If you came across this article, you probably are at the breaking point of your survey creation. You need to find channels to share your questionnaire with - quickly! And yes, the number of participants you need seems overwhelming at first. The deadline is approaching. But don’t worry. In this article, we are going to show you three most reliable ways to share your survey. Quick results guaranteed!

1: Your own networking

Pros: Low-effort, Cost-free
Cons: Risk of non-response bias, not useful for the specific target group


Use your personal contacts to spread the news about your survey around. First, put the survey on your social media and encourage friends to share it. Be sure to seem friendly and excited - this way you persuade people to do it. 

Aside from that, you might want to post a link to your survey on any group chats you belong to. Make use of your closest friends  - encourage them to put your survey on their social media feed. You might be surprised by the number of participants you can reach that way!


However easy, this approach is not free of limitations. For one, your friends might not fit your target group. Secondly, they might be too similar to each other, posing a risk of non-response bias (to learn more about non-response bias, click here). Lastly, their answers might be distorted by their proximity to you. For example, they might lie in your questionnaire to protect their friendly image.


That is when survey networks come in handy:


2: Survey platforms

Pros: Useful for the specific target group, a large pool of participants, extra features
Cons: Most services are paid, your survey get lost in the crowd


Survey platforms are online networks designed to creating and sharing online surveys. You might have heard about web pages such as SurveyMonkey or others - those are survey platforms. 


Why you should be using survey networks? First of all, they gather people from all over the world. Survey networks help when your own networking comes short. For example, when you need a specific target group or big amount of participants. Secondly, survey networks sort out faulty responses and uncaring participants (straight-liners, yes-sayers and no-sayers). If you have problems with identifying and sorting out your data, survey networks are the answer for you.


Any downsides? Well, some survey networks require you to pay in exchange for participants or in exchange for keeping your survey online, so it’s a no-no for people with a tight budget. There is also a problem with your survey rank - in bigger platforms, your survey may get lost among the plethora of other’s questionnaires.


Resolution to that is a survey network such as PollPool. PollPool is a free, user-friendly platform. We use a fictional currency of PollCoins to help you collect responses. PollCoins are collected by answering surveys available on our page. The more PollCoins you collect, the higher your status and the higher your survey is placed. Visit us on https://www.poll-pool.com/ to learn more!

3: Online forums/groups

Pros: Useful for the specific target group, a large pool of participants
Cons: Response biases, need for a cleaning data


This is the last and also one of the reliable options - online forums and groups. Survey-share Facebook groups are large and active communities filled with people willing to complete your questionnaire. Be cheerful, motivating and honest and fill in other surveys in return - and the responses will keep coming!

Other options are online forums, such as Quora, Reddit or TheStudentRoom, as well as university’s forums. Try to find out where is your target group most active - is it a music forum on Facebook? Student community on Quora? Or maybe your University’s channel on Discord? If you’d manage to reach those places, you will find a new, reliable source of participants!


And that’s it! If you still have doubts about your questionnaire, check our other articles, namely, how to clean out your survey data or why does no one want to answer your questionnaire.