A brand diagnostic survey asks the people who know your brand - customers, your own team, partners - how they see it. Done well, it shows the gap between how the company describes itself and how others describe it. Done badly, it produces a long report that confirms what everyone already thought.
This guide sets out the questions worth asking, grouped by audience, and how to turn the answers into decisions. It is one part of a broader brand audit or Brand Diagnosis, not a substitute for it.
When a survey helps - and when it does not
- It helps when you want to test ideas that conversations have already raised, compare views across groups or repeat the same questions over time.
- It does not help when you do not yet know what to ask. In that case, a few open conversations with customers usually teach more than a long form.
Before you start: three decisions
- What decision should the survey inform? A repositioning, a rebrand, a new market. If no decision depends on it, it is probably not worth running.
- Who will you ask? Customers, lost prospects, your team, partners and prescribers each see a different part of the brand.
- What format? A short online form, a structured interview or both. Shorter is almost always better: every extra question lowers the quality of the answers.
Questions for customers
How they found and chose you
- How did you first hear about us?
- What made you choose us?
- Which other options did you consider, and why?
- What almost made you choose someone else?
How they see the brand
- How would you describe what we do to a colleague?
- Which three words come to mind when you think of us?
- What do we do better than the alternatives? And worse?
Experience and loyalty
- Does the experience of working with us match what you expected?
- What is the one thing we should never change?
- What would make you recommend us more often?
Questions for your own team
Ask the same core questions internally - to leadership, sales, marketing and customer service - and compare the answers with the customers'.
- How would you describe what we do in one sentence?
- Why do customers choose us? Why do they leave?
- Which competitor worries you most, and why?
- Where does the brand feel inconsistent today?
- What should the brand stand for in three years?
Questions for partners and prescribers
Architects, distributors, consultants and other professionals often shape the decision before the customer contacts you.
- When do you recommend us, and when do you not?
- How do you describe us to your clients?
- What would make it easier to recommend us?
- Who do you see as our closest alternatives?
Open or closed questions?
- Open questions - "how would you describe us?" - reveal the words people actually use. They are slower to analyse but often the most useful.
- Closed questions - scales or multiple choice - are easy to compare across groups and over time.
- A good mix: a few closed questions for comparison and two or three open ones for language and nuance.
How to read the answers
- Compare inside and outside. The gap between how your team describes the brand and how customers describe it is usually the most important finding.
- Collect the words. Group the descriptions people use. Repeated words are clues to your positioning - or to its absence.
- Look for patterns, not averages. Differences between customer groups, markets or services often matter more than the overall score.
- End with priorities. Turn the findings into a short list: what to protect, what to fix and what to stop.
Common mistakes
- Asking too much. Long surveys get rushed answers.
- Leading questions. "How much do you value our quality?" assumes the answer.
- Only asking happy customers. Lost prospects and former customers often tell you more.
- Running the survey without a decision in mind. Findings that no one acts on change nothing.
Key takeaways
- A brand diagnostic survey is one input to a brand audit, not the whole audit.
- Ask customers, your team and partners the same core questions and compare the answers.
- Keep it short, mix closed and open questions and look for patterns rather than averages.
- End with priorities: what to protect, what to fix and what to stop.
Frequently asked questions
How many responses do we need?
Enough to see patterns in each group you want to compare. In many B2B companies a smaller number of thoughtful answers - or a set of short interviews - is more useful than a large number of quick ones.
Should the survey be anonymous?
For your own team, usually yes: people are more candid. For customers, it depends on whether you want to follow up on individual answers.
Can we run it ourselves?
Yes. An outside party can help with neutrality - people are often more open with someone who is not part of the company - and with turning the findings into decisions. Our brand audit checklist is a good first step.
Related: Brand Diagnosis · What a brand audit should tell you · Brand audit checklist