Collect Student Feedback Using Sentiment Surveys

Learn About Sentiment Surveys

Sentiment surveys let you find out how students are feeling about their support and other experiences at your school. Using surveys, you can proactively identify the best ways to support your students. Review survey results with your team and with stakeholders such as a dean, provost, principal, or school board, and use the insights to improve the student experience.

There are many survey products out there. We'll get you started using Salesforce Surveys, but you can use the methodology for implementing surveys with any product.

What Do You Want to Learn?

Consider what you want to learn from your survey through the lens of how you can improve your student support and educational experiences. How effective are your Success Plans? How supported do students feel as they navigate virtual learning? How prepared and supported do students feel as they apply to college or graduate school, or apply for financial aid?

In higher education, also ask students about:

• The support experience—appointment scheduling, topics, and the check-in process. How satisfied are students with their success team?

• The program experience—course offerings, department specifics, and end-of-term surveys. Did the student's coursework prepare them for a career in their desired field?

• The university experience—registration, university services, and event-based feedback. Do students have concerns about their financial well-being? Do they feel prepared to enter the job market?

Collaborate with Your Support Staff

Creating a successful sentiment survey starts with your support staff—after all, they know their students the best. You might want to assemble a team of your top support staff to help with the process. Then consider these recommendations.

• Identify a clear survey goal.
• Research survey best practices on the web. Look at best practices and recommendations for question length, variation, balance, and style.
• Think backwards and consider the future reporting data points. Think about long-term data points that allow you to see a before-and-after result that can be shared with others, such as a dean, provost, principal, or school board.
• Review the survey question types in Salesforce Help.
• Keep your survey varied. Use a combination of question types, not only simple Yes or No questions.
• Consider tailoring questions based on responses in the survey.
• Ensure that surveys comply with your institution's privacy and security policies.

Review Your Salesforce Survey Implementation Options

When planning your implementation, ask yourself these questions.

• Who do you want to create surveys?
• How do you want to distribute surveys?
• How do you want to track survey responses?

You'll probably want to give only specific people on your team permission to create surveys. Let's call them survey administrators. They'll work with support staff to create surveys, write questions, and coordinate survey distribution and reporting. Survey administrators require the Survey Creator permission set and access to the Survey object and tab. Only users with the Survey Creator permission set can email unique survey links that can be associated with specific students.

After you know who will create surveys, decide how you want to implement the survey.

Note You don't have to choose one implementation option. You can implement the same survey in multiple ways, or you can choose to implement each survey differently. For example, say you have a first-year orientation at the start of the fall term. You can send an email to the students that signed in at the event and you can host a survey for feedback on the event on your student portal.

Create a Trial Survey

Every org has access to create one free trial Salesforce Survey. You don't set up or purchase licenses for the trial survey. We recommend that you create a trial survey before fully implementing Salesforce Surveys.

1. Enable surveys.

   To create surveys that are accessible in a student portal, select your site from the picklist on the Survey Settings setup page.

2. Configure sharing settings for surveys.

3. Update your Student Success Hub profiles.

   • Verify that your System Administrator profile has access to the Survey object and tab.
   • If you don't want your support staff to see the Surveys item yet, verify that your support staff profile doesn't include access to the Survey tab.
4. Add the Surveys item to the Student Success Hub app navigation menu.

5. Create a survey.

   We suggest making a basic trial survey with only two or three questions.

6. For simplicity, distribute the trial survey by generating the survey link in Survey Builder and sending an email to a test Contact record.

7. Review the email that was sent to the test Contact record.

If your trial was a success and you like the Salesforce Surveys experience, contact your Salesforce representative for pricing and purchasing information.

Important To fully implement Salesforce Surveys, you must purchase Survey Creator licenses. You can check your available user licenses on the Company Information page in Setup.

Set Up Your Survey Administrators

To set up your survey administrators, complete these steps. These instructions assume that you have access to the Survey Creator permission set.

1. Give users permission to create surveys.

   The Survey Creator license comes with a predefined Survey Creator permission set. Assign this permission set to any user who will:

   • Create surveys.
   • Send unique survey links. This implementation option allows users with the Survey Creator permission set to generate unique survey links and see a student's survey responses.

2. Give users access to the Surveys tab.

   Update your survey administrators' user profiles to include access to the Surveys item in the Student Success Hub app. Alternatively, you can create another permission set that gives access to the Surveys tab.

3. Optionally, verify that the Get Survey Invitation action is on your Contact page layout.

   If you want to send unique survey links, make sure the Contact page layout includes the Get Survey Invitation action.

4. Optionally, add a related list to the Contact page layout.

   If you want to send unique survey links, add the Survey Invitations related list to the Contact page layout. This related list lets survey administrators view and manage a student's survey invitations from the Contact record.

Create a Survey

Use Survey Builder to create the survey form.

1. In the Student Success Hub app navigation menu, select Surveys.
2. Click New.
3. Use Survey Builder to create a welcome page, enter your questions, and create a thank you page. You can even preview your survey to make adjustments.
4. Click Activate to make your survey live.

To get links to your survey, click Send at the top of Survey Builder. Then specify the survey invitation settings.