Why is a post-event feedback strategy critical for boosting participation?





February 18, 2020

Events play a significant role in maintaining a highly engaged alumni community and advancement teams around the world leave no stone unturned to plan their events with meticulous detail. So, why is it that this planning stops with the end of an event?

Post-event feedback is one key aspect of event planning as it plays a crucial role in improving the quality of future events and boosting participation. It reveals what attendees, sponsors, and stakeholders loved about your event and what you can do to make it even better next time.

While post-event feedback strategy largely depends on the type of event that you’re organizing, here’s a step-by-step guide to creating an effective feedback strategy :

1. Finalize your questions

Before you start reaching out to your event attendees to collect feedback, identify the most relevant questions that need to be asked. Simply put, frame your questions in a way that you receive the most out of it. In addition to basic questions such as name, contact details, etc., include questions that help you analyze the positive and negative outcomes of the event, based on your attendees’ opinions. Here’s how Centenary College of Lousiana gauges the opinions and interests of its alumni post an event.

2. Create a survey form

Once you’re done creating your list of questions, the next step is to add them to a survey form. It is highly recommended to move away from traditional paper forms. Paper forms are difficult to organize, access, and there is a high risk of data inconsistency involved while transferring the information onto your database. Online survey forms are one of the most commonly used methods for collecting feedback from event attendees. There are multiple free and paid tools that can help you create customizable survey forms. Here are some of the most popular tools for creating online survey forms: Google Forms, Survey Monkey, and Jotform.
Centenary College of Louisiana adds event photos to the landing page where the survey form is added.

3. Spread the word through email/social media

Now that your survey form with questions is in place, it is time to spread the word and gather responses. The most popular channels for collecting post-event feedback are social media and emails.
Here’s how QuestBridge encourages alumni to share feedback post its ‘Dinner with QuestBridge Strangers’ event.

Read more about the event here: How QuestBridge promotes local connections between alumni via ‘Dinner with QuestBridge Strangers’ program

In 3 simple steps, your post-event feedback strategy is complete! 

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