Here are some of the best questions for a B2B Buyer survey about vendor selection criteria, plus tips to create them. Building this kind of survey is super efficient with Specific—you can generate yours in seconds.
Best open-ended questions for B2B buyer vendor selection criteria surveys
Open-ended questions help us dig beneath the surface, letting real buyer motivations and nuances come through. They’re especially powerful for uncovering the “why” behind decision-making rather than just the “what.” If you need unfiltered, actionable insights, start here.
What is the first thing you look for in a potential vendor?
Can you describe an experience where a vendor exceeded your expectations? What stood out?
What would make you switch away from your current vendor?
How do you typically research and shortlist vendors?
Which vendor qualities build trust for you?
What emerging trends or innovations do you expect from vendors in your industry?
When evaluating vendor compatibility, which integrations matter most for your business?
How important are ethical or sustainable business practices when choosing a vendor?
Tell us about a time when poor customer service influenced your vendor decision.
What could vendors do better to streamline your buying process?
It’s worth noting: Almost 97% of B2B decision-makers already have a preferred vendor in mind before the selection process even starts, so understanding these deeper reasons is critical. [1]
Best single-select multiple-choice questions for B2B buyers
Single-select multiple-choice questions are handy when you want to quantify preferences or start a conversation from simple options. They’re especially good at reducing friction—sometimes it’s just easier for buyers to pick a choice, and you can always follow up to get more detail.
Question: What is the most important criterion when selecting a new vendor?
Brand reputation
Integration with existing tech
Price
Customer service
Other
Question: How do you usually discover new vendors?
Personal referral
Online research
Industry events
Digital advertising
Other
Question: How important is sustainability and ethical practices in your vendor selection?
Critical
Somewhat important
Not important
Other
When to follow up with “why?” Following up with “why?” is ideal when a response leaves room for interpretation or you want to understand the reasoning behind a choice. For instance, if someone selects “integration with existing tech,” asking “why is seamless integration your top priority?” often uncovers pain points and unmet needs—which is gold for product or sales teams.
When and why to add the “Other” choice? Always consider “Other” when your list of options might not be exhaustive—basically, whenever you suspect you don’t know every answer in advance. The follow-up to “Other” can reveal unexpected trends and emerging criteria you hadn’t anticipated in your initial question set.
For example, 90% of B2B buyers say a vendor’s ability to integrate with their current technology stack is crucial, while 36% now factor in sustainability and ethics more than ever. [2] [3]
Should you use an NPS question in B2B buyer vendor selection criteria surveys?
NPS (Net Promoter Score) is a simple, industry-standard question that gauges buyers’ willingness to recommend a vendor to others. Including it in a B2B buyer vendor selection survey can quickly surface overall sentiment and loyalty, which is especially useful for benchmarking. This works well in conjunction with open-ended questions as follow-up—asking promotor, detractor, or neutral respondents what led to their score. If you want to set one up quickly, try this NPS survey builder.
Multiple studies show that more than 42% of buyers look for alternatives due to poor customer service, so pairing NPS with the right follow-up can pinpoint exactly what’s driving positive—or negative—experiences. [4]
The power of follow-up questions
Smart follow-up questions are where conversational surveys really shine. Automated probing—like what Specific offers with AI-powered follow-up questions—transforms a static answer into a real conversation, getting at the “why” behind a response in real-time. This makes it easy to clarify, dig deeper, or collect user stories—all without back-and-forth emails.
B2B Buyer: We’re looking for seamless integration.
AI follow-up: Can you describe a time when poor integration impacted your business workflow?
This specific feature saves a ton of time, uncovers deeper insights, and makes the whole experience feel more human—and less like a form. If you skip follow-ups, you’re left with vague data (“we want better integration”) instead of clear, actionable feedback (“our old vendor didn’t support our ERP, which cost us hours each week”).
How many follow-ups to ask? Generally, 2–3 well-timed follow-ups are enough to reach the real root of any answer, while still keeping the survey flow smooth. Specific lets you set limits and skip ahead once you’ve captured the needed insights.
This makes it a conversational survey: You’re not just filling boxes—AI-powered follow-ups create a dialogue, which encourages more thoughtful and complete responses.
AI analysis for open-ended responses: Even as you gather lots of unstructured feedback, it’s easy to analyze responses with AI—see this guide to analyzing survey responses using AI. AI can instantly surface themes and summarize sentiment across tons of responses, turning what used to be a chore into an insight engine.
These types of surveys are new for most organizations, so go ahead and try building one—the experience itself is eye-opening.
How to prompt AI (ChatGPT) to generate survey questions
Want to write your own draft questions before running a survey with Specific or another AI tool? You can get great results by prompting ChatGPT or any similar model. Start with a basic prompt like:
Suggest 10 open-ended questions for B2B Buyer survey about Vendor Selection Criteria.
AI always works better if you supply more detail about your audience, goal, or context. For instance, you can add:
We’re interviewing software procurement leads at mid-sized SaaS companies. Our goal is to identify what matters most when choosing new vendors, with emphasis on tech integration, brand trust, and digital experience. Suggest 10 open-ended questions.
After reviewing those questions, you might want to group them into themes for easier editing or flow. Next prompt:
Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.
If you want to go deeper into a particular area—say, tech integration—use:
Generate 10 questions for the category “Technology Integrations.”
This iterative approach gives you a tailored set of questions that truly fit your company’s process and needs.
What is a conversational survey?
A conversational survey isn’t just a list of questions—it’s an interactive, chat-like experience that adapts to each answer in real time. Instead of clicking through a static form, buyers feel like they’re having a thoughtful exchange. This leads to richer, more honest feedback and higher response rates.
Compare the traditional approach with a modern AI survey:
Manual Survey Creation | AI-Generated Conversational Survey |
|---|---|
Build questions by hand, often reusing old templates | Create or update surveys instantly using AI survey generators |
Static forms, no probing questions | Dynamic, context-aware follow-ups drive deeper insight |
Manual analysis of open-ended responses—slow and tedious | AI summaries and instant theme extraction |
Low engagement—survey fatigue common | Smooth, chat-like experience keeps buyers engaged |
Why use AI for B2B Buyer surveys? AI makes creating, editing, and analyzing surveys not just faster, but smarter. Because it adapts in real time, you get higher-quality data and less survey fatigue. With conversational surveys, context never gets lost—and you’re never stuck with thin or ambiguous responses.
If you want to learn how to set up a survey like this, check out this practical how-to guide for B2B Buyer surveys.
Specific brings best-in-class user experience to AI-powered, conversational surveys, making feedback collection and follow-up feel seamless for both creators and respondents.
See this vendor selection criteria survey example now
Run a survey that actually captures why buyers pick certain vendors—Specific’s conversational surveys help you spot market trends and buyer needs fast. Create your own within minutes and get deeper insights instantly.