I N PA R T N E R S H I P
Ballot/Voting through Survey Monkey
a step-by-step guide
This step-by-step guide will take you through using Survey Monkey for students to vote on who
they want their student representative to be. The guide will cover how to create, distribute
and analyse the responses to your Ballot/Vote survey.
If you have any questions about using Survey Monkey for your Student Representative
Election or elections in general, please contact [email protected].
Creating a Survey Monkey Account
Creating your Survey Monkey account is quick and simple all you need to do is;
a)
b)
c)
Visit the Survey Monkey website
(click here)
Click on ‘Sign up FREE’ or ‘Pro
Sign Up’ depending on what type
of account you want.
Enter the required details for the
type of account you are creating
and click ‘Sign Up’.
Figure 1: Survey Monkey Homepage
For the purpose of this walk through we
will be using a FREE account.
Please Note: that a FREE Survey Monkey
account has limits. The free account will
only allow you to receive up to 100
responses per survey and does not
allow you to download your responses, but you can still view them online. If you believe that
you may receive more than 100 responses or want to download the responses you will either
need to upgrade to a Pro account or use a different method of running a ballot.
Building a Ballot/Voting Survey
Once you have signed up for a Survey Monkey account, and logged into the Survey Monkey
website, you will need to create your ballot/vote survey. To create you ballot/vote survey
you will need to;
a)
b)
c)
d)
e)
Click on ‘+Create Survey’, this can be found in the top right corner under your
username or under the ‘Create Your
Own Survey in 3 Easy Steps’ part of
your dashboard
Now you need to give your survey a
Title. This title will be visible to
anyone completing the survey. This
Figure 2: Survey Title
could simply be ‘Student Rep
Election’ (see Figure 2)
Leave the Category box as ‘Select a Category’ (see Figure 2)
Click on the green ‘Let’s Go!’ icon (see Figure 2)
You should not see figure 3 and can start building your survey.
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f)
Click on ‘+Add Page Title, to change the title of the page to ‘Introduction’ (see Figure
3)
Figure 3
g)
h)
Under the building options on the left click and drag the ‘Text’ icon into the ‘To add a
question, simply click or drag it from the builder’ part in the centre of the screen. (see
Figure 3)
The text builder will then appear. Under
‘text’ write an introduction which
should include where they can get
information and who they can contact
about the ballot/vote. You can write
your own or use the content we have
provided under ‘Suggested Content’
at the end of this document. Once you
have written your introduction click the
green ‘Save’ icon (see Figure 4)
Figure 4
Hint: if you click on the ‘…’ (Advanced
editor) icon on the far right about the text
box. This will provide you with more options to edit your text such as bullet point.
i)
j)
k)
l)
Now you need to add a new page to your survey. Scroll to the bottom and click ‘Add
New Page’
Change the page title to ‘The Candidates’ (see stage f)
Add another ‘Text’ from the builder onto this page (see stage h). This should explain
that all the candidates running are listed below with their 200 statement; suggested
content has been provided at the end of this document. Once you have written the
content click the green ‘Save’ icon.
Now for each candidate that you have you will need to add another ‘Text’ from the
builder option on the left (see stage h). For each candidate you should write their
name in bold and directly underneath that should be their 200 word statement (if
provided). If they have not provided a 200 word statement just put ‘no statement
provided’. When you have completed each candidate’s text information click the
green ‘Save’ icon.
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m)
n)
o)
p)
q)
r)
s)
t)
u)
v)
Now you need to add a new page
to your survey. Scroll to the bottom
and click ‘Add New Page’
Change the page title to ‘Your
Vote’ (see stage f)
Click and Drag the ‘Ranking’ icon
from the builder list on the left onto
your survey and write the following
content;
i. Question Text: ‘Please rank each
of the candidates below into
your order of preference with
your first preference being the
candidate you would like to be
Figure 5
your student rep the most. You
can rank the candidates by
either, clicking and dragging their name or clicking the drop down to the left of
each candidate’s name.’
ii. Write each candidate in their own row, if you need to add a more rows click the
green ‘+’ icon.
Now go to the ‘Options’ tab and tick the ‘Randomise’ box (see Figure 5)
When you are happy the you have put all candidates names on the question click the
green ‘save’ icon
Now add your next and final
survey page (see stage i)
Change the page title to ‘Before
you submit’ (see stage f)
Add another ‘Text’ from the
builder list and in the text content
explain that they are about to
submit their vote. You can write
your own content or used the
suggested content at the end of
this document.
