Here are some of the best questions for a conference participants survey about community building, plus tips for getting actionable insights. If you want to build your own survey in seconds, you can use Specific to generate a ready-to-use conversational survey—so you can start learning right away.
Best open-ended questions for conference participants survey about community building
Open-ended questions let people share experiences in their own words. They're powerful for surfacing new ideas, unexpected challenges, and deeper emotions that no rating scale will ever catch. They're perfect if you're looking to uncover what truly matters in community building, especially when you don't want to restrict people’s answers or already know there’s more beneath the surface.
Research shows open-enders often reveal issues missed by standard rating grids—over 80% of respondents in one study highlighted unique challenges only through open text boxes. [2] Just keep in mind, responses require more thought, and it's normal for some participants to skip them or give shorter answers. But the richness you get can be worth it.
What does “community” mean to you in the context of this conference?
Can you describe a memorable moment of community engagement you experienced or witnessed here?
Which aspects of the event made you feel most connected to other participants?
What barriers (if any) did you notice that made it harder to connect with others?
How could this event better support ongoing community building after the conference ends?
Can you share one idea that would make future events more inclusive?
What kinds of relationships or collaborations do you hope will come out of participating here?
Were there any missed opportunities for connection you noticed? Please elaborate.
Which speakers, sessions, or activities best encouraged networking and why?
What type of support or platform would help you stay engaged with the community after the event?
Not every respondent will answer every open-ender; nonresponse rates for open-ended questions can be significantly higher (sometimes 18% or more compared to just 1-2% for closed-ended questions), but the insights can be invaluable if you want to hear unfiltered participant voices. [1]
Best single-select multiple-choice questions for conference participants survey about community building
Single-select multiple-choice questions are great when you want to quantify preferences, identify patterns, or ease participants into the survey. They’re also perfect for jump-starting a dialogue—offering clear options makes answering easy, and you can always ask a follow-up for more details if someone picks a specific response.
Question: Which of these aspects most contributed to your sense of community during the conference?
Networking sessions
Workshops
Social events
Online community platform
Other
Question: How likely are you to stay connected with participants you met at the conference?
Very likely
Somewhat likely
Not sure
Unlikely
Question: What prevented you from engaging more with the community during the event?
Lack of time
Unclear opportunities
Not comfortable in group settings
No barriers
When to followup with "why?" Whenever someone chooses a closed-ended option but their reasoning isn’t clear—or you sense there’s context missing—ask a follow-up. For example, if someone selects "Not sure" on staying connected, a great open prompt would be: "Can you tell us more about what makes you unsure?" Follow-ups like these often reveal unexpected motivators or blockers you’d miss with a one-and-done survey.
When and why to add the "Other" choice? An "Other" option lets participants provide a response you hadn’t anticipated. Sometimes the best ideas come from unprompted feedback; a follow-up to "Other" lets you dig into new themes or unexpected patterns that improve future events.
Should you use a net promoter score (NPS) question?
NPS is a time-tested way to gauge loyalty and overall satisfaction, and it works surprisingly well for community building after events. Asking, "How likely are you to recommend this community or event to a friend?" gives you a quick read on sentiment; plus, you can capture crucial context by adding, "Why did you choose that score?"
For conference communities, this one score can highlight whether the experience was merely transactional or actually rewarding—especially if paired with smart follow-ups. If you’re ready to try it, Specific will generate the NPS community survey template in a click.
The power of follow-up questions
Great surveys are conversations, not interrogations. The magic happens in the follow-ups—those quick, contextual probes that make participants feel heard, and help you make sense of nuanced feedback. (Learn more about automated follow-up questions.)
Specific’s conversational AI asks tailored follow-ups based on each respondent’s answer, in real time. This means you never miss a chance to clarify a vague answer or uncover the real reason behind a choice. Automated follow-ups save teams hours of email tag or scheduling headaches—plus, the flow feels surprisingly natural, not robotic.
Conference Participant: "The networking was okay, I guess."
AI follow-up: "Can you share more about what would’ve improved the networking experience for you?"
The alternative? You’re left guessing what “okay” means, or risk acting on half-baked insights.
How many followups to ask? For surveys about community building, 2-3 follow-up questions work best. You can configure Specific to stop early if the respondent’s opened up on the first try, to keep things conversational (not exhausting).
This makes it a conversational survey: Every reply becomes a two-way dialogue, making your survey feel more human and less like a cold web form. That’s the essence of a conversational survey.
AI survey analysis: Even with lots of open-ended answers, analyzing everything is easy thanks to AI-driven tools (see our guide on analyzing responses from conference participants surveys). You can spot trends and themes in seconds—not days.
These new, automated followup questions are transforming survey design—if you haven’t experienced an AI-generated, conversational survey yet, try generating one now and see how much deeper the insights go. Research confirms that conversational surveys have higher engagement rates and better quality responses than traditional modes. [5]
How to prompt GPTs for great conference participant survey questions
If you want to use GPT or ChatGPT to draft survey questions, a direct prompt works. For example:
Suggest 10 open-ended questions for conference participants survey about community building.
But you’ll get richer, more relevant outputs if you give additional context—such as your event’s goals, audience profile, what you’re struggling to learn, and the value you want from the responses:
We’re running a virtual tech conference to foster deeper peer-to-peer relationships. Many participants join alone and report it’s hard to follow-up post-conference. Suggest 10 open-ended questions to understand participants’ community needs, motivations, and obstacles. The goal is to help shape future events and boost lasting engagement.
You can also prompt the AI to help you organize ideas:
Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.
Once you have your categories (e.g. “Barriers”, “Motivators”, “Post-event needs”), you can target your focus:
Generate 10 questions for the categories Barriers and Post-event needs.
Always review and refine AI-generated content. With Specific’s AI survey editor, it’s even easier—just chat with the AI to tweak or rewrite questions in seconds.
What is a conversational survey?
A conversational survey is just what it sounds like: a survey that feels like a two-way chat. Instead of clicking through rigid forms, participants respond to questions (including AI-driven follow-ups) in a natural sequence tailored to their input. The survey adapts as the conversation unfolds, leading to higher engagement and more relevant data.
This approach stands apart from traditional survey design. An AI generator not only writes your survey based on your prompt—it also automatically builds branching logic, configures smart follow-up routines, and enables instant, context-aware analysis. Compare that to classic survey tools, which require manual setup for every step:
Manual surveys | AI-generated surveys |
|---|---|
Write questions by hand | Auto-generate expert questions in seconds |
Set up branching and logic manually | Automatic AI-driven follow-ups and logic |
Challenging to analyze open responses | Instant AI summaries and insights |
Stale and impersonal | Feels like a natural chat |
Why use AI for conference participant surveys? AI survey generators like Specific take the heavy lifting out of survey creation—making it easy to build conversational surveys that engage, probe, and analyze faster and deeper than you could by hand. The result? Higher response rates, richer feedback, smarter follow-ups, and a smoother experience for both you and your participants. (See our step-by-step guide on how to create a community-building survey.)
We’ve focused Specific on delivering the best-in-class conversational feedback experience: it makes community-building surveys feel friendly, efficient, and even fun—both for survey creators and for conference participants sharing their stories.
See this community building survey example now
Start collecting rich, actionable feedback from your participants—see for yourself how fast, natural, and insightful conversational surveys can be. Unlock deeper understanding and build a stronger event community today with Specific.