Customer Survey Template
A short survey people will actually finish, with room to write.
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[why you are asking, and what you will do with the answers]
[add one question per line]
| Name (optional) | |
| Company (optional) | |
| Date | October 14, 2026 |
What is a Customer Survey?
A customer survey collects what people think about a product, a service or an experience, in a form short enough that they finish it. It matters because the customers who complain and the customers who leave are rarely the same people, and without asking you only ever hear from the first group. A survey is how you reach the quiet majority before they become the ones who have gone.
Shops, restaurants and clinics leave them at the counter or send them after a visit. Software companies fire one off when a support ticket closes. Councils, schools and charities run them annually because a funder or an inspector expects evidence of what users think. Product teams use short ones to test a single question before building anything. The common situation is that a decision is coming — a menu change, a price rise, a service redesign — and someone wants more than the loudest opinions in the room.
A survey that records who answered collects personal data, and rules on notice, lawful basis and retention differ by jurisdiction: the UK and EU GDPR, Canada's PIPEDA, Australia's Privacy Act, India's Digital Personal Data Protection Act, US state privacy laws. If you intend to market to people afterwards, that is a separate permission under most of those regimes, and asking for it inside a feedback survey is not usually enough. Public bodies often face accessibility requirements for online forms, and surveys of children or patients carry additional conditions. Check before you launch.
A survey tells you what the people who answered think, and those people are not a random sample of your customers — the delighted and the furious respond, the indifferent do not. Treat the results as signals rather than measurements, and be careful about converting them into a percentage that gets quoted in a board pack. It also does not explain why: a score of six tells you something is wrong and nothing about what. That is the job of the free-text box and a follow-up call.
What to put in a Customer Survey
These are the details this template asks for. Anything left blank is marked in red on the preview so you can see what is still missing.
| Field | What goes in it |
|---|---|
| Business name | For example: Barton Supply Co. |
| Your address | For example: Unit 7, Barton Road, Columbus, OH 43212 |
| Why you are asking | For example: We are planning next year’s stock range and want it built around what you actually buy. |
| Survey questions | One question per line |
How to write a Customer Survey
Decide the one decision it informs
Write down what you will do differently depending on the answers. If you cannot name a decision, you are collecting data for its own sake and the survey will be too long. This step also removes questions: anything that does not change a decision comes out, however interesting it is. A survey with a purpose usually shrinks to six or eight questions.
Keep it under ten questions
Completion falls as length rises, and a half-finished survey is often worse than none because the drop-outs are not random. Put the question you most want answered first, in case it is the only one you get. Show progress if the form runs over one screen. State the expected time at the top, and be honest about it.
Ask one thing per question
'Was the staff member friendly and knowledgeable?' cannot be answered by someone who met a cheerful person who did not know the answer. Split it. Avoid leading wording too: 'How much did you enjoy the new layout?' assumes enjoyment. 'How did you find the new layout?' does not, and the answers are considerably more useful for it.
Leave real room to write
One open question near the end earns more than another five rating scales: 'What is the one thing we should change?' The lines you print or the box you show should be big enough to invite a sentence or two. Most people will skip it; the ones who write are telling you the thing you did not think to ask about.
Say what happens to the answers
State whether responses are anonymous, who will see them, how long they are kept and whether you will follow up. If you want permission to contact them, ask separately and make it optional. Then close the loop: publish or send a short note about what changed. Response rates on the next survey depend almost entirely on whether people saw anything come of the last one.
Common mistakes
- Running a thirty-question survey, so only the unusually motivated finish it and the results describe your most devoted customers rather than your typical ones.
- Asking two things in one question, which produces answers you cannot interpret and a number that gets quoted anyway.
- Making every question mandatory, which pushes people to invent an answer or abandon the form halfway through.
- Collecting names and email addresses without saying why, then using them for marketing, which is a separate permission under most privacy regimes.
- Never telling respondents what changed as a result, which is the reliable way to make the next survey get half the responses.
Frequently asked questions
How many questions should a customer survey have?
Under ten for a general feedback survey, and as few as one or two for a post-transaction check. The right number is the smallest set that answers the question you are asking. If several teams want to add questions, run separate short surveys to different segments rather than one long one, because length costs you completions from the customers who are least engaged.
What is a good response rate for a customer survey?
It varies enormously with channel, relationship and timing — a form handed over at the till behaves nothing like an emailed link to a dormant account. Rather than chase a benchmark, watch your own rate over time and treat a drop as the signal. What matters more is whether the people responding resemble your customer base or only its extremes.
Should customer surveys be anonymous?
Anonymous responses tend to be more candid, especially about staff. Identified responses let you follow up and fix an individual problem, which is often the more valuable outcome. A common compromise is anonymous by default with an optional box for contact details. Whichever you choose, say so clearly on the form, and never link responses back to people if you promised you would not.
When is the best time to send a customer survey?
Close to the experience you are asking about — the same day for a visit or a support interaction, within a few days for a delivery. Memory fades quickly and late surveys collect general impressions rather than specifics. The exception is anything with a longer payoff, such as training or an implementation, where asking too early measures optimism rather than outcome.
Should I offer an incentive for completing a survey?
It raises responses and it changes who responds, so weigh both. Small incentives tend to pull in people with no strong view, which can actually improve the sample. Prize draws are regulated in some places, so check the rules before running one. If you incentivise, disclose it, and never make the reward conditional on a positive rating.
This page explains general practice and is not legal advice. Requirements differ between countries and, in some cases, between states — check what applies where the document will be used.