With the Question Import tool, you can import up to 100 Questions at once using a spreadsheet. If you are familiar with using Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets, you can write out your questions faster using those programs - We welcome you to do so! We recommend starting from our template file to have a general layout to follow, but you can create your template from scratch with your program of choice.
This article will guide you through using Google Sheets to import questions into your Experience. Microsoft Excel will also work, as will just about any modern spreadsheet program. As long as you follow the layout and export your spreadsheet as a .CSV file, you can write your questions in practically any program you like.
Please note that importing questions will remove all crowd responses in your Experience, as well as all existing questions and answers. That includes all Rankings, Crowd Activity, and Crowd Lead Data. Be sure to Export Experience Results & Data before importing questions.
Crowdpurr's starter spreadsheet imported into Google Sheets
Very simply put, a Comma-Separated Values (.CSV) file is your spreadsheet in a different form. Each row is converted into a line of text where each cell is separated by a comma.
You can actually open .CSV files in any text editor to see the results.
Questions
When writing your questions in a spreadsheet, each question must go on a separate row. Column 1 should contain the question text. The entire question must be in the cell - do not spread it out across multiple rows or columns. You can adjust the width and/or height of each cell to make longer questions easier to read.
Column 2 should be the code for which type of question you want to include. You can set this to any type of question we offer: Multiple Choice, Text Answer, or Numerical Answer. You can also use Like or Dislike and Yes or No questions for Polls. Enter the appropriate code for each question in your file.
Question Type Codes
| Multiple Choice | multipleChoice |
| Text Answer | text |
| Numerical Answer | numerical |
| Drag & Drop | reorder |
| Like or Dislike (Polls only) | likeDislike |
| Yes or No (Polls only) | yesNo |
Not for Multiple Choice questions! Any row without a valid code will be automatically assigned the Multiple Choice question type by default. If every question you want to import is a Multiple Choice question, you can leave that column completely blank.
If you're using any of the previous question codes within your import spreadsheet, please match them exactly! If a code contains a typo or extra space, the import tool will assume you meant to use a Multiple Choice question by default.
Question Points
Column 3 allows you to include a per-question Point Value through the import. Custom Point Values should be between 1 and 1,000 points per question. For Polls, this column will automatically be ignored, but it must still be included as a column on the spreadsheet for the import process to work properly.
Nope! You're more than welcome to include unique point values on as few or as many of your questions as you'd like or even leave the column completely blank. Any question where that cell is blank or set to 0 will use the default Overall Points Per Question value under the green Settings tab, and under Trivia Format.
If all of your questions are set to the same point value, the default value on your game will be set to that instead of assigning a per-question value to each of them.
Question Time
Column 4 allows you to set unique Question Timer durations for each of your questions, similar to the per-question Point Values in Column 3. You can set each question to any amount of time listed under the Overall Question Timer dropdown boxes. (i.e. 10 Seconds, 15 Seconds, 20 Seconds, 60 minutes, etc.)
Nope! Like the Question Points column, you can include unique time values on as few or as many of your questions as you like, or even leave the column completely blank. Any question where that cell is blank or set to 0 will use the default Overall Question Time value under the green Settings tab and under Playback & Timing.
Additionally, if all of your questions are set to the same timer duration on the spreadsheet, the default Overall Question Time on your game will be set to that duration instead of assigning a Per-Question timer for each question.
Question Media URL
Column 5 allows you to paste in a Question Media URL such as an image link address or YouTube video URL to display alongside the question.
If you prefer to upload your own image or embed a YouTube video to questions directly on the platform, you're welcome to leave this column blank to later select your desired Question Media after importing the spreadsheet.
One important note when importing and exporting any uploaded images and stock images, these must still be uploaded on an existing Experience in your account in order to re-import correctly. Alternatively, they must be uploaded images from a library game. If you’ve uploaded an image or added a stock image, export it as a CSV spreadsheet, then delete the Experience, question, or image, it will not reimport the uploaded or stock image.
However, GIFs and YouTube videos do export and import as normal so these media do not have to be on an existing Crowdpurr Experience.
Question Note
Column 6 allows you to type in a Question Note and also allows you to add HTML code to customize your text within the spreadsheet. If you're familiar with HTML and want to add basic HTML formats to your Question Note while editing the spreadsheet, feel free to type text formatting code directly onto the cell.
If you prefer to stylize your Question Note using Crowdpurr's built-in rich text editor, you're welcome to leave this column blank to later add your Question Notes after importing the spreadsheet. Please visit the following Help Center article: Question Notes Explained.
Question Link
Column 7 allows you to insert a Question Link to add hyperlinks to individual questions. This is useful for slower-paced or educational Experiences where the objective is to have your participants click on the question's link in order to read text or watch a video in order to answer the question.
Please visit the following Help Center article for more information: Question Links Explained.
Correct Answer(s)
Column 8 allows you to set the Correct Answer(s) for your questions. If you don't wish to include a correct answer for a particular question, simply leave that cell blank.
If you would like to include more than one correct answer, simply type all the correct answers into the same cell, separated by@@@. Our import tool will then create a separate answer for each one.
Setting up the row like this...
...will make a question like this!
Answers
Columns 9 and onward entail your answers. The configurations for Multiple Choice and Text Answer and Numerical Answer questions slightly differ, which is discussed in detail below.
These rows...
|
|
| ...will look like this after importing. |
| ...will look like this after importing. |
Exporting to a .CSV File
Now that your questions are written, it's time to export your spreadsheet. Crowdpurr only accepts .CSV files through our import tool. It is a universal format that any modern spreadsheet program is able to reproduce.
In Google Sheets, go to the File dropdown menu and select Download. Select Comma-separated values (.csv, current sheet) from that menu. Your spreadsheet will download to wherever your downloads go by default, likely onto your desktop or your Downloads folder.
Downloading the Google Sheets spreadsheet as a .CSV file
Microsoft Excel will still work when exporting as a .CSV file. However, we recommend that you set the file encoding to UTF-8 when you do. Some characters like apostrophes (') and quotation marks (") will automatically change in MS Office programs. This can cause problems when importing.
This helpful article on WebToffee shows you how to set the file encoding to UTF-8 in a variety of spreadsheet programs:
https://www.webtoffee.com/how-to-save-csv-excel-file-as-utf-8-encoded/
Importing Your Questions
On the light blue Questions tab, click on the gray Question Tools tab to open the Question Tools panel. Click on the Import Questions button, which will bring up the light blue Import Questions dialog.
Question Tools box
Import Questions dialogue
Finally, click the Import Questions button and select the .CSV file you exported from your spreadsheet program. After a few moments, your new questions will finish uploading, and your Experience will be ready to start!
Please note, this will reset your Experience and delete all existing questions and answers in your Experience. If you need to save your questions or crowd responses, consider cloning the Experience beforehand and importing the spreadsheet into the clone instead. You can also export your Crowd Activity data to save it onto your device.
What's next?
Check out these articles for more information about the topics covered here:
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