What are microsurveys? And how to use them

Brief and manageable. Those are the ingredients for higher survey response rates in today’s market. In fact, brevity has become a strong requirement of most customers, who are typically either short on time or on-the-go. This trend is also in part due to the increasing number of survey respondents using mobile devices, according to Lucid. They are simply less tolerable of long surveys and therefore only willing to participate when there is little to no effort involved. As a result, more organisations are making use of so-called microsurveys to gather their customer feedback.

In this post, we will talk about what defines a microsurvey, how does a microsurvey differ from traditional surveys, why they are valuable for organisations, how to use microsurveys in practice and more.

What is a microsurvey?

As the name suggests, microsurveys are short yet effective surveys that typically consist of around two to three questions. They are often solicited with the goal of evaluating a single issue, and thus generating feedback that enables the organisation to tackle that issue quickly and effectively. Also worth noting is that microsurveys are predominantly used in-product to gauge product usage and satisfaction. However, they are not limited to this purpose. Many organisations are also increasingly using microsurveys on their marketing channels such as web and mobile apps.

Microsurveys vs traditional surveys

So what differentiates microsurveys from traditional surveys? Traditional surveys lack the context and response rates that microsurveys can provide. Traditional surveys – often conducted via email – are typically much longer and give the user less wiggle room in terms of targeting respondents. That isn’t to say you shouldn’t use them. They have their advantages, especially when being used for market research and more in-depth surveying. However, they require a lot more time and effort from the respondent and have therefore lost their popularity in the last few years.

Alternatively, as we mentioned above, microsurveys are short and simple surveys that ask only a few questions at a time. These surveys also carry the advantage of user targeting, giving the organisation more relevant feedback and higher response rates. Not to mention they are easy to create and therefore aid in internal productivity.

The value of microsurveys

Microsurveys are very effective surveys for a number of reasons. These types of surveys help promote higher survey response rates (and thus higher volumes of data) as well as allow you to gather contextual feedback (i.e. actual product usage).

Higher survey response rates translate to more feedback data. And this is exactly what every company wants when it comes to making meaningful changes to a product. Why? Because the more insights you have, the more means you have to make good product decisions.

So why do these surveys generate such a higher response rate? The answer is simple. Users aren’t looking to invest much time in filling out a survey, especially if they are active within the product or on your website. And when they do want to submit feedback – whether they are experiencing an error or have some advice – the level of effort to do so is low. In fact, these surveys are capable of gathering twice as much feedback as email surveys.

Additionally, microsurveys facilitate the collection of more contextual data. For example, gathering feedback from digital channels such as email can sometimes lack a certain level of situational distinction provided by microsurveys. Given their more targeted nature, microsurveys offer a more context-specific type of data that enables its users to identify how a respondent experiences a specific feature or release. As a result, the specifics of actual product usage are revealed to the organisation.

Using microsurveys in practice

Now that you understand the value of microsurveys, let’s take a look at how these little mini-surveys can be used in practice.

1. Product feedback microsurveys

Product feedback surveys can be used to ask your users how they’re experiencing a particular feature within the app. This particular type of feedback is collected in various ways and oftentimes it is centered around a certain product goal such as a product launch, the product development pipeline, user onboarding, or even user testing (i.e. the introduction of new services, features and upgrades).


Example survey taken from Mopinion customer, Meistertask.

2. Feature request microsurveys

This type of survey is often used by product managers and developers for triggering an in-app microsurvey for users who want to suggest or request a new feature. Having a form like this consistently live within your platform or on your website can be very helpful, especially if you’re a product-led business.

A survey such as the one below will give you insight into what users need to reach their goals within your product as well as direction in terms of how to move forward with the development of your product.



In fact, this type of survey usage was featured in our recent post on 10 things you didn’t know you can do with Mopinion.

3. Persona microsurveys

Persona microsurveys are ideal for understanding who is using your product and how. For example, you can gather a lot of information about the demographics of your user base, by requesting details such as age, industry, location, etc. alongside the feedback.



And not only will these surveys help guide you in understanding your user base in-product, but also your audience on – for example – blog articles. They will teach you a lot about which segments are using your product or website, and in which way.

4. Churn prevention surveys

Churn prevention surveys, otherwise known as exit surveys, are surveys that help organisations catch the user before they leave. There are a few instances wherein you can apply this type of microsurvey, including the moment a customer is about to cancel their subscription or when a website visitor is about to leave the page without purchasing or signing up.

Sure, you can see these scenarios play out in screen recording tools and in-app monitoring software. However, these solutions don’t give you much of an indication as to why the user churns.

To gather this feedback, you can simply ask them why they are leaving. Either provide options or let them tell you themselves with an open answer section (or both!). That’s up to you.

5. Loyalty and satisfaction microsurveys

Additionally, microsurveys can be used to gauge customer loyalty and satisfaction, with metrics such as Net Promoter Score and Customer Satisfaction.

Let’s use Net Promoter Score (NPS) as an example. NPS is one of the most popular loyalty metrics and is a great way of gauging customer loyalty online. It’s a quick and easy indicator of how loyal your customers are.

Note: these types of surveys should never be used as a generic metric as they are only really effective when geared towards current and/or long time customers who are familiar with your brand. In other words it’s better to collect NPS scores from actual customers rather than anonymous visitors who have yet to build up any sort of relationship with your brand.


Example survey taken from Mopinion customer, Meistertask.

Creating microsurveys with Mopinion

Here at Mopinion we are huge advocates of simplistic, yet powerful feedback surveys. Not only are these surveys a breeze to create, but they make the analysis and action management process much more effective.



Before creating microsurveys in Mopinion you will need to decide what your goal is with the survey (i.e. feature requests, churn prevention, measuring loyalty, etc). Once this has been established you will create a custom-designed survey by simply dragging and dropping suitable form elements into your survey. Alternatively, users can make use of readily made survey templates that make the survey creation process that much faster. These surveys can then be deployed either passively or actively on the page or in-app, giving the user the flexibility to gather their feedback as they see fit.

Additionally, Mopinion offers a variety of unique survey options such as intelligent targeting, visual feedback, multi-language support, advanced question routing and much more. Once your surveys are all set up, you can put together a custom dashboard with all of the charts you need to be able to analyse the incoming data and identify important trends.

Ready to get unlock meaningful insights that’ll take your user experience to the next level?