Objective:
In this How-To, we will learn about how to edit a survey after it is sent and what that means for your survey data. We will explore the following topics:
- How to edit a sent question on a survey and what happens to current survey recipients
- How modifying a survey can affect your data and reports
- How Core iQ handles the deletion of a survey and the data associated with it
How do I edit a survey question after it is sent? Do I have to resend my survey?
Let’s say that you sent out your Product Evaluation survey to a targeted audience, only to realize that you missed a typo or choice in one of your custom questions. Not to worry, Core iQ allows you to edit sent surveys (with a few important stipulations). To edit a LIVE survey, we will just need to find our survey template within the Communication Templates area. Since the template is Active, we will need to start by clicking the Deactivate & Modify button within the editing area. This will mark the template as Inactive for the time being, but will allow us to make changes to any questions that we might need to.
To make an edit to an already sent question, we can click the pencil icon, which will remove the lock symbol and allow us to edit the text within that question. Just a reminder, only custom questions are able to be edited within Core iQ. Any Standard question is non-editable as it has already gone through extensive review by the Onovative staff before being added to the Standard Question area.
If we edit or delete a custom question within our survey, CoreiQ will handle serving the newly edited survey to any future survey takers. Anyone who has already opened the survey will not see these reflected changes unless they close out of the survey and come back to it, or unless they refresh their page. Survey changes will take effect IMMEDIATELY after you click the Save & Preview button, so be sure that your changes have been reviewed before clicking this button.
How are Approved surveys handled in Core iQ?
Please be aware that because of the nature of surveys, and the fact that they are LIVE documents, we highly recommend triple checking your surveys before marking them as Approved. Once an Approved survey is sent within Core iQ, it becomes difficult to make changes and take your survey back through the Compliance process. Within Core iQ, once a survey is sent to customers, anytime you make a change to that survey and click on the Save & Preview button, THOSE CHANGES WILL GO LIVE. This means that even if the survey template is changed to Inactive after it is sent, it will still show your saved (and only your saved) changes to customers. If you need to make changes to a LIVE survey, we recommend not clicking the Save & Preview button until those changes are Compliance approved. This means that your Compliance officer will need to view the survey changes within the survey builder after they are made. Once you have saved those changes, you can mark the template as Active.
What if I change a survey after a customer has opened it?
If someone has opened the survey before you begin to make and/or save changes, they will be able to complete their version of the survey. However, any changed questions will not be reflected on their survey until they refresh the page or until they click on the survey link again. This means that if you choose to edit or delete a question, some of your customer data may not be as easily accessible. You will still be able to choose deleted or edited questions within the Survey Outcomes Report, but you will need to pick all versions of a question to see every answer. By default, any edited or deleted questions will be included within any Survey Outcomes Report that is only run with only the survey chosen as the filter. Again, we highly recommend triple checking your surveys before they are sent out to customers.
What happens to my response data when I edit a survey?
One of the things that happens when you edit a question that has gone out on a LIVE survey is that obtaining data through our Survey Outcomes Report requires a bit more finesse. When the edit is made to a question, Core iQ will still retain the data from the previous version of the question. However, it will create a new version of that question for future survey takers to respond to. That means that if you make an edit to a question, when you go to run the Survey Outcomes Report, you will need to include all versions of that question if you want to look at a particular set of responses.