personas from which you want to collect feedback.

Qualroo

Source

Qualroo offers ready-made survey templates that you can tweak according to your needs. Furthermore, it offers to outclass customer targeting. It helps you create pop-up surveys. That coupled with automatic analysis and quick survey responses make it a great survey tool.

9. Conclusion

Product surveys can be a tricky thing to get right. However, when you do, the results can be amazing. Consider this article as a guide when you next look to do a product survey. It covered the following topics along with what to do and what not to do when thinking about a product survey:

• The basics of product surveys
• How a product survey can benefit your business
• The best questions to ask on a product survey
• Eight types of surveys and their uses
• The five best channels to send your surveys and which softwares to use

10. Further Reading

7 Survey Subject Line Examples You Can Copy

5 Examples of Biased Survey Questions and Why You Should Avoid Them

How to Create Effective Survey Questions

Online Survey Advantages and Disadvantages

11. FAQs