Save and Return - best practice?

The only thing that comes to mind would be making the answers to the questions embedded data fields, then piping the responses into the form each time they come back. I can't think of how to do this with an anon link though, as I would build it using an authenticator block. What are some of the ideas you have? It might be good to hear them out and see if there are easier ways to accomplish the same task.

Thanks, and maybe I won't be able to use an anonymous link. The content is almost exclusively writing prompts; questions with essay text box response options. I'd like them to save their work and be able to come back to continue working on it, as they like. Thank you so much for your help!

@EmilyRose The save and continue option in survey options is for exactly this use case, though it won't save if the clear their brawser cache / cookies, if they are in incognito mode, or if the change browsers.

@EmilyRose @AnthonyR brings up a good point. There is a save and continue function, but, as Anthony describes, relies on cookies, which doesn't sound ideal for your use case. It sounds like this is for a class (or classes) and so you wanted to use an anonymous (anon) link because it would be easier to distribute en mass. However, if you think of this as 2 surveys, instead of 1, then you can still do this with relatively low effort. 1 survey would be used to create the mailing list using a Contact Last trigger and could be distributed using an anon link. They would take this survey to create a username that would be used for logging in to the 2nd survey (also an anon link). The 2nd survey would be their save an continue survey where it pipes in their response data as a way of "saving" it. Since I am not sure of all the details of what you are trying to accomplish, I created 2 simple surveys to help understand the concept. Please look at the attached files. In Theory Testing (1) the recipient signs up and you create a mailing list (Tools>Triggers>Contact List Triggers) that brings in the information they filled out in the form. *Important* at this point, you will want to map their username to External Data Reference, unless you are using their email address to authenticate. This is because Survey 2 has an authenticator block in the survey flow, which only works with Email or External Data Reference. In Theory Testing (2) you are creating an embedded data field (WritingSample1) equal to their text entry of their 'writing prompt'. Then, when the log in a (2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc.) time, their previous writing prompt will populate and tell them to copy and paste it into the text box in order to save. Then this becomes the new embedded data field (WritingSample1). I didn't get a chance to test this as I am busy with year-starting work, but in theory this should work as you need. It does require them to copy and paste previous writings, but there are ways to negate this.... but it is more complex survey flow logic that I didn't have time to build out. Let me know if you need more help 😃.

Thank you so much for your suggestions. There are a lot of new-to-me ideas here! I am just getting back into this project and evaluating these suggestions. @Akdashboard thank you so much for taking the time to answer my questions and to even share examples! Unfortunately, I'm having trouble with your files - they open into StatsIQ and I can't see the survey and am not sure how to change the view. @lillianc I haven't used email triggers before and am interested in this solution! Thank you! Q: Does the retake link function differently than 'save & return' option? Q: Would using an authenticator help in this situation? (they use their email address as the unique identifier to login)

@EmilyRose from what I have experienced, the "save and continue" option in Survey Options only works prior to a user submitting a response. Once they submit, they can't go back to the same link and continue. I think it's meant for anonymous link users to return to the link at a later time and continue working on the survey where they left off (only on the same browser and computer they started on), but not after they submit the response. The retake link option allows the participant to edit their response after it's completely submitted. As for the authenticator, you would want to use something different than the email address, since anyone who knows their email address could access their responses. The authenticator allows participants to retake the survey, but does not automatically load previously saved progress if they have already submitted the survey. To get previously saved responses to load after the respondent has submitted responses, I would recommend doing the following: 1) use a contact list trigger that saves the bio information as metadata in the contact list you use to authenticate, 2) assign default choices within the survey that pull directly from the contact list. This allows respondents to see and change previous choices. Once they submit their revisions, the contact list with all of their bio data also gets saved.

> @lillianc said: > @EmilyRose great question! I just helped some colleagues with an online application that allows people to save (submit) and return to edit later using an email trigger. They showed me the resource on how to create a retake link > > The survey is configured so that anybody can start a submission through an anonymous link. Respondents can always come back to edit their submission through the retake link that is sent through an email trigger. The retake link repopulates all of their answers from the last submission and you can configure the link to overwrite the last submission or not. > > Though it's not as ideal as a static portal to log in, they can come back and edit this way. This idea is _far_ easier than mine. Highly recommend this solution.