People in charge of creating a survey frequently ask this question, along with others. What is the easiest way for me to send my questionnaire to respondents? Can I include a database in the address book of the online survey platform? Or is there another way to use my file with information on respondents?
To answer this question, even before you start to program the survey, you should identify the characteristics of your database and your goals.
If you answered “yes” to one of these questions, your best solution is to create a profiled survey and send an invitation email by uploading the contact file to FTP.
The profiled survey will enable you to benefit from all the information in your contact file without having to ask qualifying questions. In other words, you won’t need to add questions concerning the respondent’s profile (age, gender, socioeconomic group, postal code for private individuals, sector of activity, years active or company number for professionals) because you already have it.
The link that the respondent receives via email is unique because it contains the respondent’s identifier. When respondents click on this link, they and their profile are automatically recorded in the raw results database for the survey.
There are two big advantages to a profiled survey:
Prepare your file with the emails of respondents and any other pertinent information for your survey. Save the file as an ASCII text file (.txt).
When you have finished your profiled survey, choose “FTP email send” and configure the invitation email. Remember to place an unsubscribe link at the bottom of the message.
Activate publication and then click on the target and choose “Download File”.
Using the “Import wizard” you can:
Loading is almost instantaneous. The emails will be sent within a few minutes. During this time, you can continue to work on your survey platform to prepare reporting links or sub-populations.
Tip: If you have several contact files for the same survey, publish them only once per solicitation phase (first mail, reminder). Download your files on the same publication one after other. This will also make it easier for you to access publication statistics on your files: bounced emails, black list, abandon, etc.