The Power Of Blog Reader Surveys

I hooked up a link from our blog to SurveyMonkey.com.

I started with 10 questions - no hits. Reduced it to 4 questions and added an animated gif to get their attention - people started responding.

I queried readers on the ease of finding information.  Well, 50% indicated a problem. What!?!?! How? It's a blog - you just pop a word into the searchfield, right?

The problem turned out to be that the search field at the top of the screen wasn't always available when you're down at the bottom of a page so they never saw it. I added the search widget so that the field now appears to their immediate right.

Survey says.... problem solved.

The lesson here is that your reader is your ultimate customer, not you.  If they aren't happy with the experience then they're not going to come back and they're not going to tell other people about your site. The game here is BUZZ... without it you're just someone wasting a lot of time and effort in compiling notes for yourself.

Oh, and don't get all frustrated that not everyone is responding to your survey. It's kind'a like comments - it's a gift when someone takes the time to write. With your survey, the gift is in you to give back to your readers a better experience so ask insightful questions and listen to what they're telling you.

This guest post is from Shawn Chambers of The Plastic Spork Blog. Go check out his survey!