Create a Polling Survey

Polling surveys display as a question on a customer portal page or any page that is external to the customer portal.

1. From the Surveys explorer, click New.
   A new survey opens on the content pane.

   Tip: You can also create surveys from an open survey by clicking New. Additionally, if your navigation set is configured to add surveys from the file menu, click File > Surveys > Survey.
2. Click Polling Survey.
   The Summary tab for a polling survey displays on the content pane.

   By default, the Summary tab is active. From here, you can review general information about the polling survey in the At a Glance section, as well as manage polling survey notes, tasks, attachments, and audit log. As you create the polling survey, you move through each tab to complete the polling survey elements.

3. To assign the polling survey to another staff member (by default, the survey is assigned to the staff member who creates it), click the Assigned drop-down list and select the staff member. To search for a staff member, enter the staff member’s name in the Find field.
   Wildcards are supported when searching staff members. You can search strings that include a space by entering %+Space+character, which is helpful when searching last names. For example, typing %+Space+b returns all last names starting with the letter b. There is also an implied wildcard when searching, so typing b in the Find field returns all items containing the letter b.
4. Click the text in the At a Glance section to perform common polling survey functions.

   At a Glance Section

   Field	Description
   Invitation Method	This field displays the invitation method currently selected for the survey. Click Change to change the method. After a polling survey is submitted by a customer, you cannot change the method.
   Survey Status	This field displays whether the polling survey is active or inactive.
   Expiration Date	This field displays the polling survey expiration date and time. By default, no expiration date is set.
   Expiration Max Responses	This field displays the number of responses a survey can accept. If set, this field also displays the number of responses received, as well as the number of surveys that are still allowed. The maximum number of survey responses you can define is one million. This field works only on sites using Customer Portal Framework Version 3.0 or later.
   Expiration Message	Click Edit to customize the survey expiration message. If you do not define your own survey expiration message, the system default message is used. This field works only on sites using Customer Portal Framework Version 3.0 or later.
   Question List	This field displays how many active and inactive questions are in the polling survey. The system supports a maximum of 100 questions. There must be at least one active question in the polling survey.
   Responses	This field displays how many polling surveys were offered to and submitted by customers.

5. Click the Question List tab to add questions to the polling survey.
   You can either add existing questions or create new questions. Keep in mind, if more than one question is used in a polling survey, one question is randomly selected to display to customers for a one-hour time period. Every customer who is offered the poll during that hour sees the same question. At the end of an hour, a new question is selected at random.

   Tip: Since all questions are stored in the same place, questions are shared across the different survey types.
6. Click Add Question.
   The Select Question window opens.
7. To add an existing question, double-click the question you want to add.
   The question is added to the Active Questions list.
8. To add a new question, click Add Question, and then click New Survey Question.
   1. To create a text question, see Create a Text Question.
   2. To create a choice question, see Create a Choice Question.
   3. To create a matrix question, see Create a Matrix Question.
      Note: Display options which lets you define HTML properties for all question types, may be affected by widget styling attributes defined in the customer portal. (Display options are available on the ribbon of a new question.)

      You can also activate and deactivate questions, open questions for editing, and remove questions from the questions list. Questions with results cannot be removed, but they can be deactivated.

   Tip: Questions can be edited after they have been created, even if they have been used in a polling survey. Keep in mind that if you edit a question, those changes appear immediately in any polling survey that uses the question. For this reason, if you want to preserve the integrity of the data returned by the original question, we recommend creating a new question rather than editing the existing question.
9. To define polling survey options, click Polling Options on the ribbon. The Polling Survey Options window opens.
   1. To define the polling survey title that displays on the web page, enter it in the Poll Title field.
   2. To let respondents see the polling survey results chart on the web page, select Show Chart.
   3. To display the total number of votes on the web page, select Show Total Votes.
   4. To display polling survey results to all web page visitors, even if they have not responded to the poll, select Show View Results Link.
   5. To define what happens after customers submit a polling survey, click Add Action in the End of Survey Actions section. You can also edit, remove, and reorder actions. End of survey actions are handled the same way as end of survey options in broadcast and transactional surveys.
   Note: In order for an end of survey action to work from an external page, the customer portal needs to associate the customer with a contact record. Therefore, the customer must be logged in to the customer portal site, or you must implement open login or pass-through authentication (PTA) functionality. See Set End of Survey Options.
10. To spell check the polling survey, click Spelling.
11. To preview the polling survey, click Preview Survey.
    The polling survey preview lets you see specific questions and switch between views.

    Tip: Since polling surveys are not accessible through a link, you can’t send a proof of your polling survey to anyone. So previewing and spell checking your polling survey are important steps in your process.
12. Click the Results tab to view the reports associated with the polling survey.
    1. Select a question and click Go.
       The question results display in a web browser.
    Tip: If your polling survey uses a text question, you can use topic monitoring to group the text responses containing similar content so that you can look for emerging themes. See Topic Monitoring.
13. Click Save.

What to do next

When you save the polling survey, a survey ID is assigned that must be associated to the polling widget in the customer portal. See Add the Polling Widget to a Page.