When sending an Email or Shareable link survey, it's possible to limit the time a respondent will be able to submit their feedback.
Adding such a restriction lets you control the survey's expiration date for each respondent separately.
This feature can help you:
ensure respondents only submit feedback during a timeframe after which a link will become unavailable,
send one survey to various audiences at different points in time, keeping all the analysis in one place,
send the same survey multiple times, without worrying that the respondents will keep answering the survey too many times.
🚀 Keep on reading to learn how to set it up!
Step 1. Create an Email or Shareable link survey
As a first step, create an Email or Shareable link survey from scratch, with the help of AI, using one of the survey templates, or by importing your questions.
Check out this guide for step-by-step instructions.
Step 2. Set the survey's expiration date
If you already have an Email or Shareable link survey, head over to the Configure tab:
Select the tool you wish to send your survey with in the Identify respondents with section:
Then, go to the Link expiration date section:
Here, select the timeframe during which the survey should be available to those who receive this particular link. The countdown will be starting from the time a survey was sent to them (specified in the sent_date tag, described in the next parts of the article).
You can set the expiry date in days, weeks, or months:
The way this setting works is, based on the email service provider you selected in the Identify respondents with section, we add an additional merge tag to your survey link, called sent_date:
Please note that some providers from the Identify respondents with list may not add value to the sent_date merge tag automatically.
After selecting your email service provider, make sure that your survey's link has a part after the "=" sign in the "sent_date" tag.
If not, you will need to add the values manually for this feature to work as expected.
We'll discuss this case in the next paragraph more in-depth.
Step 3. Add a sent_date value to your survey link (if needed)
The Link expiration date should be selected in your survey, as described in Step 2. However, depending on your distribution method, you may need to take some additional steps in order for the expiration date to work as desired.
Keep on reading to learn more!
Option 1: You are using a distribution tool that adds values to sent_date tag automatically
The first option applies when you are using a distribution tool that adds values to sent_date tag automatically.
These are:
Braze -
&sent_date={{ "now" | date: "%Y-%m-%d"}}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Braze will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Salesforce -
&sent_date={!Today()}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Salesforce will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Mailchimp -
&sent_date=|DATE:Y-m-d|
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Mailchimp will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Klaviyo -
&sent_date={% current_day %}.{% current_month %}.{% current_year %}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Klaviyo will populate it with the date the email is sent.
ActiveCampaign -
&sent_date=%TODAY%
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and ActiveCampaign will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Drip -
&sent_date={{ "now" | date: "%Y-%m-%d" }}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Drip will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Marketo -
&sent_date={{system.date}}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link and Marketo will populate it with the date the email is sent.
Zendesk -
&sent_date={{ticket.ticket_field_option_title_<field ID number>}}
We will add this merge tag to the survey link, but in order for Zendesk to populate it with the date the email is sent, you'll need to create the following setup first.
Zendesk setup instructions for the sent_date field
Zendesk setup instructions for the sent_date field
1. Go to Zendesk Admin panel - Objects and rules - Fields - Add field. Select field type “Date” and fill in the name. In our example it’s “Today’s date”:
2. In Admin panel, go to Objects and Rules - Automations - Add automation. Here you should be able to set up an automation that will update the "Today's date" field with today’s date once some condition was met.
Here's our example:
Once the conditions from the automation are met, make sure the "Today's date" field in the ticket will be updated with today’s date:
You can create another automation in Zendesk to achieve this.
3. Now we need to fill the merge tag in the survey link. As you may have noticed, the merge tag added to the survey link by us looks like this:
&sent_date={{ticket.ticket_field_option_title_<field ID number>}}
You'll need to change the <field ID number> part to your Zendesk field ID number (in our example, the ID of the "Today's date" field) in order for the link to capture the date the survey was sent.Field ID number can be found in Admin panel - Objects and rules - Fields:
In our example, the survey link we would send via Zendesk would be:
https://survey.survicate.com/surveyId/?p=zendesk&email={{ticket.requester.email}}&t_id={{ticket.id}}&agent={{ticket.assignee.name}}&sent_date={{ticket.ticket_field_option_title_2684813xxxxxxx}}
Let's look at an example.
Here, the selected email service provider is Salesforce, and the merge tag is customized to capture the date the survey was sent via Salesforce to a respondent and inform us about the sent date:
Here, Salesforce is responsible for filling out the date in the survey link, when the survey is sent via Salesforce to respondents.
