Learning from Failed Deployment

So the Metro group decided to put out a survey and use the new Google Docs tool to create and deploy. They survey looked great and I had a friend in California test it out. Everything seemed to work.

The embed function was failing due to site code-stripping, so we had to send it out as a copy and paste link; HOWEVER, the link was long and wrapped to a second line. The result? every place we posted the link for deployment, it cut the text off after so many characters.

Suddenly, a flood of announcements came in about the error in the survey link.

What we learned:

• Long links suck
• Triple-check cut & paste
• People are actually reading our emails!
• More responses came in from Facebook than our direct campaign
  
• TinyURL doesn't like google doc links
• Facebook doesn't like google doc links