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Promotion Tip:
Query Your Visitors With Surveys
by Larisa Thomason,
Senior Web Analyst,
NetMechanic, Inc.
Tip O'Neil, former Speaker of the US House of Representatives said that one of the most important rules in politics is: "people like to be asked." It's an important rule for Web sites too. Most visitors love participating in online polls. Use these surveys to collect information about your visitors' preferences and encourage repeat visits to your site.
What To Ask And How
The questions you select depend on the purpose of your poll. If it's strictly for entertainment purposes, you're only limited by your imagination. A kid's Web site devoted to astronomy might ask: "What's your favorite planet?" while a music site wants to know which singer you'd most want to be stranded with on a desert island.
Sometimes, what seems to be a silly poll may also serve a serious purpose. Microsoft is retiring Clippy, the popup paper clip who regularly annoys users of Microsoft Office. Clippy has his own Web site, where visitors can vote on his new job. Site visitors are encouraged to vote then invited to view a demo and order a trial copy of Microsoft's new product, Office XP.
Most visitors are eager to give you their opinion along with some limited personal information - if they see some benefit from it. For instance, we conducted our first online newsletter poll last year and asked visitors what type of HTML editor they used to create their Web sites. In the accompanying article, we explained that the results would help us decide what editor-specific newsletter topics would interest subscribers.
At the end of each newsletter story, we ask subscribers to rate the tip. Those votes matter! We use them to decide what types of stories are most useful to subscribers.
If you're asking for personal information, choose your questions carefully. Reassure visitors that you're not collecting individual data on them, their privacy will be protected, and briefly explain how participating will benefit them.
Explore Your Options
CGI or other scripts to generate online polls are readily available, even free in many cases. Select the one that best fits your level of programming expertise.
Our online polls use a custom CGI script installed on our own server. Some Web hosts provide a library of scripts for their customers. Otherwise, you can write your own or install one of the many free CGI scripts available on the Web.
Be extremely careful if you decide to install a prewritten CGI script on your server. Check your terms of service first to make sure your Web hosting account supports them. Then, monitor your site's performance because a poorly written CGI script can run wild and consume a server's resources. You'll incur the ire of neighboring sites and may get yourself kicked out.
If CGI scripts scare you, you can still have a poll on your site. Some software packages let you create polls, then store the results in your own database. Other free services let you place polls on your Web site using scripts that reside on their servers. You don't have to worry about bad CGI scripts, but read the agreement carefully first: some "free" services will place banner ads next to your poll.
Here are a few online poll services we found in a quick Web search:
| Name |
Description |
| Pollit |
Free web-based polls with up to 25 questions. |
| Mister Poll |
Place polls on your Web site or for inclusion in Mister Poll's online poll directory. Free service. |
| Poll Wizard |
This is an add-on to FrontPage that lets you create polls for Windows-based Web sites. Requires access to a Windows Web server or IIS. $34.95 |
| Survey Builder |
Web-based application that uses Active Server Pages and a SQL or Access database. |
| Poll Pro |
Software installed on your server to create polls and save results in a database. Windows NT environment only. $189-$239. |
| Ballot Box |
Free software to create polls for your Web site. No banner ads are added to your polls. |
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What To Look For
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NetMechanic Poll
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The software packages or free services are a good option if you're pressed for time or have limited programming skills. But research them carefully: costs, policies, and capabilities can differ markedly.
Here are a few considerations:
- Is it easy to use? Most services let you take a free tour. Try it out before you buy.
- Can you customize it? You should be able to select colors, fonts, and layout that complement your Web site.
- Can you control spamming? The better polling packages have logic that keeps people from voting multiple times and skewing your results. These packages log the IP addresses of people who vote, or issue a cookie to each person.
- How much does it cost? Remember that some of the free services require you to accept banner ads somewhere within the poll. That may not be a problem, but be sure you understand where and when they'll appear.
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Take Our Poll!
So once again, we offer you the chance to give us your opinion! What type of newsletter story do you find most helpful and interesting? We'll use the poll responses to help plan the Webmaster Tips newsletter calendar for the rest of the year.
While you're using an online poll as part of your promotional strategy, don't forget that people still have to find your site first. Use Search Engine Power Pack to get your site registered and ranked well with search engines.
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