Here are some ideas on how to get more votes for your polls:
Vote and comment on other people’s polls and profile pages
Even the golden rule of “do unto others as you want others to do unto you” applies to polls. Taking interest in others polls and profiles will have them do the same for you next time you put up a poll. Plus the more you vote the more your icon will appear on our homepage, so more people will notice you and click on your pretty face.
Add people as pollsters
When you add other users as pollsters, you’ll get their polls in your pollsters feed (right under your profile name). Since people tend to reciprocate, the more pollsters added, the more will add you, and will see your polls in their feed. They’ll vote on your polls. Just don’t forget to return the favor.
Send poll to your friends through email or IM
A great way to get some extra votes on our poll is to get your friends to check out and vote on the poll you just posted. All you have to do is click on the “send to a friend” button at the bottom of the poll, or get the URL from the “share” option and paste it in an email message. If in dire need, send a link to your mom. That’s a sure vote.
Post poll link in relevant message boards, communities, and social networks
Addicted to Facebook? or Myspace? Well, posting your poll’s link in your profile or status update can get you those beautiful votes. Even posting a link on a forum you often write on can get people interested and voting.
If you have a website or a blog, why don’t you just post the poll on it? All you have to do is click on the share button at the bottom of the poll, then customize the poll to match your blog, and grab the embed code to paste it in your site.
This might be basic for some of you, but we get quite a few emails asking how to include pictures on polls, or how to poll between photos or graphics. Here’s a walkthrough on how to create a photo poll on Polls Boutique:
1. On Polls Boutique’s homepage, click “create your own poll”
2. On the poll creation screen, choose the “photo poll” tab.
3. Both the option fields and the poll question field will get extra blank lines.
4. Hit “Browse” and choose your poll photos. Photos can be JPG, GIF, and PNG.
5. Hit “Create” and you’re done. Your photo poll is ready.
“her review discussed everything she witnessed and heard in the restaurant. During her visit, Onstott disclosed to her that he funded his establishment using money obtained from illegal activities. An even worse observance was when a police officer came to the restaurant to serve Onslott with a warrant. The Yelp User also mentioned the sub par service and food in her review. After a quick search, it was evident that this isn’t the first time Onslott and Beso have received negative reviews. Once Onstott discovered the review, he contacted the Yelper. He threatened to harm her and file a lawsuit if she did not immediately remove her review… Within a few hours of the poll being posted on pollsb.com, there were 219 views and 53 votes.”
The social poll is a drastically different concept than that of the traditional opinion poll.
While both the social poll and the opinion poll try to generate or predict, a result from a controlled, specific target group, the social poll is so much more than a result shown in percentages, or a predicted outcome of an election.
The social poll is about the social interaction that can flourish around polls, around questions and answers, the building blocks of dialogue. It’s about the interaction that people instinctively create when they’re faced with questions and are voicing their opinions.
The social poll isn’t just about the bottom line. It’s also about individuals and their opinions. It’s the capability to show both the macro and the micro of a question, the individual opinion within the mass.
At Polls Boutique, we try and embrace this social interaction: on polls, on results, on a specific person’s opinion. We put it at the top of our priorities. And while we do give our users the chance to generate interesting opinion polls and results, we also get excited about each individual choice and comment, as they complicate the picture and generate something better than just a result.
We put polls Boutique on the iphone and the experience is fantastic. It was so fun voting on polls using the iphone, we had to make a little video out of it:
It’s no secret that we’re trying to evangelize bloggers into using polls on their blog posts. And when we speak with bloggers about this, most of them understand the strength of a poll as a form of communication with your audience. But for the sake of those who don’t, here’s why posting poll on your blog makes sense:
1. Like blog comments, polls are a great way to add a level of interaction to your blog posts. Posting a poll on your blog is like asking your readers a question, conversing with them, getting their opinions. This is what makes good blogs great: they listen to their audience, they learn what their audience wants, and they follow up on it.
2. Polls are great for blogs because they produce additional content. As a blogger with a poll, you not only produce content in terms of your writing, but you also have your poll results to enhance your understanding of the covered subject. When a critical mass of people vote on your poll, you can update your post with the results, adding high quality content to your writing.
3. Polls are perfect as feedback tools. Redesigned your blog? Made a new video and have two versions to pick from? Have two versions of some song and want your readers to tell you which one is better? Use a poll!
4. Polls can help you market your blog. Every poll posted on Polls Boutique, is enjoyed not only on your blog as a poll widget but also on pollsb.com, by a community of many thousands of voters and pollsters who can dig your stuff and follow your poll to your blog. Make sure your add links to your polls and invite your voters to go read the post you wrote.
A friend sent us this picture of polls boutique’s sticker on one of those Village Voice plastic newsstands in New York. Woohoo! Someone cares enough to show us some street love!
And then we had an idea: Why don’t we invite our users to send us pictures of their free polls boutique stickers? We would love to see where people stick those stickers, and would even like to post the pictures on our blog.
Wanna join in on the fun? Here’s what you do:
1. You get your free polls boutique stickers (just email your mailing address to freesticker@pollsb.com and your stickers will arrive in the mail, free of charge).
2. Stick your stickers somewhere good (but please, keep it legal and don’t deface other’s property).
3. Take a picture of the sticker, preferably with you standing in the shot and giving us a thumbs up.
4. Send the picture to us at freesticker@pollsb.com.
We’ll post your picture, clearing your path to Polls Boutique fame.
We’ve been trying to figure this one out for a long time:
When we started pollsb.com, we wanted to try a social connection model that’s similar to flickr and twitter’s: a one way connection in which anyone can add you as a pollster and get your polls on their pollster feed.
Lately though, we’re thinking about a social network model where one user “requests” friendship from the other, and has to be confirmed to be his friend (like on myspace and facebook).
We’d love to get some feedback on the subject. And so, we’ve made a poll about it:
