Survey Distribution Tutorial

From QualtricsWiki

Contents 1 Distribute Survey 1.1 Generic link 1.2 Qualtrics Mailer 1.2.1 Qualtrics Mailer - Customized Link Text 1.2.2 Quick Send 1.3 Mail History 1.3.1 Actions 1.4 Pop-up Surveys 1.5 Embedded HTML Survey 1.6 Website Feedback Link 1.7 Survey Distribution - Advanced Topics 1.7.1 Distribution Method Pros and Cons 1.7.2 Survey Integrity 1.7.3 Reminder and Thank you Emails

Distribute Survey

There are several ways to distribute your survey; you can send them through the mailer, a personal email, or post it on a web site (as a link, embedded, or pop-up).

Generic link

When you activate your survey, Qualtrics generates a generic link that navigates a respondent's web browser to your survey. This generic link can be copied and pasted into emails, web pages, or documents. Following the link will bring the respondent directly to your survey.

1. Go to the Distribute Survey tab of Qualtrics.
2. Select a survey from the drop down menu (if you have already selected a survey from the My Surveys page and are navigating from edit or view results the previously selected survey will automatically appear).
3. If the survey is not active, activate it by clicking on the blue text that says,

   

4. Highlight and copy the blue survey link, paste it to whatever method you want to distribute.

Qualtrics Mailer

The Qualtrics Mailer is the most common method of distribution. It automatically generates an invitation by email, allowing you to distribute your survey to a panel of participants. Each participant receives an individualized link and a response ID, which allows you to track the responses. By default these individualized links can only be used once. Before you send out a mailing you will need to:

• Create a panel in the panel library (see Panel Library ).
• Create an invitation message in the library (see Message Library ).

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1. Go to the Distribute Survey tab of Qualtrics.
2. Select a survey from the drop down menu (if you have already selected a survey from the My Surveys page and are navigating from edit or view results the previously selected survey will automatically appear).
3. If the survey is not active, activate it.
4. Click on the "Send Survey" button on the gray bar (shown above).
5. Click on the "Qualtrics Survey Mailer" sub-tab.

1. Select the date and time that you want your survey distributed.
2. Select if you want to send your survey to an individual, a panel, or a sample generated from a panel.
3. Select your panel from the drop-down menus.
4. Enter your subject.
5. Select your message from the appropriate drop down menus.
6. Click Schedule.

Advanced options

Qualtrics Mailer - Customized Link Text

When you send a survey invite in Qualtrics the survey link will appear twice in the message once as a hot link and once as the full url. This is done so that if an email client removes the hot link respondents can copy and past the full url into their browser and still take the survey.

You can change the text of the hot link. This needs to be done in the message library when you make the message. We do not have this feature implemented in our toolbar, but it is a simple adjustment to the link code. The survey link code that appears in the Invite or Reminder message by default appears as the following:
${l://SurveyLink=Take the survey} You can delete the text "Take the survey" and replace it with any text for example "click here" in which case the link would appear as follows:
${l://SurveyLink?d=click here}

Of course, in place of "click here" you would put whatever text you want the link to appear as.

Note: This change will not be shown when you preview the message. You will need to send a test email to yourself through the mailer to make sure it appears how you desire.

Quick Send

The Quick Send option allows you to send out customized links, just like the Survey Mailer, to a few emails without having to create a panel. When possible it is suggested that the Survey Mailer be used instead of the Quick Send.

Mail History

In the mail history you will see a list of all the mailings of this survey that you have sent. This page will also tell you:

• Status, A green dot means that the mailing has been sent a gray dot means that it has not been sent.
• The date the mailing was sent. This is in Mountain Standard Time.
• How many emails failed.
  • Failed emails tells you how many of the email addresses in your mailing where not valid emails (they are missing a @ etc.)
  • Failed emails are not bounce backs. Qualtrics has no ability to track bounce backs.
• How many surveys in the mailing have been started.
• How many surveys in the mailing have been finished.

Actions

On the right hand side of each mailing you will find the actions button. This button will allow you to perform the following actions:

1. Edit Distribution. This basically lets you change the time when the mailing is scheduled to be sent.
2. Download Mailing History. This will download a csv file to excel that contains a list of people the mailing was sent to as well as their status: whether the mailings have been sent, if they have started the survey, if they have opted out, or if they have finished the survey.
3. Send Reminders or Thank Yous. This lets you schedule when to send Reminders and Thank Yous.
   1. Reminders will only be sent to those who have not yet finished the survey.
   2. Thank Yous will only be sent to those who have finished the survey.
4. Delete distribution. This tool will delete the specified distribution from the mailing history.

