Asking for Feedback After Your Presentation

It’s always a good idea to ask for audience feedback after a presentation. Constructive feedback is necessary if you want to improve yourself and your presentation skills. This is your chance to figure out where you shine and where there is room for improvement. Even the greatest leaders understand the value of feedback and how it’s a critical component for growth and development. It’s important to be mindful of how you collect feedback so you can be sure it is worth your while. Here are a few suggestions for how to ask for feedback after a presentation. 

Feedback Forms

One simple way to collect valuable feedback is by providing audience members with a feedback form after your presentation has concluded. Encourage your audience to fill it out and leave it with you in a dropbox. When you create a feedback form, stay away from multiple choice questions, as this provides very little useful feedback. Rather, ask open-ended questions to solicit more useful feedback such as, “What is the most valuable thing you learned today? How could this session have been more valuable? What recommendations do you have?†

Interactive Polls/Questionnaires

Once the audience leaves the room, it can be difficult to ensure they will take the time to fill out forms, respond to emails, etc. Therefore, ask for feedback while your audience is still present. There are several polling and questionnaire apps that you can use for live polling during your presentation. The respondents will remain anonymous, but you can see the results of your polls and surveys instantly. 

Social Media

Twitter and Facebook are also great tools for gathering audience feedback. Today’s generation might not be reliable when it comes to written feedback, but they have no problem posting it to social media. Twitter can be used before, during, and after your presentation to engage and interact with your audience. Create a hashtag for your talk and encourage audience members to post comments or questions during and after your presentation. This is a great way to collect valuable and authentic feedback. You can also create a Facebook page for your presentation and ask audience members to post comments and feedback to your Facebook page. 

Emails

Another way to collect audience feedback is by sending a follow-up email with feedback questions. This is a great way to recap your main points and reconnect with your audience after the presentation.  It also gives audience members a chance to provide constructive feedback about the presentation.