Get the Feedback You Need: Best Practices for Event Surveys

As Annual Conference season approaches, now is the perfect time to think beyond registration, logistics, and event-day details, and plan for what happens after the meeting ends.

Whether you're organizing an annual conference, leadership training, retreat, workshop, or ministry event, gathering feedback from attendees can help you improve future events, strengthen the attendee experience, and make more informed decisions about everything from speakers to schedules to site selection.

The key is asking the right people, asking the right questions, and making it easy for people to respond.

Why attendee feedback matters

A thoughtful post-event survey can help you:

• Understand what worked well

• Identify what needs improvement

• Measure satisfaction with speakers, sessions, and logistics

• Strengthen relationships with attendees, sponsors, and partners

• Make better planning decisions for next year’s event

1. Identify feedback groups

Best practice: If different groups had different roles, schedules, or goals, they should not all receive the exact same survey.

Consider surveying these groups:

Attendees

This is your primary audience and often your most important feedback source. Their responses can help you evaluate the overall event experience, content, hospitality, and logistics.

Vendors or sponsors

Vendors and sponsors should receive a different survey than attendees. Their experience is centered on visibility, connections made, booth setup, communication, and return on investment.

Youth or young attendees

If your event includes youth-specific programming, activities, or tracks, consider a separate or simplified survey tailored to their experience.

Speakers or special guests

Rather than sending a standard survey, speakers and special guests often benefit more from a personalized follow-up note that thanks them and invites specific feedback.

Staff or volunteers

Staff don’t always need a full survey, but it can still be helpful to gather internal feedback either through a short, customized survey or as part of a broader event debrief.

2. Keep your questions simple, specific, and easy to answer

The best event surveys are:

• Short enough to complete quickly

• Specific enough to be useful

• Focused on one idea per question

• A mix of rating scales, multiple choice, and short-answer responses

Avoid asking double questions like:“How was the venue and food?”Instead, separate them so your feedback is clearer and more actionable.

3. What should you ask attendees?

You don’t need a huge survey, but you do need the right categories.

Core attendee survey questions to consider

Overall event experience

• Was this your first time attending?

• How satisfied were you with the event overall?

• What was your favorite part of the event?

• How can we improve on future events?

Sessions, breakouts, and workshops

If your event includes multiple sessions, ask attendees to evaluate them individually.

• Which sessions did you attend?

• How helpful was each session?

• Which breakout or workshop was most valuable to you?

• What topics would you like to see next time?

Speakers and presenters

• How would you rate each speaker or presenter?

• Which speaker or session stood out most to you?

• Do you have any suggestions for future presenters or topics?

Event logistics

These should usually be asked one at a time for clearer feedback:

• Venue

• Food

• Host city or location

• Transportation

• Hotel accommodations

• Communication before the event

• Registration process

Special event elements (if applicable)

Depending on your event, you may also want to ask about:

• Worship experiences

• Vendor or exhibit hall experience

• Childcare availability and value

• Networking opportunities

Final open-ended question

Always end with a simple catch-all question like:

• Is there anything else you’d like us to know?

That one comment box often surfaces your most useful insights.

4. Don’t forget vendors, sponsors, and internal teams

If your event includes exhibitors, sponsors, or volunteer teams, their feedback can be just as valuable.

Questions for vendors and sponsors

Ask about:

• Overall satisfaction with the sponsorship/vendor experience

• Quality of pre-event communication

• Booth setup or location challenges

• Likelihood of participating again

• Additional comments or suggestions

Questions for staff or volunteers

Keep these short and practical:

• How clear were your responsibilities?

• Did you have what you needed to do your role well?

• What challenges came up?

• What would help improve the experience next time?

5. Timing matters: when should you send the survey?

If you wait too long, response rates drop fast.

Best practice for timing

• Send the first survey within 24–48 hours after the event ends

• Send one reminder a few days later if needed

• Keep the survey open for about 5–7 days

• If needed, send a different follow-up to sponsors, vendors, or speakers on a separate timeline

For larger events like Annual Conference, it can also help to:

• Mention during the event that a survey is coming

• Include the survey link in the closing session slides or final email

• Let attendees know their feedback will help shape future gatherings

6. Make it easy to respond

Even the best survey won’t help if people don’t complete it.

Increase response rates by:

• Keeping it short

• Using mobile-friendly forms

• Asking only relevant questions

• Personalizing by attendee type when possible

• Being clear about why the feedback matters

A simple line like this can help:

“Your feedback will help us improve future gatherings and better support attendees, churches, and ministry leaders.”

7. A simple rule for better event feedback

If you want better feedback, remember this:

Ask only what you’re willing to use.

Don’t overload people with questions just because you can.Focus on the decisions you’ll need to make later:

• Should we use this venue again?

• Were the breakout topics helpful?

• Did the schedule work?

• Did vendors feel the event was worth it?

• Was communication clear enough before attendees arrived?

When your questions connect directly to future planning, the feedback becomes much more useful.

8. Choose the right survey tool for your event

There are many survey tools available, but the right one depends on your event size, registration process, and how integrated you want your communication to be.

Stova

For larger or more complex events, Stova can be especially helpful because it combines registration, communication, and post-event surveys in one platform.

And if you’d rather not manage the technology yourself, UMC Support’s Travel and Meeting Planning team can handle your online event registration for you using Stova.

Through GCFA’s Online Event Registration service, the team provides a powerful web-based event management system built specifically to support United Methodist events, with features like:

• Branded registration pages

• Online payments

• Multiple language options

• Attendee communication tools

  
  

UMC Support uses Stova as its event management software because it offers the capabilities most needed for United Methodist meetings and conferences.

Why it stands out:

• Registration and attendee data live in the same system

• You can send targeted pre-, during-, and post-event emails

• Surveys can be built in advance and scheduled to send automatically

• You can segment surveys and emails based on registration categories

• You don’t have to move contact information between multiple platforms

• UMC Support can manage the registration process on your behalf, helping reduce administrative burden

That makes it especially useful for events like Annual Conference, where you may need different communications for clergy, laity, exhibitors, special guests, or other attendee groups.

Other common options

If you need a simpler or lower-cost option, these can also work well:

• Google Forms – simple, free, easy to use

• Microsoft Forms – helpful if your organization already uses Microsoft 365

• SurveyMonkey – strong survey templates and reporting

• Jotform – flexible forms with customization options

If planning your event, from registration to the final survey, feels overwhelming, UMC Support’s Travel and Meeting Planning team is here to help. Our experienced team can support you from the earliest planning stages through onsite coordination and post-event follow-up, so you can focus less on logistics and more on the purpose of your gathering. From beginning to end, we’re ready to help make your next event a success.