Best questions for customer survey about website usability

Here are some of the best questions for a customer survey about website usability, with tips on how to design them for maximum insight. You can instantly generate a conversational survey with Specific in seconds—no manual setup needed.

The best open-ended questions for customer survey about website usability

Open-ended questions let your customers provide genuine, detailed feedback about their experience. They shine when you want to uncover pain points, unexpected insights, or discover why people behave a certain way on your site. You’ll spot recurring themes and dig deep into usability issues—crucial, since user testing can reveal up to 85% of usability problems on a site. [1]

Here are 10 proven open-ended questions to use in a customer website usability survey:

1. What part of our website did you find easiest to use, and why?

2. What part of our website was confusing or frustrating to you?

3. Did you accomplish what you came to the website for? If not, what stopped you?

4. Is there a feature or detail you expected to find but didn’t?

5. How does using our website compare to using other similar sites?

6. Is there anything that would’ve made your experience smoother?

7. Can you describe any problems you encountered during your visit?

8. How did you feel about the information you found on our website?

9. What, if anything, surprised you about the site’s layout or navigation?

10. Do you have suggestions to help us improve our website usability?

The right open-ended questions create space for valuable context—and let AI-powered follow-ups automatically probe further if an answer is unclear or especially interesting.

Top single-select multiple-choice questions for customer website usability

Single-select multiple-choice questions are powerful when you need to quantify key usability trends—or when you want to make it easier for customers to respond quickly. They’re great conversation-starters and help you categorize feedback before digging deeper with follow-up questions.

Question: How easy was it to find what you were looking for on our website?

• Very easy

• Somewhat easy

• Neutral

• Somewhat difficult

• Very difficult

Question: Which area of the website did you use during your visit?

• Homepage

• Product or service pages

• Help or support

• Checkout or sign-up

• Other

Question: Did the website meet your expectations in terms of performance and speed?

• Exceeded expectations

• Met expectations

• Fell short of expectations

When to follow up with “why?” If a customer picks an answer like "Somewhat difficult" or "Fell short of expectations," that’s your cue to ask a follow-up: What made it difficult? Was there a specific obstacle? This layered approach surfaces actionable improvements.

When and why to add the “Other” choice? Sometimes, none of your predefined options capture the customer’s experience. By providing “Other,” you invite people to specify unique issues or behaviors you might have missed—then smart follow-up questions can reveal fresh ideas you hadn’t considered.

NPS: The net promoter score for website usability

NPS (Net Promoter Score) measures a user’s likelihood to recommend your website to others. It’s a powerful, single-question benchmark for customer loyalty and satisfaction. For website usability, a focused NPS survey can signal whether your site experience drives advocacy, or if there are “promoter” blockers hiding under the surface. Blend it with follow-up questions tailored to promoters, passives, and detractors to get meaningful insights that go beyond a number. You can instantly build an NPS website usability survey using Specific.

The power of follow-up questions

Great surveys don’t just ask one question and move on—they dig deeper, just like an expert interviewer would. That’s why we love Specific’s automated follow-up questions feature so much. When your survey asks follow-ups based on each user’s previous answer, you can clarify ambiguity, explore how widespread a pain point is, and understand the context behind strong opinions.

Here’s a quick example:

• Customer: "I couldn’t find the return policy."

• AI follow-up: "Were you looking for the return policy on a product page or at checkout?"

Contrast this with surveys that skip follow-ups—you’d end up with vague answers and miss chances to fix real-world problems.

How many followups to ask? In most cases, 2–3 targeted follow-up questions are sufficient to get a full picture, while giving respondents an option to skip when they’ve said enough. Specific lets you customize this so the survey stays friendly and focused.

This makes it a conversational survey: Each answer feels like a real conversation, not a clinical form. Respondents are more likely to share honest, nuanced feedback.

AI survey response analysis: Worried about having to analyze all that open-ended text? Don’t be. With AI, you can summarize responses and uncover patterns instantly, making rich data as simple to process as checkboxes.

Automated, real-time follow-ups are changing how website usability surveys capture feedback—give it a try with an AI-generated survey and see for yourself.

How to prompt AI (like ChatGPT) to write better website usability questions

If you want to use ChatGPT or another GPT, a strong prompt makes all the difference. Here’s how you can start:

For an initial brainstorming session, try:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for a customer survey about website usability.

But remember—AI is always better with specifics. Share details about your industry, goals, or recent product updates for more targeted questions. For example:

We run a SaaS tool for small e-commerce businesses. Suggest 10 open-ended survey questions to identify major usability issues and feature gaps that impact conversions.

Once you have a list, dig deeper by asking:

Look at the questions and categorize them. Output categories with the questions under them.

Just choose the categories you care most about, then prompt:

Generate 10 questions for categories “Checkout & Payment” and “Navigation.”

This sequenced approach makes your AI survey builder even smarter. Try it in Specific’s conversational AI survey maker for an instant jumpstart.

What’s a conversational survey?

Instead of cold, one-way forms, a conversational survey chats naturally with your customers, replying to what they say and following up when needed. You can design, build, and run surveys in seconds using an AI survey generator—then analyze every answer conversationally.

Here's how manual surveys stack up against conversational/AI ones:

Why use AI for customer surveys? AI adoption in business is skyrocketing—78% of organizations globally now use AI in at least one function, up from 55% a year ago. [3] Survey creation is a perfect use case: AI saves hours, produces richer questions, tweaks language for your audience, and adapts as feedback rolls in.

If you want the smoothest experience for both question creators and respondents, Specific offers a best-in-class conversational survey experience. Designing and launching a smart, dynamic AI survey is as simple as chatting—and you can learn how to create your own customer survey in minutes.

See this website usability survey example now

Build a customer website usability survey that’s conversational, smart, and uncovers real insight today—take advantage of AI follow-ups, instant analytics, and a seamless user experience only Specific provides. See the difference for yourself.