The short answer is yes, when we create an online quiz for you, technically you can have any type of quiz question you desire. But that doesn’t necessarily mean you should.
In this article we’re going to look at the pros and cons of different types of questions and give you some tips on how best to use them when you create your own quiz.
We’ll also let you in on our favourite types of quiz questions and give you a heads up on which ones to avoid when you create your own quiz.
The best type of question for an online quiz
This prestigious title must go to the closed-ended question. It has a limited set of responses that can be processed and analysed easily. The closed-ended question comes in many different guises. Read on to learn about each type and why they’re our faves when it comes to creating a quiz.
- Rating scale questions
This is when the quiz taker assigns a value to the thing you’ve asked them about. Rating scales are popular because they combine measurement with opinion, for example by asking to what extent you agree with something or how often you do something
A variation of the rating scale question, and the most common type of questioning used in Specialised Marketing Assessments, is the not very nicely named ‘forced choice scale question’.
A forced-choice question is designed to force quiz takers to express an opinion or attitude. It’s useful for evaluating traits within an individual, whereas rating scale questions are more useful for evaluating traits across individuals.
It differs from the rating scale question in that it doesn’t include any neutral responses such as ’Undecided’ or ‘Don’t know’, so it allows you to collect more actionable data.
Pros
- Easy for quiz takers to understand
- Quick to analyse
Cons
- If answers lack specificity, it can be hard to understand what the quiz taker is telling you
Best practices
- Ensure balance by having an equal number of positive and negative responses
- Don’t make your wording sound too extreme, this can be off-putting as generally, people prefer not to appear OTT, especially us Brits! Instead of ‘Absolutely awesome balls!’ Consider using “Excellent”
- Consider when it is and isn’t appropriate to use forced choice scale questions. While it’s a fab way of shoving your audience off the fence, it may lead to respondents having to choose an option that they don’t really agree with
- Include easy to interpret responses and all quiz takers should draw the same meaning from the responses
- Make sure you have the right number of responses to provide enough differentiation. But if you have too many that aren’t so different from one another, your quiz takers will have difficulty reliably placing themselves
- Multiple Choice
A multiple-choice question is where the quiz taker is asked to choose one or more items from a limited list of choices.
Pros
- You can process the data quickly
- They are quick to answer so you can ask more questions
- Respondents don’t have to formulate an answer but can focus on the content
Cons
- They can be time-consuming to create
- They limit the quiz taker in their answers
Best practices
- Use simple sentences and precise wording
- Make all options plausible
- Keep all responses the same length
- Avoid double negatives
- Keep the number of options consistent
- Matching
Matching questions require quiz takers to match a series of statements to a series of responses. They are a variation of the multiple-choice format.
Pros
- Quick and easy to create
Cons
- Takes longer for the quiz takers to answer
Best practices
- Provide clear directions
- Keep the statements and responses as uniform as possible
- Ranking question
The Ranking question provides the quiz taker with a list of items for them to rank according to how much they like them or how important they think they are.
Pros
- They’re a useful way to get quiz takers to tell you their choice between preferred items
Cons
- Forces quiz takers to differentiate between items that they might think of as equal
Best practices
- Make sure that the items you’re asking the quiz taker to rank actually relate to one another and can be evaluated using the same criteria
- Keep your list of items to rank under five. Anymore, and it will be difficult for the quiz taker
- Star rating question
A star rating question allows quiz takers to rate a product or service, usually out of three to five stars. It’s a great option if you’re asking for general opinions. You can also use emoji or smiley rating icons, which are more suitable when asking about emotions or sentiments.
Use cases would be asking hotel guests to evaluate their hotel room, breakfast, or their stay in general or asking employees to rate a training event.
Pros
- They are easy to set up and easy to analyse
- They can be created for almost anything
- They provide an opportunity for things to be graded fairly
- They are less subjective than other question types
Cons
- Data can be skewed as research shows that most people will provide a positive rating to justify their decision in choosing the product or service
Best practices
- Don’t assume that because the responses are so simple, you can ask a more complicated question. Keep it short and clear!
Other types of quiz questions
Now we’ve covered our favourite types of quiz questions and the ones we recommend using in your Specialised Marketing Assessment, let’s look at other types of quiz questions available.
Whether these quiz question types are appropriate for you to use depends entirely on the goals for your bespoke quiz. When you create your own quiz with SMA Digital, we’re always on hand advise and guide you.
Fill-in-the-blank
A fill-in-the-blank question consists of a phrase, sentence, or paragraph with a blank space where a quiz taker provides the missing word or words. You can also create a question with multiple blanks.
Pros
- Highly reliable
- Easier to write
Cons
- Numerous possible correct answers may exist
- Takes more time for quiz takers to complete them
Best practices
- Keep answers for the blanks simple and brief
- Limit answers to one word. This prevents issues such as extra spaces or word order that can cause a correct answer to be scored as incorrect
Demographic Question
When we create a quiz we add in ‘segmentation questions’ to help you qualify your leads. It is in this section of the quiz that you might use demographic questions to ask for personal information or details about their business.
Pros
- Easy to answer
- Easy to analyse
Cons
- Can be vague
- Can become outdated
Best practices
- Put them at the end of your quiz so your quiz taker’s focus is directed on the main part of your quiz
- Some demographic questions can be sensitive, be sure to include a ‘prefer not to say’ option
Quiz question types to avoid
And finally, let’s go over the types of quiz question that we wouldn’t touch with a 10-foot barge pole, the reasons why, and how to avoid them.
Leading questions
A leading question forces the quiz taker to answer in a particular way, often by implying or encouraging a certain answer. These types of questions are undesirable as they produce inaccurate information
A question can be leading if it assumes that something is true, even if there’s no evidence. For example, “how much do you think prices will drop?” assumes that prices will go down. You could turn this into a non-leading question by first asking “Do you think prices will drop?”
Statistical results based on leading questions give an unrealistic picture of your quiz taker’s opinions or trends.
Questions can also become leading if they imply something. For example, ‘Do you have any problems with your boss?’ prompts the quiz taker to question their employment relationship, it raises the prospect that there are problems. A better alternative would be ‘Tell me about your relationship with your boss?’. It’s non-judgey and doesn’t suggest there’s anything wrong with the relationship.
Double-barrelled question
A double-barrelled question is composed of two separate issues or topics, but only one response is available.
It can be easy to fall into the trap of using double-barrelled questions, it can happen when you want to explain or clarify certain aspects of your questions by adding extra information. This tends to make your question confusing and it becomes difficult to understand the true intentions of your quiz takers’ answers. So, it’s basically useless you’re a lawyer trying to trick a witness!
An example of a double-barrelled question could be ‘Did you find the training interesting and useful?’
It has two parts. Even though interesting and useful are both positive attributes, they’re not interchangeable. Some quiz takers might find the training interesting, but not useful. While others might find it useful, but not interesting. But how should they answer? And more importantly, how can you interpret these answers?
If you find you have double barrelled quiz questions, simply break them up into separate questions:
- ‘Is the product interesting?’
- ‘Is the product useful?’
Another example is ‘How satisfied are you with your pay and work environment?’ This should be:
- ‘How satisfied are you with your pay?’
- ‘How satisfied are you with your work environment?’
At SMA Digital we avoid leading and double-barrelled questions and the subsequent loss of actionable data by having robust quality assurance and quality enhancement methods built into our quiz design and creation process.
We hope this information helps you decide which type of questions are right for your quiz and how best to use them.
