The answer is B.

Hey there - Growing up, whenever I’d be studying for a test, my dad would interrupt to impart this completely unverified wisdom on me: When in doubt, choose B. He was overly confident that if you answered B for every question on a multiple choice test, you’d come out ahead. (I never actually tried this, nor have I done any research around it — if you have, school me, please.) Anyway, by grad school, I’d come to loathe multiple choice tests. I found them, in most instances, to be a cop out by the professor, who most often was testing for memorization than understanding. So last week, when a friend reached out because she was creating a survey to send to people who’d gone through a challenge she’d just run and asked me about using multiple choice questions, I had a prettttttty opinionated reaction. My gut answer: NO! DON’T YOU DARE! I reeled that in a bit after I actually took the time to process it (and respond in a 10-minute Voxer message) — and here’s what my answer ended up boiling down to: When you’re collecting data from your audience, multiple choice questions can be great in some instances. Want to know the age range of your audience; how many kids they have; how much they might be willing to pay for something? Providing preset answers might be the way to go to easily analyze that data later. You could even take this beyond general data and into specifics of your offer: Maybe you want to know which area of your membership your people utilize most; what module of the course they got the most out of; what time of day they prefer to receive your emails. Again, preset answers work because the answers are variables that fall into defined buckets. Anddd that’s about where my fandom of multiple choice for surveying ends… Because, as a copywriter, my entire goal behind collecting voice of customer research is to hear how the clients + customers of my clients talk about their experiences. When I use a multiple choice question to extract that from them, I’m leading them with my language, robbing them of the opportunity to use their voice. (And gift me with their words, which translate directly into copy.) This is why, in a 7-10 question survey, the majority of the questions I ask will be open-ended, free response questions. When we give people the big ol’, empty block to spew their thoughts into, it’s an open invitation for them to bring their own language to the table. That’s where the gold lies. (And our coveted empathy is gained.) Asking the open-ended question: Thinking back to when you first found out about my membership, what was going on in your life + business?… is going to open your people up to talk about their pain points and struggles in a way that a question like, When you first found out about my membership, were you experiencing A, B, C, or D? will. (Plus, they don’t have to do nearly as much reading…) Now, I hear you… You don’t want to “burden” your people with lengthy surveys that force them to do all the work. (Though I’d, of course, challenge you on this — give your people the chance, and more often than not, they’re eager to share their thoughts, particularly if there are incentives involved.) So, if you’re on the “make it easy for them” train and want to include multiple choice, do it — but do it wisely, giving them room for follow up, like so: When you first found out about my membership, were you experiencing A, B, C, or D? Follow up: If you chose B, what is it about your experience that made you say that? (Because of course they chose B, right?) Until next time, be kind + stay curious - Sara P.S. H/T to [my fellow Sara-no-h](=) for reaching out to ask me about using multiple choice in surveys — and for listening to the 10-minute diatribe I sent back 🤣 Ready to call it quits? [Click this link]( to remove yourself from all communications. (No hard feelings.) If you'd like to opt-out of specific content, just hit reply + let me know. I’ll get you sorted, ASAP. | SFS HQ: Oxford Street, Cambridge, MA 02140