Best questions for event attendee survey about staff helpfulness

Here are some of the best questions for an event attendee survey about staff helpfulness, plus practical tips on how to create them. With Specific, you can build a tailored survey in seconds—saving time and elevating your feedback process.

The best open-ended questions for event attendee survey about staff helpfulness

Open-ended questions give your event attendees space to share details, stories, and suggestions about staff helpfulness—going far beyond a simple “yes” or “no.” These questions let you uncover nuances and specifics, but be aware: open-ends can lead to higher nonresponse rates. For example, a Pew Research Center study found online open-ended survey questions have nonresponse rates averaging 18%, sometimes reaching over 50%. Still, when the insights matter, the richness outweighs the risk. [1]

Here are 10 open-ended questions that go deep into staff helpfulness:

1. Can you describe a time during the event when a staff member made your experience better?

2. Were there any moments when you found it difficult to get help from staff? Tell us about it.

3. What’s one thing our staff did well that stood out to you?

4. In what ways could our staff have been more helpful or approachable?

5. Did any staff member go “above and beyond” for you? Please share more.

6. How did you feel about the way staff handled your questions or concerns?

7. Is there something the staff could have done differently to improve your event experience?

8. Do you have any suggestions for training or supporting our event staff?

9. Were there gaps in staff visibility or availability? How did that impact you?

10. Any other feedback about your interactions with event staff?

The best single-select multiple-choice questions for event attendee survey about staff helpfulness

Sometimes your attendees will engage more if you keep it simple. Single-select multiple-choice questions make it easy and fast for them to respond, helping you quantify the results and boost response rates. According to Pew Research, closed-ended questions in online surveys tend to have a much lower nonresponse rate—often between 1% and 2%—which means you’ll hear from more attendees, more often. [1] These are perfect for getting a pulse on staff helpfulness, with the option to dig deeper using follow-ups.

Question: How would you rate the helpfulness of event staff?

• Very helpful

• Somewhat helpful

• Not very helpful

• Not helpful at all

Question: Which area did you receive the most helpful support from staff?

• Registration

• Technical support

• Food & beverage

• General information

• Other

Question: Was it easy to find a staff member when you needed help?

• Always

• Usually

• Sometimes

• Rarely

• Never

When to follow up with "why?" Single-select questions are a great conversation starter, but they can’t provide details on their own. If someone chooses “Not very helpful,” a smart follow-up like “Why did you feel staff weren’t helpful?” quickly bridges the gap and uncovers actionable feedback, making your insights much more useful.

When and why to add the "Other" choice? The “Other” option gives space for answers you didn’t anticipate. It’s especially powerful when paired with a follow-up question—this is often where you’ll discover insights that weren’t even on your radar, such as niche feedback about venue navigation or a standout personal interaction.

NPS question for staff helpfulness: when and why

The Net Promoter Score (NPS) question is a trusted way to assess overall satisfaction—and it fits perfectly in an event attendee survey about staff helpfulness. By asking, “How likely are you to recommend our event (based on staff helpfulness) to a friend or colleague?” and allowing respondents to rate from 0 to 10, you get a single, universal metric that’s industry-recognized. NPS helps you identify not just how people feel, but which attendees will actually spread the word. It’s a powerful benchmark, and you can generate an NPS survey for event attendee staff helpfulness here.

The power of follow-up questions

Follow-up questions are where surface replies become real, actionable insights. If you’re curious about the how and why, learn more about automated follow-up questions made possible by AI. These smart follow-ups let you dive deeper—responding instantly, adapting to the attendee’s last answer, and collecting context like a researcher with unlimited time. When you use Specific, the AI builds on each response in a natural, chat-based way, all in real time.

• Attendee: "Staff were helpful."

• AI follow-up: "Can you share a specific example of how a staff member helped you?"

Without this follow-up, you’d just get a vague statement with no specifics. But a well-timed follow-up opens the conversation and reveals more.

How many follow-ups to ask? In most surveys, 2–3 follow-ups are just right—enough to go deep but not feel overwhelming. It also makes sense to let respondents move to the next question if they’ve already explained themselves. Specific has a setting to control this, making the conversation flow naturally.

This makes it a conversational survey: By triggering relevant follow-ups, your survey shifts from feeling like a form to feeling like a friendly dialogue—that’s the essence of a conversational survey.

AI analysis of answers is easy, even if you gather tons of written responses. With AI survey response analysis, you can chat directly with your results, summarize key insights, and never get buried in verbatim feedback.

These automated follow-up questions are a new, powerful way of collecting feedback. Try generating a live survey and see how dynamic follow-ups drive richer responses.

Prompt ideas for AI survey generators and ChatGPT

If you want to craft your own staff helpfulness survey using ChatGPT or another AI, here’s a great place to start. Try this prompt:

Suggest 10 open-ended questions for Event Attendee survey about Staff Helpfulness.

For best results, always add more context about your event and your goal. Here’s an upgraded version:

"Suggest 10 open-ended questions for an Event Attendee survey about Staff Helpfulness. The event was a three-day conference with 300 participants, featuring workshops, networking, and technical sessions. I want actionable feedback to improve staff support and training for next year."

To dig deeper, use:

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

From here, pick your priority categories (like "staff visibility," "technical support," etc.) and prompt again:

Generate 10 questions for categories staff visibility, technical support.

What is a conversational survey?

A conversational survey transforms boring forms into engaging, chat-like interactions. The AI acts like a skilled interviewer, responding in real-time and asking deeper questions based on each person’s unique experience. This approach goes far beyond static question lists—it’s about starting a dialogue with your event attendees.

Here’s how manual approaches stack up against using Specific’s AI survey generator:

Why use AI for event attendee surveys? AI-powered survey tools, especially those that offer a conversational format like Specific, make feedback collection intuitive and efficient. They adapt to attendee responses, ask clarifying questions, and help you uncover not just what happened—but why. If you’re curious about the technical details or want to see exactly how to create an event staff helpfulness survey, you’ll find even more tips and walkthroughs in our guide.

Specific delivers best-in-class conversational survey tools that make both the creation and response experience smooth, rich, and engaging—unlocking better insights from every event.

See this staff helpfulness survey example now

Start gathering detailed, actionable feedback in minutes—experience the power of real-time follow-ups and AI-backed insights to transform how you understand event attendees’ perspectives on staff helpfulness.