Now if you hover over the blue
‘Done’ button you will see a green
‘edit’ icon appear to the right.
Figure 6
Click on the ‘edit’ icon (see Figure
6)
Change the Done button text to ‘Submit’ and click the green ‘save’ icon (see Figure 6)
You have now built your Ballot/Vote Survey and can move on to distributing the survey to the
student body.
Distributing the Ballot/Vote Survey
Once you have created your Ballot/Vote Survey, you will need to distribute the survey
amongst the student body. Survey Monkey provides you with a couple of options to
distribute your survey, but we will run through how to distribute using email and the web link.
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a)
b)
c)
Click on the ‘Collect Responses’ tab at the
top of the page to assess Survey Monkeys
distribution options for your survey.
Click on ‘Send it Fast and Easy’ icon (see
figure 7)
Click on the green ‘Next’ icon (see Figure 7)
For the Vote survey you can use either the email
option or the web link option. It is recommended
however that you use the email option or your vote survey.
Figure 7
Distributing using the Web Link Option
The Web Link option provide you with a URL
that you could copy and send out in social
media, post of canvas or in an email from
your outlook. When students click on this it will
link them to the survey anonymously.
To distribute your Ballot/Vote Survey, using the
Web Link option, you will need to;
a)
b)
c)
d)
Click on the ‘Responses Per Computer’
drop down, under the web link (see
Figure 8)
Click on the icon next to ‘Allow multiple
responses per computer’, this will ensure
that multiple students would be able to
Figure 8
complete the survey even if they used
the same computer. (see Figure 8)
Copy the Web Link (see Figure 8)
Use the Web link in any message you are using to promote the vote for example
Canvas, Emails or Social Media. This link will direct them straight to your ballot/vote
survey.
Advice: It is strongly recommended that you use the email distribution option for your
Ballot/vote survey. This will make it easier to track voters to ensure that they are eligible to
vote and that they have only voted once. If you do decide to use the Web Link you will need
to add a question into your survey that asks for their Name, Student Number and University
Email Address.
If you have a Pro Account: you are able to customise the web link by clicking the
‘Customise’ icon to the right of the web link. This will allow you to change the link after .com/
to whatever you like as long as it is not already being used.
Distributing using the Email Option
The Email option allows you to send an email straight from Survey Monkey to everyone that
you would like to complete the survey. This email provides them with a unique web link
meaning that you will know exactly who has completed or started the survey.
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This option is useful if you have a position that represents a specific group of students, e.g.
International Students Rep, so that you can email those specific students with a different
message or survey.
Figure 9
To distribute your ballot/vote Survey, using the email option, you will need to;
a)
b)
I.
II.
Click on the ‘Email’ icon at the bottom of the ‘Collect Responses’ Tab
You will need to create a list of contacts that you would like to send the survey to. It is
suggested that you do this in an excel file.
In excel in column A type ‘Email’, in column B type ‘FirstName’ and in column C type
‘Last Name (see figure 9)
Under each column write your students email
first name and last name. This will give you a
contact list.
Advise: if you download your students information
from BIRMS you could copy and paste the relevant
information into this excel file.
III.
c)
d)
e)
f)
g)
Then save your file as a CSV (Comma
Delimited), this can be found under Save as
type (see Figure 9)
Now you need to add who you want to send
the survey to, in Survey Monkey, by clicking
the ‘+Add Recipients’ icon to the right of the
Sent to box (see Figure 10)
This will give you a list of ways you can upload
your recipients contacts, click on the ‘CSV’
icon.
Then find your contact list you name in excel
and upload. Your file name should then
appear in the Sent to box ready for the
email to be sent to your contacts.
Now change the Subject Title, this could be
‘Vote for your Student Rep’ (see Figure 10)
Change the content of the email by clicking
the ‘edit’ icon to the right of message. (see
Figure 10)
Figure 10
Figure 11
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h)
i)
j)
k)
l)
m)
n)
I.
II.
Now write the content of your email, this should include a description of the role and
who they can contact or more information. Suggested content has been provided at
the end of this guide.
Change the Button text to ‘Vote for your Student Rep’
Click the green ‘Save’ icon to save your email content.
When you are happy with your email click the green ‘Next’ icon at the bottom of the
page (see Figure 10)
The next page may ask you to validate the email address you signed up to Survey
Monkey under Senders Email Address. You can change this and it will be the email
address that appears in the recipient’s inbox (see Figure 11)
Once you have validated the sender email address click the green ‘Next’ icon at the
bottom of the page (see Figure 11)
The next page will ask you whether you want to send the email now or schedule for a
later date.
