How to Use Polls to Maximize Engagement at Events

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The best events are ones where attendees leave feeling like they’ve had a two-way conversation. They’ve gleaned some valuable information from the speakers, got to ask questions, and perhaps shared some feedback and their own perspective with the speakers or organizers as well.

On the opposite end of the spectrum: events where attendees leave feeling unsatisfied are the ones where it feels like a one-way street. You know how it is… when the speakers talk at you rather than to you, and there’s no space for any sort of interaction or engagement.

If you’re planning an event, a key component of ensuring that everyone leaves happy is to maximize engagement. And the best way to do this is… polls!

Conducting a poll can be as simple as asking for a show of hands, but a bit of quick tech prep can help you get even more out of your results. In this article, we walk you through how to use polls to encourage engagement and interaction. Read on to find out more.

1. Consider the objective of the poll

Before you think about your poll questions, take a step back and consider the objective of the poll.

Polls are great for engaging your audience, yes. But that aside, you can also use polls to:

Brainstorm ideas and open the floor up to discussion
Get feedback from your audience about whether a topic is understandable
Get your audience to vote on what they want to learn more about
Quiz your audience after a talk

The more granular you get with your objectives, the more effectively you’ll be able to plan and set up your poll effectively.

For example, say you want to quiz your audience after they’ve sat through a talk.

If your end goal is to motivate your audience to pay more attention, you should announce the quiz at the start of the session (and perhaps offer a token prize for the best performer as well).

If your end goal is to get a sense of whether the material is digestible and retainable, then you wouldn’t want to announce the quiz beforehand. This will give you a more accurate sense of whether your material works, or whether it’s not accessible enough.

2. Adapt your approach based on feedback from polls

This one is for the speakers: As you conduct your session, it’s always a good idea to adapt your approach in real-time, as you get feedback via your polls.

For example: let’s say you’ve polled your audience on whether they’ve understood a topic that you just covered, and results show that 75% of them say no.

Now, the worst thing you can do is to not address the feedback, and just keep plodding on with your material. This will likely make your audience feel frustrated, and turn them off even more.

So, try to keep things flexible and respond to feedback as much as you can. With the previous example: if the poll shows that your audience didn’t understand what you just covered, spend an extra 10-15 minutes on that, even if it means you’ll need to strip down and simplify the content for the next topic. After the event, you can also follow up with sending your audience extra information or reference material about that particular topic, for their own reading.

3. Use the appropriate poll format

There are many different types of polls, including:

Open text
Multiple-choice
Rating
Word cloud

Here’s what each type of poll is good for – make sure you use what’s suitable for your needs:

Poll	Used for	Example
Multiple choice	Warming up your audience Quizzing your audience	[For worldwide virtual events] “Where are you joining us from today?”
Rating	Gathering feedback or opinions	“How feasible do you think the Agile Methodology is for your company?”
Ranking	Decision-making or prioritizing	“Which of these topics are you the most interested in? Please rank.”
Open text	Brainstorming and crowdsourcing ideas Best for smaller groups (as participants need time to type out their answers)	“How do you think your company could better automate its marketing activities?”
Word cloud	Brainstorming and crowdsourcing ideas Best for questions with one or two word answers	“In one or two words, what does marketing automation mean to you?”

4. Don’t assume everyone knows how to use polling tools

Most polling tools will require your audience to access a specific website, key in a code, then submit their answers. You might be familiar with these tools if you’ve used them before, but these steps might not be immediately intuitive to everyone in your audience.

To get around this, explain the instructions clearly, and make sure you’ve got them displayed on a presentation slide as well.

Give your audience ample time to log on and join, and have facilitators walk around and offer help to anyone who looks like they’re struggling. You can also add a couple of fun trivia questions before the official questions, to allow your audience to try out the polling tool and get the hang of responding via the tool.

5. Keep best practices for poll questions in mind

There’s an art when it comes to writing poll questions – you want these to be clear, unambiguous, and easy to understand.

Here are some tips:

Questions should have one part, and not be compounded. For example: “Do you believe in marketing automation and think that your company should invest more in it?” should be broken up into two separate questions.
Questions should not involve any acronyms, jargon, or language that may be confusing to the audience.
For multiple-choice questions, the given options should be distinct with no overlaps. Also add a “Not applicable” for participants who do not have experience with the question.