5 tips for creating better mobile surveys

Mobile surveys are one of the most effective ways to understand how mobile experience is for your users. They help you collect feedback directly from users while they are engaging with your mobile product, making the insights more contextual, timely and actionable.

However, many organisations still struggle to create mobile surveys that generate meaningful results. Low response rates, poorly timed surveys, vague questions and a lack of context can all make mobile feedback difficult to use.

So, what is the key to creating better mobile surveys? It starts with asking the right questions, at the right moment, in a way that feels natural within the mobile experience.

TL;DR – Article Summary

• Mobile surveys help organisations collect feedback directly inside their mobile apps.
• A good mobile survey should be short, purposeful and easy to complete.
• Native mobile surveys are deployed through SDKs, while webview surveys use web technologies inside the app.
• Microsurveys with two to three questions usually work best for mobile users.
• Using scales instead of simple yes/no questions gives you more nuanced feedback data.
• Metadata and visual feedback help add context to mobile survey responses.
• Better mobile surveys can help improve mobile UX, increase engagement and support better product decisions.

In this post, we will dive into the following:

• What are mobile surveys?
• Mobile surveys in a native app vs a webview
• 5 tips for creating better mobile surveys

What are mobile surveys?

Mobile surveys (also referred to as in-app surveys) are a great way to connect with app users, and therefore a crucial tool for collecting mobile feedback. As you might’ve guessed, this type of survey is deployed in mobile apps, enabling organisations to gather relevant user feedback on how customers experience the app as a whole, as well as its individual features.

For example, a mobile survey can help you understand:

• How users experience a new app feature
• Whether users managed to complete a specific goal
• Why users abandoned a process
• How satisfied users are with the app experience
• Whether users encountered a bug or technical issue

Mobile surveys are a crucial tool for collecting mobile feedback because they allow you to reach users in the moment. Instead of asking users to remember their experience later, you can collect feedback while the experience is still fresh.

This makes mobile surveys especially useful for product teams, UX teams, mobile marketers and customer experience teams that want to improve the app experience based on real user input.

Mobile surveys in a native app vs a webview

Before we get started it’s important to point out that there are two different kinds of mobile surveys: mobile surveys deployed natively and mobile surveys in a webview.

Native mobile surveys are deployed within the app using SDKs (Software Development Kit). These are advantageous in that SDKs allow the user to display a feedback survey in the app based on user behaviour (or in-app events). This way the user can reach someone very purposefully and ask for feedback.

Note: the design options for a native survey depends on the platform your app is running on. If the whole app is native, however, then all elements will have the same look and feel as the rest of the app.

Mobile surveys in a webview, however, are slightly different. These are essentially surveys built into mobile apps using web technologies, such as HTML, CSS or Javascript. To collect feedback via webview, all you need to do is load a feedback form into the webview using your feedback software. It works the same as loading a feedback form on a website, only it is now shown in your app. These surveys have a lot of freedom when it comes to styling. There are many survey apps available that provide web based surveys which can be used for this purpose. However, keep in mind that specialised providers like Mopinion offer out-of-the-box solutions that are robust and easy to use.

Which one you should choose depends on your needs and what kind of mobile app you are working with. Learn more about the differences between SDKs and webviews here and see which one might be best for you and your business.

Now that we’ve identified the two different types of mobile surveys, let’s take a look at how you can optimise them.

Try these 5 tips for creating better mobile surveys

If you’re reading this, you’re likely already deploying mobile surveys. But are you making the most out of them?

A good mobile survey should feel like a natural part of the app experience. It should be easy to complete, relevant to the user and connected to a clear business goal.

Here are our top 5 tips for creating better mobile surveys.

1. Keep mobile surveys brief and simple

Brief and simple are the ingredients for higher survey response rates in today’s market. In fact, this trend is – in part – due to the increasing number of survey respondents using mobile devices. Therefore, it’s critical to use what are called microsurveys in your app. These are mobile surveys that typically consist of around two to three questions max.

Note: if you are going to use longer mobile surveys in your app after all, then it’s best to start with shorter, easier questions and save the longer ones for the end. That way your user has already invested time in the survey and will be more likely to complete it.

Do you need some inspiration for structuring your feedback form? Read our blog about survey questions – complete with 80 examples.

2. Give your mobile surveys purpose

There’s no sense in deploying mobile surveys just to say you collect feedback in-app. Every VoC survey needs to have an objective or purpose, whether that’s product feedback, support feedback, mobile experience feedback, or even beta testing. In the example below, Vodafone Ireland is using a mobile survey in the form of afake door test to research the interest in a certain feature.



