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Best Practices: Increasing Response Rates

Use these strategies to plan your outreach, make participation easier, and encourage more people to respond.

There is no single response rate that is right for every survey. Participation varies based on the population, timing, and institutional context. Focus on the factors you can influence and whether respondents represent the population you intended to reach.

What to Consider: 

Prefer a walkthrough? Watch [LINK] Response Rate Planning: What to Think About Before You Launch for additional guidance and examples.

Planning and Timing

Plan your response-rate strategy before setting up your survey. Early planning gives you time to coordinate outreach, prepare communications, identify campus partners, and address potential issues before launch.

Consider when your intended respondents are most likely to have the time and capacity to participate.

When choosing your dates:

  • Review the academic calendar

  • Avoid finals, holidays, breaks, and competing surveys when possible

  • Coordinate with other departments

  • Leave enough time for reminders and additional outreach

  • Assign someone to monitor participation while the survey is open

For current students, a survey window of approximately 30 days is generally recommended. Alumni and employer surveys may benefit from a longer window of approximately 60 days.

For exit surveys, consider launching while participants are still connected to the program and before they graduate or complete it.

When possible, begin promoting the survey before the invitation is sent. Advance communication from faculty, staff, or other familiar campus partners can help participants recognize the survey and understand why it matters when the invitation arrives.

Survey Access

Choose a distribution method that fits your audience and makes the survey easy to access.

Benchworks can send invitations directly, or you can generate a single survey link to share through your own channels, including:

  • Email
  • Text messages
  • Campus portals or learning systems
  • QR codes
  • Printed materials
  • Meetings, classes, or events

Before launch:

  • Review participant names and email addresses for accuracy
  • Use personal email addresses for alumni when institutional accounts may no longer be active
  • Complete the required email-delivery steps
  • Work with your campus IT or email administrator when needed
  • Test invitations, survey links, and QR codes

When appropriate, provide dedicated time for voluntary participation during:

  • Classes, floor meetings, or organization meetings
  • Campus programs or events
  • Outreach activities in high-traffic locations

For more information on survey access:

Invitations and Reminders

Write messages that help participants quickly understand the request and decide to act.

Your invitation should include:

  • What the survey is about

  • Why the recipient’s perspective matters

  • How your institution plans to use the findings

  • An accurate estimated completion time

  • The closing date

  • Incentive information, when applicable

  • A contact for questions

Use a subject line that identifies the survey or its purpose. Keep it short enough to read on a phone and consider including one useful detail, such as the deadline, estimated completion time, or incentive. Avoid vague language, all capital letters, or unnecessary urgency.

Plan reminders before launch:

  • Space reminders throughout the survey window

  • Keep them shorter than the original invitation

  • Send them at different times or on different days when appropriate

  • Make the deadline more prominent as the survey closes

  • Review the default reminder dates and adjust them to fit your timeline

  • Use consistent language across invitations, reminders, and other outreach

Benchworks reminders are sent only to participants who have not completed the survey. You can also send an additional reminder while the survey is open.

When additional follow-up is appropriate, consider personal outreach from a familiar faculty or staff member. A brief message from someone participants recognize can reinforce the survey’s purpose and encourage them to respond.

Engaging Campus Partners

Participants may be more likely to notice and act on a survey when they hear about it from people they already know.

Ask faculty, staff, student leaders, or other relevant partners to support your outreach. Before launch, provide them with:

  • A short explanation of why the survey matters
  • Examples of how results have been or will be used
  • Ready-to-share email or message copy
  • The survey link or QR code, when appropriate
  • Dates for planned outreach and reminders

Partners can reinforce the survey during classes, meetings, programs, events, or through their usual communication channels. Coordinate the timing so their messages support your planned invitations and reminders.

Incentives

An incentive may attract attention, but it should complement your outreach rather than replace it.

Choose an incentive that fits your intended audience and follows your institution’s policies, approval processes, and requirements. Consider offering several smaller prizes or a modest reward for every eligible participant instead of one large prize.

Clearly explain what the incentive is, who is eligible, how recipients will be selected, and when participation closes.

For more information: Survey Incentives - Examples and Best Practices

Monitoring Response Rates

Monitor participation while the survey is open so you have time to address problems or adjust your outreach.

While the survey is open:

  • Check response and email-delivery activity after invitations and reminders
  • Confirm that scheduled reminders were sent
  • If there are few or no responses shortly after launch, verify that invitations were delivered
  • Identify groups that may need additional outreach when that information is available
  • Adjust reminders, partner outreach, or promotion while there is still time

Contact Benchworks Support at benchworkssupport@elentra.com if you suspect an email-delivery problem.

Follow-Through

After the survey closes, tell participants and campus partners what happened next.

When possible, communicate:

  • What you heard from respondents
  • How you plan to use the findings
  • What will change and when
  • Appreciation for participants’ time and feedback

Share this information through the same channels you used to promote the survey, such as email, newsletters, meetings, campus displays, or social media.

Showing that feedback leads to action can strengthen trust and support participation in future surveys.

Questions?

If you have questions about improving response rates or planning outreach for an upcoming survey, contact Benchworks Support at benchworkssupport@elentra.com.