Making
the right choices between open-ended
and closed survey questions, allows you to get only the data that
best serves the goal of your customer, employee or market research
survey.
You
already know the difference between an open-ended
question and a closed question, right?
Open-ended
questions are the kind that don’t set specific options for
response. For example, “What’s your reason for reading this blog
post? Type your answer in the box below.”
Closed
questions are the kind you can answer with one word or number, or by
choosing from preset responses. For example, “How often do you
visit this website? Once a day, once a week, once a month or once a
year?”
The
difference matters because when you’re designing a survey to
collect feedback from customers or employees, the type of question
you use influences the type of answers you get and the insights you
can gain.
Let’s
start by looking at when, how and why you’d want to use open-ended
questions.
#1:
Allow an infinite number of possible answers
The
big plus of an open-ended question is that you’re not placing any
limits on the response. That means your survey
respondents can tell you anything they feel is relevant and
anything they want you to know. Closed questions, on the other hand,
drastically limit the possible responses.
#2:
Collect more detail
Open-ended
questions give your respondents the freedom and space to answer in as
much detail as they like, too. Extra detail really helps to qualify
and clarify their responses, yielding more accurate information and
actionable insight for you.
#3:
Learn something you didn’t expect
All
this freedom to give any answer, of any length and with any level of
detail, means that you’ll sometimes discover something completely
unique and unexpected among your survey responses. Whether it’s a
process innovation that’ll save the company money, or a marketing
concept with the potential to boost your brand, these unanticipated
answers can be extremely valuable.
#4:
Get adequate answers to complex issues
Sometimes
an open-ended question is the
only way to collect the answers you need. In a situation that
requires contextualisation, complex description and explanation, a
simple Yes/No or multiple-choice answer just won’t cut it. When
you’re asking someone to explain a decision or report a problem,
for example, open-ended questions tend to work best.
#5:
Encourage creative answers and self-expression
Given
room to express themselves freely, some respondents will surprise you
with their eloquence and creativity. An open-ended
question frees respondents to convey their feedback and ideas to
you in their own voices. You may also receive survey answers in
unexpected formats, such as poetry, or a hyperlink to a blog post
your respondent wrote on the topic in question.
#6:
Understand how your respondents think
Free-form
written answers reveal a great deal about the workings of the
respondent’s mind. From the essential logic of their reasoning and
the steps in their thinking process to their language choices and
frame of reference, there’s a huge amount you can learn from
reading their thoughts in their own words.
#7:
Ask without knowing
The
big problem with closed questions
is that to design them into your survey, you’ll need to know
roughly what answers you expect. If you’re testing a hypothesis,
for example, it’s easy enough to come up with appropriate answer
options that will support or refute it. But using open-ended
questions lets you explore topics you don’t yet know enough about
to form a hypothesis.
