Save and Continue

On longer surveys, you may want to allow respondents to come back later to finish their response. The Save & Continue Survey Toolbar adds an option for survey respondents to enter their email address to receive a link to return to their survey later.

The toolbar will be added to all pages after the first page of your survey.

When a respondent uses the Save & Continue feature, all survey progress up to that point is saved (including on the active page).

Example Use

Use this feature when you don't have a list of contacts to upload to an Email Campaign* but you want to offer your respondents a way to save and return to their response.

*Email Campaigns have a built-in save & continue functionality that works differently than the feature described here. Email Campaign links automatically save progress up to the last submitted page.

Save and Continue Setup

1. Click Tools > Response Settings.
2. Enable the Survey Toolbar by checking the associated checkbox.
   
3. Within the Toolbar Content section, turn on the Save and Continue feature by checking the associated checkbox.
   
4. Customize when and how your Toolbar appears.
   • Top - Fixed: This will display the Survey Toolbar at the top of the survey page. The fixed setting will keep the bar in view when survey respondents scroll down on the page. See below example.
   • Top: This will display the toolbar at the top of the page and will scroll out of view when respondents scroll down.
   • Bottom - Fixed: This will display the Survey Toolbar at the bottom of the survey page. The fixed setting will keep the bar in view when survey respondents scroll down on the page.
   • Bottom: This will display the Survey Toolbar at the bottom of the survey page. It is important to note that, without the fixed setting, this will often be out of view until respondents scroll down on the page.  
     
   • Only show on the first page - This setting does not apply to Save and Continue. The Save and Continue option will show on pages after the first page.
5. Click Save Settings.
6. (Optional) To change the Save & Continue bar text and email messages go to Tools > Text & Translations > click English (or any other language choice) > Toolbar. You will see a section titled Save & Continue Messages where can proceed to customize all aspects of Save and Continue.

When Save & Continue is enabled, saved responses will be marked as Partial. We are unable to provide you with the email addresses used, so please include an email question in the survey if you want to be able to follow-up with the respondents.

Determine Who Used Save & Continue

If you want to see which of your respondents used the Save and Continue link, you can see this information in a CSV/Excel Export of your data.

Go to the Results > Exports and click CSV/Excel link. In the window that pops up, select Include URL Variables. Once your export has run, you'll see a column labeled URL Variable: snc. If this column has a long string of alphanumeric characters, they used the Save and Continue link. If it's blank, they didn't!

Save & Continue Feature Compatibility

• Save & Continue is compatible with IP Duplicate protection.
• The Save & Continue Setting is not compatible with Javascript Embeds.
• Once a response using a Save & Continue Survey Setting link is completed, there is no way for the respondent to edit their response using that link. You will need to provide them an edit link to make changes to their response.

Save & Continue and Email Campaigns

Email Campaigns have a built-in save & continue functionality that works differently than the feature described in this article. Email Campaign links automatically save progress up to the last submitted page.

If you have enabled the Save & Continue feature and are also distributing your survey via Email Campaign, the respondents who access you survey via the campaign will see the following message:

"All progress before this page has been saved. Click on the original link in your email to return here."

This message instructs your campaign respondents to use the original link that they received in their email message to continue their survey progress. Those respondents who are not taking the survey via email campaign, will see the normal Save & Continue banner and messaging.

Save & Continue and Login/Password Actions

Alchemer's Login/Password Action also has its own built-in Save and Continue functionality. 

• In order to use the Login Action Save and Continue Password feature, the login action must be on Page One of your survey and it cannot share this page with any other questions or actions (text elements are allowed).
• When re-accessing their response, respondents will be forwarded to the last survey page they submitted. If respondents re-access an already completed survey, they will be forwarded to the survey's Thank You page.

For instructions on how to use the Login Action Save and Continue functionality, visit our help article.

Change Save & Continue Email Details

When a respondent uses the Save and Continue option in a survey, they are sent an email from Alchemer with the link they need to continue. You can change the email subject line, the email content, and the from address and from address name.

1. If you would like to change the content of any of the above-named fields, click the Tools tab of your survey and select Text & Translations.
2. Select your translation (choose English if you haven't made a translation to another language) then click the Toolbar tab.
3. Scroll down to the Save & Continue Email Settings section and you will see the options to change the Subject, Message, and both the From Address* and the From Address Name.
4. While editing the Subject and both the From Address fields is fairly straightforward, the Message field can be a bit more complex. Here are a few things to keep in mind with the Message field:
   • When you edit the Message field, you will notice that it contains a [%%CONTINUE_LINK%%] merge code.
   • This merge code dynamically pulls the link that is necessary for a respondent to continue their progress, into the email message that is sent.
   • Under most circumstances, this merge code should not be removed.
   • The link that is pulled in and sent as part of the Save and Continue email will not be hyperlinked by default. Respondents will need to copy the link and paste it into their browsers to continue the survey. If you wish to make this link hyperlinked, visit the hyperlinking instructions below.