Identifying what you want to learn from the user feedback you receive is critical. Do you want to get insights on how your users experience a new product or feature in your app? Or do you want to learn why your user has churned?

Additionally, it’s important to establish which parts of your app you are hoping to improve. Do you simply want to deploy a mobile survey in the menu of your app? Or is it important to capture feedback in the moment?

These decisions will impact where you deploy your surveys, which metrics you use and of course, what kind of mobile survey you will use (i.e. native or webview).

3. Get more nuanced data by giving more options

After reading that last tip, it may be tempting to use ‘yes’ or ‘no’ questions in your mobile surveys. After all, it is a quick and easy way to gather feedback from your users. But what are you really learning from a quick ‘yes’ or ‘no’?

Try using a scale instead. This will give you more nuanced data and reveal much more about the sentiment behind your feedback.

For example, let’s say you have a user who is satisfied with the mobile experience. If you use a ‘yes’/’no’ survey, you will learn the following: the user is satisfied with your mobile experience. Period.

However, if you leverage a CSAT (Customer Satisfaction), you will learn the degree of satisfaction your user is experiencing. See the example used by international shipping service DHL.



Working with a lot of feedback data? This will also help you identify trends in the CSAT data and quickly spot changes in satisfaction levels, enabling you to prioritise the data.

4. Customise surveys for a seamless mobile experience

Another tip is to use custom branded mobile surveys. This is so important for the purposes of branding and survey response rates. A well-branded mobile survey will give your users comfort knowing that the survey is from your organisation, leading to more confidence and higher engagement.

You can do this by personalising questions (i.e. about the product or service), using your company’s colours, incorporating the company logo and using your company’s voice in the survey. TOGGO – a brand by Germany’s leading kids’ entertainment provider SUPER RTL – is a great example of personalised surveys that blend into the look and feel of the app.


TOGGO – a brand by Germany’s leading kids’ entertainment provider SUPER RTL – is a great example of personalised surveys that blend into the look and feel of the app.

This also gives your user the feeling that the survey experience and their mobile experience are seamless.

Additionally, custom mobile surveys enable a more effective analysis process. The reason being is that your data is more focused and specific to your goals, thus giving you more accurate data. In return, you and your team can strategize more effectively and create an even better mobile experience in the long run.

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5. Add context to your mobile survey data

You can gather a lot of meaningful insights from mobile surveys using metrics and open comments sections alone. However, what’s even more powerful is the additional data you can collect to give this feedback context.

There are two ways to enrich your mobile survey data including metadata and visual feedback.

Check whether your feedback software enables you to collect supplementary metadata. Metadata includes data such as device type, app version, user info and more. Having these types of data linked to your feedback, you can more easily identify issues occurring in your app.


Example of how metadata is displayed in Mopinion.

Additionally, there’s visual feedback. Visual feedback is essentially a screen capture solution that is built in your mobile survey (again, provided this is offered by your feedback solution). This type of feedback lets your users pinpoint issues for you with mobile, native-specific screen capturing within the device. The screenshot is then submitted alongside the user’s feedback and metadata.

Start making your mobile surveys count!

A lot of time and energy goes into the creation and maintenance of a mobile app, so don’t spoil the process by missing the mark with mobile surveys.

Mobile surveys help you listen to your app users, understand their experiences and improve your mobile product based on real feedback. But to make them count, they need to be short, purposeful, well-timed and easy to complete.

They also need to provide enough context for your team to take action. That means using the right metrics, asking relevant questions and enriching your feedback with metadata and visual feedback where possible.

Mopinion for Apps

In addition to website and email feedback, Mopinion, part of Netigate, offers a solution for collecting and analysing mobile feedback called Mopinion for Apps.

This product enables users to gather powerful insights into the mobile experience. Equipped with sophisticated in-app targeting, a wide range of customisation options and all kinds of data at your fingertips, Mopinion for Apps is a scalable solution for organisations of all shapes and sizes.

With Mopinion for Apps, you can collect feedback inside your mobile app, analyse responses and turn user insights into practical improvements. And as part of Netigate, Mopinion supports a broader approach to customer experience, helping organisations listen to users across multiple touchpoints and make better, more customer-focused decisions.

Whether you want to improve your app experience, test new features, collect product feedback or understand why users are dropping off, Mopinion for Apps helps you make mobile feedback more actionable.