The sent_date value passed to us from Salesforce determines the starting date from which we will count the time you set up in the Link expiration date section, after which the link will no longer allow to answer the survey.
🚀 That's why, even if you send the survey link to various customers on different days, the expiration date will be calculated for each one of them separately, based on the sent_date value.
Option 2:You are using a distribution tool that doesn't add values to sent_date tag automatically or you are not using any identifying tool at all
In this example, let's take a look at how the sent_date value should be captured if the distribution tool you select in the Identify respondents with section doesn't add the merge tag to the survey link by default, or if you plan to distribute the survey via a channel other than the email software listed in the Identify respondents with section.
Just as in the previous example, after adding questions and customizing the survey design and settings, set up an expiration date in the Configure tab.
Then, move to the survey's Share tab.
Let's say you would like to send your survey via Intercom Emails - the survey link in the Share tab will look like this:
https://survey.survicate.com/surveyId/?p=intercom&first_name={{first_name}}&last_name={{last_name}}&email={{email}}&uid={{user_id}}&sent_date=
As you can see, after the sent_date part, we don't have any value that will capture the date the survey was sent from Intercom.
❗️That's why, it's crucial that you add the date manually before pasting the link to Intercom Email, in the YYYY-MM-DD format, so the survey link will look like this:
https://survey.survicate.com/surveyId/?p=intercom&first_name={{first_name}}&last_name={{last_name}}&email={{email}}&uid={{user_id}}&sent_date=2024-08-28
Here's how you can automate this process for HubSpot, one of the most popular CRMs
Here's how you can automate this process for HubSpot, one of the most popular CRMs
When you select HubSpot as the tool to identify respondents with, this is what your survey link will look like:
https://survey.survicate.com/surveyId/?p=hubspot&first_name={{contact.firstname}}&last_name={{contact.lastname}}&email={{contact.email}}&sent_date=You can avoid manually adding the sent_date value to the link each time you send the survey, by creating the following setup in HubSpot.
❗️Please note that this will work only if you are using the Operations Hub Professional or Enterprise plan in HubSpot that’s required for workflows to fire daily.
Create a property (attribute) in HubSpot called for example “Email send date”.
Then, follow this method to create a workflow that will be fired every day at a certain time to update this property with the date when this workflow fired:
It can be applied both for Deals and Contacts.
Then, you should add the merge tag for the "Email send date" property to your survey link, after
sent_date:
As a result, it will be automatically filled with the date the email with the survey is sent.
If you plan to distribute the survey via a channel other than the email software listed in the Identify respondents with section, you can leave the Identify respondents with field empty.
Then, go to the Share tab of the survey, copy the survey link and manually add the sent_date merge tag, letting us know on what day the survey is being sent, same as in the example of Intercom Emails.
Please note that the date must be in the correct format for us to calculate the expiration date, which is YYYY-MM-DD.
Then, this is how the survey link should look like:
https://survey.survicate.com/surveyId/?p=anonymous&sent_date=2024-08-28
💡 In both cases (options), whether you're using a supported email service provider, or sending the survey via another tool, you can set a different expiration date to the same survey many times, to match your use case.
Link expiration date FAQ
How are the days counted?
If a survey is sent on the 1st of August and the expiration date is 1 day, then respondents can only answer that survey on the 1st of August and it will be expired on the 2nd.
We don’t take into consideration hours, just days.
Are weeks and months counted from the beginning of the next week or month, or is it 7 days and 30 days?
If you set up the Link expiration date to be 1 week, it will mean 7 days.
If you set it up to be 1 month, it will mean 30 days.
What happens if the expiration date changes after the survey was sent?
If you change the Link expiration date after sending the survey, the time to answer that survey will be changed as well.
For example, if you set the Link expiration date to 14 days, then sent the survey, and then change the Link expiration date to 10 days, the time allowed to answer the survey will be shortened.
Will the sent_date field be available in the Analyze tab of the survey?
Yes, sent_date is stored as a visitor attribute and will be available in the Analyze > Individual responses tab of your survey in the Survicate panel.
Can I send the survey with HTML code and still use the Link expiration date feature?
Yes. In this case, please remember that all survey links in the HTML code must include the &sent_date=.... parameter.
📞 If you have any questions or need assistance - feel free to reach out to our team via chat or email: support@survicate.com.