Surveys overview

A survey is how you collect feedback in ScatterSpoke. There are two kinds, and the difference is who decides what gets asked.

Static Surveys

A Static Survey is a traditional survey: you write a fixed set of questions, and every participant answers the same ones. You control the wording, the answer types, and the order.

Static Surveys are unlimited on every plan, including Free.

Use one when you already know what you need to ask — a pulse check, a post-release survey, a standing weekly question set.

Agent Surveys

In an Agent Survey, you don’t author questions. Instead:

1. The AI interviews you about the outcome you want, assembling an Agent Survey Brief.
2. The AI then interviews each participant turn by turn, adapting to where their answers lead.

Two participants can be asked entirely different follow-up questions, because the agent probes what each person actually said.

Agent Surveys are a paid-plan capability.

Note

A fixed set of authored questions presented as a chat is not an Agent Survey. The distinguishing feature is that the questions are generated live from the conversation.

Choosing between them

	Static Survey	Agent Survey
Who writes the questions	You	The AI, guided by your brief
Every participant sees	The same questions	A conversation shaped by their answers
Best for	Known questions, trend tracking, quotas	Open exploration, “why” behind a signal
Plans	All, including Free	Paid plans
Comparable across runs	Yes — see Recurring Survey Series	Yes, via themes rather than identical questions

If you’re not sure, start with a Static Survey. You can always run an Agent Survey afterwards to explore something the answers surfaced.

What both share

Whichever kind you run, the rest of the system works the same way:

• Every response has a transcript — the ordered record of what was asked and how it was answered. Structured answers for charts and filters are derived from it, so the evidence is always traceable.
• Access is per participant. A Survey Distribution is an individual access grant that decides whether a given person can enter, resume, or edit. Survey state decides whether the run is accepting responses at all.
• Participants don’t need an account. They answer through a link; no Seat Holder access is required. See the participant experience.

Where to go next

• Create a Static Survey — the fastest way to get a survey out
• Question types — the answer formats available
• Agent Surveys — the Design interview and Coverage
• Distribution — links, email, QR, and embedding
• Templates — start from a prepared survey instead of a blank one