What Questions Should You Include On Your Post-Event Survey?

November 14, 2022 Desiree Homer

When you’re event planning a New York conference, corporate event, or trade show, you know your work’s not done at the end of the night. Your next step is to send out those post-event surveys. They’re critical for collecting attendee feedback and helping you make improvements in your event planning efforts. But the surveys are only as good as the questions you’re asking. Be smart about crafting your inquiries. And consider this lineup of questions to include to make the most of your attendee outreach post-event.

What was your favorite part of or experience during the event?

Asking this post-event survey question will allow your attendees to explain, in their own words, what they enjoyed the most. 

How useful or valuable do you feel this event was?

This question will help you better understand what your attendees found most valuable or useful to them, either as professionals or within their own business or life experiences. 

Would you recommend attending this event to others?

This question can be telling in that those who had memorable and valuable experiences will likely refer this event to others. If there is hesitation or negative feedback here, it might be worth probing further.

Would you attend this event again in the future?

Like the previous inquiry, this question will help you understand if you’ve created an event experience that inspired future attendance. 

Were you satisfied with the number of workshops, breakout sessions, or activities?

The responses here will help you plan out future events, either with fewer or additional activities, workshops, or breakout sessions in mind.

How impressed were you with the guest or keynote speakers?

Gauge how effective your speakers were by asking this question. Learn too, which guests and stage presentations were most well-received, so you can be sure to book them again for future events.

What was your biggest, most valuable takeaway from this event?

Discern what the most impactful aspect of your event really was with this one. And it will help you determine how successful you were in achieving your event objectives.

How satisfied were you with the venue and event aesthetics?

Get into the details and ask guests how they felt about the location and venue. They’ll highlight here if they had trouble parking, if they were concerned about acoustics, and whether or not they were impressed with the decor and layout.

How satisfied were you with the menu, catering, and food services?

Food matters to your event. And this question will help you understand whether or not you chose the right catering partner for the conference. If guests are raving about the snacks, beverages, and menu, you’ve hit a home run.

Do you feel the event staff was helpful?

From your event planning vantage point, you might assume all the coordinated staff was helpful and professional. But you won’t know for sure, of course, unless you ask.

What topics would you like to experience in future events?

Provide guests with a clean slate to share their ideas for topics, workshops, or speaker lineups. They’ll tell you what they think would be great for the next event experience.

What areas of improvement would you suggest overall?

Just when you feel you’ve asked all the right post-event survey questions, you’ll miss something. Asking this question can be the safety net to collect any other areas of improvement your guests might suggest.

Please share any additional comments, thoughts, or suggestions.

This is a great closing event question for capturing quotable statements and testimonials. Verify permission, of course, but this allows attendees to end on a good note. Alternatively, if they’re not so favorable in their comments, it’s equally useful to you as the event planner, so you can problem-solve and improve.

Keep those post-event surveys flowing after each engagement you plan. And use these questions, or variations of them, to dive deeper into exploring big wins, serious setbacks, and event planning areas of improvement. 

For ongoing insights about event planning tips and best practices, keep up with our Event Planner Expo blog series. And you can get on the waitlist today for updates and announcements for The Event Planner Expo 2023!

 
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