Pop-up Surveys

Qualtrics generates javascript code that can be copied and pasted into your website's HTML so that when a respondent navigates to a specific page, the survey pops up. It will display as an element of your web page rather than as a new window so that it will not be affected by pop-up blockers.

1. Go to the Distribute survey tab of Qualtrics.
2. Select a survey from the drop down menu (if you have already selected a survey from the My Surveys page and are navigating from Edit or View Results the previously selected survey will automatically appear).
3. If the survey is not active, activate it.
4. Click on the "Pop-up Survey" sub-tab.
5. Copy the javascript code from the text box and paste into the HTML of your website.
6. In the boxes below, you can change the size of your pop up window.

Embedded HTML Survey

An embedded survey is similar to the pop up survey, but rather than opening in a separate window, the survey is embedded directly into your web page.

1. Go to the Distribute Survey tab of Qualtrics.
2. Select a survey from the drop down menu (if you have already selected a survey from the My Surveys page and are navigating from Edit or View Results the previously selected survey will automatically appear).
3. If the survey is not active, activate it.
4. Click on the "Embedded Survey" sub-tab.
5. Copy the HTML Code from the text box and paste it into the HTML of your website.
6. In the boxes below, you can change the size of your pop up window.

Website Feedback Link

1. Go to the Distribute Survey tab of Qualtrics.
2. Select a survey from the drop down menu (if you have already selected a survey from the My Surveys page and are navigating from Edit or View Results the previously selected survey will automatically appear).
3. If the survey is not active, activate it.
4. Click on the "Website Feedback Link" sub-tab.
5. Copy the HTML Code from the text box and paste it into the HTML of your website.
6. In the box below, you can change the image or text of you link.

Survey Distribution - Advanced Topics

Distribution Method Pros and Cons

Any method of distribution comes with advantages and disadvantages. Any time that a generic survey link is used (this includes the pop-up and embedded surveys) you have more chances of people taking the survey, but you don't have as much control over the responses. People can take the survey more than once which may sway the statistical significance of your results. With the Qualtrics Mailer, you can identify all of your respondents, track their status (complete or incomplete), and use embedded data to create reports on the back-end. The drawback of the Qualtrics Mailer is that you are limited to those people that you already have information about. When designing a survey and planning its distribution you should think about your desired results and the distribution method by which to best achieve them.

Survey Integrity

Qualtrics offers several options to help insure your responses are legitimate and pertinent. Survey integrity is always an issue when collecting data from people. These options can increase the relevancy of your responses.

1. Prevent Ballot Box Stuffing - Install a cookie on the machine that prevents that computer from accessing the survey a second time.
2. Invitation only surveys - Only those receiving an invitation from the Qualtrics Mailer are allowed to take the survey.
3. Password Protection - In order to take the survey, the respondent needs a password.
4. Survey Expiration - Set the specific dates and times that the survey will be active.

These options can be accessed by:

1. Going to the Edit a Survey section of Qualtrics.
2. Clicking on the survey options sub-tab.
3. Under the survey protection section, all options will be displayed with check boxes to select/deselect.

Reminder and Thank you Emails

If you have used the Qualtrics Mailer to send your survey to a panel, Qualtrics can send reminder emails to those who have not yet finished the survey, and Thank you messages to those who have completed the survey.

1. Go to the Distribute Survey tab.
2. Click on the Mail History button.
   1. The table displayed shows all mailings scheduled for the selected survey.
3. Find the panel, sample, or individual to whom you want to send a reminder/thank you email.
4. Click the corresponding gray arrow button in the Actions column.
5. Select Send Reminder or Thank you in the dropdown list of options
   • 
6. In the pop up window select what kind of message you would like to send.
   • 
7. Schedule the reminder/thank you in the same way that you did the original Invite.
   • 
   1. Specify when to send out the mailing by selecting a specified time frame or by selecting a Custom date and time.
   2. Make sure the From Name, From Email Address, and the Subject line are correct.
      • These fields are carried over from the invitation and automatically populated, but can be adjusted, if needed.
   3. Specify if you would like to use a pre-existing message or Create a New Message.
      • If using a pre-made Reminder message, then select the Library where it is stored and select the message.
      • If creating a new message, you will need to select which Library to save it to and provide a name for the message. The name is for your own reference purposes and is not seen by the survey taker.
8. Click the "Send" button in the bottom right corner of the page when you are finished scheduling the Reminder or Thank You.

Note:

• Reminders are sent to those who have not completed the survey. This means those who have not started the survey, as well as those who have started, but not completed the survey.
• Thank You messages are only sent to those who completed the survey, and not to those who did not start at all or started, but did not complete the survey.