Add Hyperlink to Save and Continue Email Message

As noted above, when the Save and Continue link is sent to your respondents, the link will not be hyperlinked in the body of the email. As such, respondents will need to copy and paste the link into their browsers to continue your survey.

If you would like to hyperlink your link (make it clickable), follow these steps:

1. Access your survey's translation interface via Tools > Text & Translations.
2. Click on the survey language for which you are looking to make this customization. In most cases you will just have your default language such as English. In those cases, click on the default language.
3. On the next screen, click on the Toolbar tab to access the customizable fields for the Save and Continue toolbar.
4. Scroll to the section titled Save and Continue Email Settings and click on the Message link or the corresponding Edit link.
5. Locate the [%%CONTINUE_LINK%%] merge code and replace it with the below. The highlighted portion should be replaced with your survey's Primary Link, found at the top of the survey's Share tab. You can also customize the continue your survey text as needed — this is the clickable text that your respondents will see in the email.
   
   <a href="https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/1234567/Survey-Title?snc=[survey('session id')]">Continue your survey</a>
6. Make sure to Save your message once you have made the necessary customizations.
7. Repeat the above process for each language version of your survey and make sure to test this thoroughly to make sure it is working as intended. 

Close a Survey with Save and Continue Enabled

When you close a survey all survey share links, including Save and Continue links, will close preventing respondents from recording further responses or completing partial responses.

If you wish to allow survey respondents with Save and Continue links to complete their response after the survey is closed you can check the Allow Existing Sessions to Continue option. This option allows respondents who are in the middle of a response at the time that you close the survey to proceed. It also allows survey respondents who have recorded a partial response to resume their response via either an Email Campaign link or a Save and Continue link after you have closed the survey. Leave this option unchecked if you wish to stop all survey activity at the time that you close the survey.

Customize the Save & Continue Bar Look & Feel

The Save & Continue bar is designed to complement the survey theme you are using. If you are looking to change colors of text/background on the save and continue bar, while there is no built-in method for toggling the colors, you can absolutely change this with a little CSS!

On the Style tab scroll to the bottom of the survey preview and click the link to access the HTML/CSS Editor. Copy and paste the CSS code for the elements of the Save and Continue bar you would like to change on the Custom CSS tab! 

After "background-color:" and "color:" place either with the color of your choice, such as "black," "purple," etc., or you can use a color picker like this one to insert a hex code: www.colorpicker.com.

For font size adjustments, place either a font size small, medium, large, x-large or specify exact pixels after "font-size:"

To center the 'Save and continue later' link:

.sg-snc-trigger {
margin: auto;
width: 100%;
}

To change the color of the background:

#sg-snc-bar {
background-color:black;
}

To change the color and/or font-size of the "Save and continue survey later" link:

#sg-snc-bar a {
color:#FFFFFF;
font-size: large;
}

To change the color and/or font size of the "Please supply an email address..." text:

#sg-snc-box {
color:yellow;
font-size: large;
}

To change the color and/or font size of the left labels on the email fields:

.sg-snc-fields th {
color:red;
font-size: large;
}

To change look & feel of the Save button:

.sg-snc-buttons input {
background:orange;
color:white;
font-size:15px;
border:1px solid #FFF;
padding:2px 7px;
cursor:pointer;
border-radius:3px;
}

To change the hover color of the Save button:

.sg-snc-buttons #sGizmoSaveButtonX:hover {
background-color:red;
}

To change the hover color of the Cancel button:

.sg-snc-buttons button#sGizmoCancelButtonX:hover {
color:red;
}

To change the color of the input text:

#sg-snc-email, #sg-snc-email2 {
color:red;
}

And lastly, to change the color and/or font size of the Cancel link:

.sg-snc-buttons button {
color:turquoise;
font-size:large;
}

Using Save & Continue for Collaborative Survey Responses

Some of our customers have used Save & Continue as an outside-of-the-box solution to allow multiple survey respondents to collaborate on a single survey response. Using Save & Continue in this way, a given survey respondent can click the Save & Continue option and provide another respondent's email address in order to invite them to complete a response.

If you are using Save and Continue in this way you'll want to customize the default text of the Save and Continue tool so it makes sense in this context.

1. To customize the text for the Save and Continue feature go to Tools > Text & Translations and select the language you wish to customize.
2. Select Toolbar.
3. Within the Save & Continue Messages section, we recommend customizing:
   
   
   • Trigger Text
   • Prompt
   • Confirmation Message
   • Subject - located within Save & Continue Email Settings section
   • Message - located within Save & Continue Email Settings section

Note: You might consider removing the Back button if using Save and Continue in this way to prevent answers provided by previous respondents from being overwritten.

It is important to note that even when the Back button has been removed, the invited respondent will still have the option to change the previous respondent's answers on the page where the Save and Continue option was clicked.