“How did you hear about us?”: good and bad answer options
By Peter Coolen · · 5 min read
“How did you hear about us?” is the most popular post-purchase question for a reason. Your analytics only see the last click. They miss the podcast your customer heard on the way to work, the friend who recommended you and the TikTok they watched a week before they searched for your name. Only the customer can tell you that.
But the question is easy to get wrong. A badly written version gives you a pile of answers you can’t act on. Here is how to write one that gives you clean, honest data.
Open text or a list?
An open text box feels respectful, but it creates work. You will get “insta”, “IG”, “Instagram ad”, “saw u on instagram” and “a reel” for the same channel, and you will have to group them by hand before you can count anything.
- TikTok
- Google search
- Podcast
- Friend or family
- Other
A single choice list gives you numbers you can compare month to month. The “Other” option still catches the channels you didn’t think of.
Vague options
“Social media” doesn’t tell you where to spend your marketing budget. Neither do “Online” or “Internet”, which describe almost every channel there is.
- Social media
- Online
- Word of mouth
- Other
- TikTok
- YouTube
- Google search
- Friend or family
- Other
Options that overlap
If you list “Instagram” and “An ad”, a customer who saw an Instagram ad can pick either. Your numbers then depend on how each person reads the question.
- An ad
- Influencer
- Social media
- Other
Make every option a different place: Instagram, TikTok, Google search, a podcast. If you need to know whether it was an ad, ask that as a separate, optional question.
Too many choices
A list of twenty channels is slow to read on a phone, and people pick the first option that is roughly right. Most stores get the bulk of their customers from a handful of places.
Twenty options, including channels you have never used.
Six to ten options covering the channels you actually invest in, plus “Friend or family” and “Other”.
“Select all that apply”
Multiple choice sounds more complete, but it makes the results hard to read. When one customer ticks five boxes, which channel brought them in?
- TikTok
- Google search
- Podcast
- Friend or family
- TikTok
- Google search
- Podcast
- Friend or family
Single choice. The word “first” helps people pick one answer.
Asking returning customers
Someone on their fifth order heard about you a long time ago. Their answer will be a guess, and they will be tired of the question.
The same question on every order, for every customer.
Show the survey only to first-time customers. Returning customers can get a different question, such as what made them order again.
Forgetting the “Other” answers
The “Other” answers are where you find out about the channels you didn’t know you had: a blog that reviewed you, a niche forum, a creator you have never worked with.
Counting “Other” as one big bucket and moving on.
Read the “Other” answers every month. When the same one keeps coming up, add it to the list.
A good starting point
- TikTok
- YouTube
- Google search
- Podcast
- Friend or family
- OtherA review on a blog I follow
Replace the channels with your own, keep it to one question and make it required. If you want more detail, add one optional open question after it, such as “Which podcast or creator was it?”.
Want to ask more than one thing? Read good and bad examples of post-purchase survey questions.
Written with AI, idea and final edit by Peter Coolen.