There are 5 key steps to complete when setting up a Survey Study, detailed below.
Create new Studies much faster and more reliably by setting up custom Email Templates and Question Templates (used in screeners and surveys) that can be leveraged by your team. This saves you significant time and allows you to ensure the right questions are being asked, pre-define mapping between questions and custom Properties to automatically enrich Participant Profiles, and use professional, consistent, approved communication in all email outreach.
After completing all Study setup steps, you can either (1) publish it to an Active status to proceed with the next steps to add and invite Participants and begin research or (2) save and exit to keep it in a Draft state to return later. Learn more about Study Statuses.
Visit our Creating Studies in Rally guide to learn more about how to prepare key components in advance before creating Studies, and learn the next steps for conducting each Study type after creation.
Create A Survey Study
Navigate to the Studies page and select '+ New Study'.
Enter a Study Name.
Recruitment defaults to In-house (recruit Participants from your own database in Rally).
Recruiting Participants from an external panel (incentives + recruitment fees per Participant required) is not currently available for Survey Study types. Learn about external panel recruitment for Interview or Unmoderated Test Studies.
Select the Study Type 'Survey'.
Select 'Continue' to open the Study Builder.
Plan
Start by setting up the key details of your Study.
Study name: Give your Study a clear and descriptive name to easily identify it in your workspace.
Study external name: Add an external name for your Study. This can be used with Personalization Tokens to easily add the participant-facing name into emails, etc.
Research Goal (optional): Define the specific goal or objective of your research study to guide your team.
Research plan (optional): Provide additional details about your research plan, such as methodology or target audience.
Study type: Confirm the Study type is 'Survey' before proceeding.
Participant limit: Set a maximum number of Participants for your Study or choose to allow unlimited Participants for continuous research.
Consent (optional): Add a consent form to ensure Participants understand and agree to participate in your Study. Choose the type of consent form and its placement within the signup process.
Select consent form: Select the consent form to include from the dropdown.
Upload Documents, such as NDAs, and create custom Consent Forms to select from in Studies.
When to capture consent: Decide when to request consent from participants to determine consent placement within the Study by selecting an option:
Before participants start the survey
After participants complete the survey
Manual - you'll email the consent form
Learn how to manually email consent forms directly to Participants.
Incentive (optional): Specify the amount or reward you will provide to Participants for their Participation.
Users can 'Add Funds' to the selected Incentive Budget here, or wait to add funds before sending incentives later. This may require manager approval.
Learn how to set up, send, and manage Incentives.
Branding: Personalize your Study with your company's logo and brand colors to create a cohesive experience.
Set up and manage Brands for your workspace.
Language (optional): Select from the options to translate your Study into another language. Currently, each Study can only have 1 language set; for example, choosing Spanish will not show an English option for users.
Note: Web pages, screener endings, and uneditable elements of emails will be translated by Rally to your chosen language, but customizable elements that your team creates or includes (such as screener and survey questions or question templates, email content or email templates, and consent forms) will not be automatically translated and can be prepared in advance by your team.
Survey
Ask the right questions and keep your Participants engaged to gather the best feedback.
Survey tool: Select your preferred survey tool. While Rally's native survey tool is recommended for seamless integration with properties and automated follow-ups, you can also choose from one of our Survey integrations with Qualtrics, SurveyMonkey, Typeform, or UserTesting. You can also 'Link to a custom survey' to use an alternative non-integrated survey tool; if you choose this option, follow the link to ensure proper setup to see survey completion updates in Rally Studies.
Build Survey: If you use Rally's survey tool, create your survey by adding questions and implementing conditional logic to tailor the screening process. Select '+ Add Question' and either:
'Create New Question'
Learn how to create new questions, map questions/responses to Properties, and optionally save them as new Question Templates as you go.
'Add From Question Templates'
We recommend creating custom Question Templates in advance to allow your team to quickly and easily build quality screeners.
Survey endings: Customize messages for Participants based on their qualification status.
Standard: A general message that Participants see after they submit the screener.
Example: "Thank you for taking the time to fill out the survey."
Qualified: A message that Participants see after they submit the screener with auto-qualifying answers.
Example: "Thank you for choosing to participate. We think you'd be an awesome fit for our study, and we will reach out to you when there are opportunities for you to participate in."
Disqualified: A message that Participants see after they submit the screener with auto-disqualifying answers.
Example: "Thank you for taking the time to fill out the survey."
💡 Screeners cannot be submitted twice by a Participant for the same Study. This avoids overwriting original responses or any Participants attempting to bypass a disqualification with an additional submission attempt.
Emails
Preparing your emails upfront saves you time and keeps your messaging consistent. You can always return to edit them later or edit them when sending. We highly recommend setting up custom Email Templates for your team in advance to save significant time and ensure professional, consistent, approved communication is used in all email outreach. Email Templates can be selected when reviewing and editing messages during the Email setup step.
Study Invitation: Send an invitation to potential Participants to participate in your Study by taking the survey.
Incentive: Thank Participants for taking part in the Study, confirm incentive details, and fulfill incentives. Not included for Studies without incentives enabled.
Edit and Preview Outreach Emails
Select the pencil icon next to each email to customize and carefully preview each one.
💡 Visit Email Templates for complete steps and additional important information.
Select Template: Select from pre-made Email Templates for consistency.
Layout: Select Plain Text or choose Branded for more professional outreach.
Subject: Edit the email subject as needed. Optionally, include Personalization Tokens to auto-populate such as Participant's First Names.
Body: Edit the email body as needed (less relevant for Email Templates). Optionally, further customize formatting and add Personalization Tokens to auto-include relevant information, such as Study Name or Incentive Amount.
Include Unsubscribe Link: Include a link at the bottom of your emails allowing recipients to stay unsubscribed. It will help you stay compliant with local spam laws and improve deliverability. Unsubscribe links are required for branded emails.
Send Test: Optionally, send yourself a test email.
+ Save As New Template: Save any new email you create as an Email Template for later reuse.
Done: Select Done to close the editor.
💡 Learn how to decrease spam rate and improve email deliverability before emailing customers.
Share
Choose how you'll recruit Participants and share your Study.
Select Recruitment Channels:
Send Emails: Emails are always enabled.
Share a Public Link: Toggle on 'Share a Public Link’ if you’d like to invite Participants via a share link.
Recruitment Preferences:
Welcome Page: Create a custom Welcome Page for Participants by selecting 'Edit Page'. Check the corresponding boxes to decide whether the welcome page will be shown to Participants invited via Email or Share Link, or neither.
Contact Information: Confirm which information will be required from Participants when they sign up.
First Name & Last Name: This setting is enabled by default and requires a person to enter their first name & last name to join this Study. Optionally, disable this setting for Participants invited via Email.
Email Address: This setting is enabled by default as an email address is required to join a Study. Decide whether to allow 'Personal or work emails' or 'Work emails only'. This defaults to 'Personal or work emails'.
Review
Confirm everything is correct or add any missing info to ensure your Study is complete.
Review the components of your Study: Rally will check for any known errors or missing details in your Study setup for you to make necessary edits. Preview your entire Study from the Participant's perspective to ensure a seamless experience.
Select 'Create Study' in the top right to launch the Study and get started!
If you're not ready to Publish it, select 'Save & Exit' to save it in a Draft state to return later.
Next, add Participants to your Study before sending email invitations or sharing links.