If you are happy to send the email straight away click the green ‘Send Now’ icon (see
Figure 12)
If you want to schedule for a later date click the box next to ‘Schedule a later date
and time to send’ and complete the information of when you want to send the email.
Then click the green ‘schedule’ icon at the bottom of the page.
Figure 12
You have now either sent your email invitation out for students to start completing the survey
or have scheduled a date and time that Survey Monkey will send the survey out.
Reviewing and Analysing your responses.
Once you have started to
distribute your survey you should
start to receive responses. When
you log into your Survey Monkey
account you can monitor the
amount of responses you have
received by looking under the
‘Responses’ column next to the
survey you want to look at (see
Figure 13).
Before you start to review and
analyse your responses you will
need to close your survey. This is to
ensure that you do not receive any
Figure 13
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additional responses after the deadline, or when you have started analysing responses.
To do this you will need to:
a)
b)
c)
Click on the survey that you
want to look at, by clicking on
the survey title in green.
Click
on
the
‘Collect
Responses’ tab, if you are not
already on it
You will see a list of all the
distribution options you are
Figure 14
d)
e)
f)
using with a green ‘OPEN’
next to them (see Figure 14)
Click on the drop down to the far right of each distribution option
Click on ‘Close Collector’ to close that distribution option (see Figure 15)
Repeat this for all the other distribution options open until they are all closed.
Now that you have closed your survey
you can start to review the responses.
Survey Monkey does some analysis
online and allows you to view online
each individual response. You can also
download responses to excel, however
you will need to have a Pro account to
do this.
To review and analyse your responses
you will need to;
a)
b)
c)
d)
Click on the ‘Analyse Results’ tab
at the top of the page.
You will now see a summary of all
the responses for your survey.
The Summary graph will show you
Figure 15
the
score
each
Candidate
received from students ranking them. You can also determine this by the score column
in the table below the graph (see Figure 15)
If you are running the vote as a ‘first past the post’ election, the students with the
highest scores will be elected into the available positions.
For more advice on how to run your vote if you are not using first past the post, please
contact [email protected] or see the ‘Student Representation System Election
Guidance’ document on the Student Representation intranet page (click here).
If you have a FREE account you will only be able to view responses online and cannot
download responses. If you have a Pro account you can download all responses and then
copy the information you need from excel.
Suggested Content
Below we have provided some suggested content that you could include in your survey or
email if you decide to use the email distribution option. The content in bold indicates
information that will need to be inserted into the content.
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Survey Content
Introduction Page;
The Student Representation System allows you to be represented by a fellow student (student
Rep) to the University and the Guild of Students.
There has been more interest in the role of [Insert Student Representative role] then there are
positions available and now you get to vote on who you would like to represent you.
The next page will introduce each candidate running to be your next student rep. You will
also see under each candidate’s name a short statement that they have written explaining
why they would like to be your student representative and how they would work to represent
you.
You will then be asked to cast your vote by ranking each candidate in preference order.
If you have any questions about the voting process please contact;


[Insert University contacts information]
Guild of Students by emailing [email protected]
The Candidates Page;
Each candidate that is running in this election to become one of your student reps is listed
below. Under each of their names you will find a short statement on why they want to be
your student representative and how they would work to represent you. This statement is
there to help you decide on who you would like to represent you.
When you have read through each candidate’s information, move onto the next page
where you can cast your vote.
Before you submit Page;
Before you submit your vote please ensure that you are happy with the order you have
ranked each candidate so that it reflects your preference.
The vote will close on [Insert Date]. Once the vote closes each candidate will be contacted
and told if they have been successfully election by you, the student cohort.
You will then be informed of who your [Insert Student Representative Role] is and how you
can contact them.
Email Content;
Dear [FirstName],
The Student Representation System is an opportunity for you to represent to the University,
and the Guild of Students, by a fellow student (student rep).
Nominations to put yourself forward to be a student rep for your student cohort have now
closed and there has been more interest in the role than the amount of positions available.
When this happens an election takes place where the student cohort gets to vote for who
they would like to represent them.
This email is to tell you that this election is now open and you can vote for who you want to
represent you. This vote closes on [insert close date], so you have until then to cast your vote.
Kind regards
[insert name]
Distributing the s Survey