The Best Time to Send Surveys

When it comes to surveys, high response rates typically depend on these seven checkpoints:

  1. How well surveys are written for their target audience
  2. The length of a survey – short vs. long
  3. The respondent profile type – B2B vs. B2C
  4. The number of responses required
  5. The experience of taking the survey – how easy it is to complete it on various devices
  6. How the survey is sent
  7. When the survey invitation is sent

In a world where we compete for the attention of our respondents, how and when we send survey invitations impacts the results. People have been asking us for years when is the best time to send surveys to get the highest responses. We’ve been collecting  data for years of collaborating with our customers. Now is time to back it up with usage data to understand what’s actually happening. The questions we seek answers for include:

  • What day of the week is the most popular to send and distribute surveys?
  • What time of the day is the most popular to send and distribute surveys?
  • What week of the month is the most popular time to send surveys?
  • What time of day do respondents complete surveys for our customers the most?
  • What day of the week do respondents complete surveys the most?
  • Are there any notable differences between different product types – surveys, Communities, Workforce, CX?

Here are some interesting findings that may inspire you to rethink how and when to distribute surveys.

The most popular day of the week to send out surveys is Tuesday

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Tuesday then closely followed by Monday are the two most popular days of the week to distribute and send surveys. Thursday came in third followed by Wednesday, and then Friday rounding out the weekdays. Surprisingly, Saturday’s distribution volume drops slightly from Friday while Sunday is the least popular day of the entire week.

Product-specific distribution

Workforce – Monday and Tuesday was the two popular days to send employee surveys. This aligns well with employee email research showing that the best day to deliver important work emails is on a Monday or Tuesday in the early morning or mid afternoon due to open rates being the highest during those times.

Communities – Tuesday is the most popular day to send community surveys although other days were slightly lower but fairly consistent.

CX – Customer experience surveys are generally contingent on the point-of-sale and customer journey. If automated, the date and time will vary based on customer activity.

The most popular time to send survey invitations is between 10 am and 11 am local time

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Customers tend to respond to surveys in the mid-morning between 10-11 am followed by the early morning between 6 am and 9 am local time.  A 2019 study by Convertful showed similar popular email distribution times for email marketing to be 10 AM for professional services but showed different preferred distribution times for eCommerce and software/SaaS audiences (between 12 pm – 2 pm).

The last week of the month is when we see the highest survey sent and completion activity

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From week one to week four distribution activity starts out strong but drops the lowest during week two then steadily rises to the highest on week four.

The most popular day respondents complete surveys the quickest are Tuesdays

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To answer this question, we reviewed timestamps based on the average time it took to receive completed surveys. Tuesday had the quickest response time while it took the longest to get results over the weekend. The second highest response day was Friday which may seem surprising. Friday is a high-activity day with spikes in questions from survey respondents. The completion time slows down for the rest of the week, but not enough to be worried about sending surveys on those days. Other factors that could influence survey completion times are the length and topic.

The level of engagement with your target audience influences the distribution date and survey completion rates

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Engaged audience responses quicker and delivers higher response rates. Highly engaged respondents trumps nearly all survey deployment and completion date and time logic, , regardless of industry or when or how you send your surveys. However, to get to the level of managing a highly engaged audience requires short and long-term strategies to recruit maintain, and manage ongoing relationships.

The takeaway:  

  • Tuesday is the most popular time to send survey invitations
  • 10-11 am local time is the most popular time to send surveys
  • The last week of the month is the most popular time to send invitations
  • Tuesday has the quickest response time to surveys than any other day
  • Highly engaged audiences typically respond faster and quicker regardless of date or time survey invitations were sent

The MaCorr Team; www.MaCorr.com

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