How to Add Questions to a Facebook Group

Adding membership questions to your Facebook Group is one of the most powerful things you can do to build a thriving, engaged, and high-quality community. This feature helps you filter out spammers, understand your members' needs, and set the right tone from the moment someone asks to join. This guide will walk you through how to set up membership questions and share the three essential questions every group admin should be asking to maximize their impact.

Why Membership Questions are a Game-Changer for Your Community

Before getting into the step-by-step setup, it’s worth understanding why this feature is so important. Far from being a simple gatekeeping tool, membership questions serve as the foundation for a healthy and active group. Setting them up properly can transform your community management workflow and the overall vibe of your group.

Here’s what asking the right questions can do for you:

• Weed Out Spammers and Bots: Automated accounts and bad actors rarely take the time to answer custom questions. Simply having them in place serves as an effective first line of defense, filtering out a large portion of low-quality or malicious requests automatically.
• Establish Group Culture Immediately: By asking a question about your group rules, you instantly signal that your community is well-moderated and that certain standards of behavior are expected. This encourages genuine members to join and deters those who aren't a good fit.
• Gather Incredible Audience Insights: What are your members struggling with most? What content do they want to see? Your membership questions are your earliest opportunity to survey your audience. This data is invaluable for creating content, products, or services that truly resonate.
• Grow Your Email List: You can use a cleverly worded question to invite new members to join your email newsletter, providing another channel to connect with your community outside of the Facebook ecosystem. This is a brilliant tactic for building brand assets you truly own.

How to Add Membership Questions to Your Facebook Group: A Step-by-Step Guide

Setting up your membership questions is a straightforward process whether you're on a desktop computer or using the mobile app. Once you have your questions ready, you can get everything configured in under five minutes.

On a Desktop Computer:

1. Navigate to your Facebook Group and look for the Admin tools menu on the left-hand sidebar.
2. Under Admin tools, scroll down and click on Group settings.
3. In the settings menu, scroll down to the "Manage Membership" section until you find the option for Membership Questions. Click the pencil icon to edit.
4. This will open the "Ask Pending Members Questions" screen. Click the Add question button to get started.
5. A new window will pop up allowing you to choose a question format (Checkboxes, Multiple Choice, or Written answer) and type your question.
6. Repeat the process to add up to three questions. After you’ve added them, click Save at the top of the Membership Questions screen. That’s it! The questions will now be presented to anyone who requests to join your group.

On the Facebook Mobile App:

1. Open the Facebook app and navigate to your group.
2. Tap the shield icon (or sometimes your profile picture with the shield) in the top right corner to access your Admin tools.
3. From the Admin assist screen, tap the settings gear icon, also in the top right.
4. Scroll down to find Membership Questions listed under the "Manage Membership" section and tap it.
5. Tap the Add question button.
6. Choose your format, type your question, and tap Save in the top right corner.

You can create up to three custom questions. Each question can be formatted as a written answer (allowing a free-form response), multiple choice (where users select one option), or checkboxes (where users can select multiple options).

The 3 Perfect Questions Every Facebook Group Should Ask

While you can ask anything you want, a strategic combination of three specific questions will give you the best mix of security, insight, and marketing power. Consider it a small funnel designed to attract the right people and provide you with the information you need.

Question 1: The Gatekeeper (Rule Agreement)

This is the most critical question and should be non-negotiable for approval. Its purpose is to get explicit buy-in from new members that they have read and will abide by your community rules.

• Purpose: To enforce rules, screen out low-effort joiners, and create a solid basis for future moderation if a member breaks the rules.
• Format: Multiple Choice or Checkbox.
• The Perfect Phrasing: "This community is built on respect and helpfulness. Our rules are designed to keep it that way. Have you read the Group Rules and agree to follow them? Answering 'yes' is required for approval."

Pro-Tip: Create a single answer option like "Yes, I agree to the rules." By making this the only choice, you get a clear commitment. When reviewing pending members, you can immediately decline anyone who skips this question or fails to check the box. It makes managing your request queue fast and efficient.

Question 2: The Researcher (Audience Insight)

This question is where you get inside the minds of your new members. The goal is to understand what motivated them to join and what problem they are trying to solve. The answers will directly inform your content strategy.

• Purpose: To understand member pain points, goals, and interests so you can create content that genuinely helps them.
• Format: Written Answer.
• The Perfect Phrasing (choose one that fits your group):
  • "What is the single biggest challenge you're facing right now with [your group's topic]?"
  • "What do you hope to learn or achieve by joining our community?"
  • "Where are you on your [topic] journey? Are you a beginner, intermediate, or advanced?"

Pro-Tip: Create a simple spreadsheet - Google Sheets is perfect for this - and have your admins or moderators copy and paste the answers to this question before approving a new member. Over time, you’ll build an incredible database of your audience's needs in their own words. When you're planning content for the next month, just open this spreadsheet for endless ideas.

Question 3: The Marketer (Lead Generation)

This is your chance to connect with your members beyond the Facebook algorithm. It's a powerful way to grow your email list but must be handled with care and transparency. Offer clear value in exchange for their email address.

• Purpose: To ethically invite new members onto your email list, giving you a direct line of communication with your audience.
• Format: Written Answer.
• The Perfect Phrasing: "We send out a weekly newsletter with our best [topic] tips, free resources, and exclusive updates not shared in the group. Would you like to join? If yes, please leave your best email address below."

Important Note: The answers to membership questions disappear forever once you approve or decline a request. So, if someone provides their email, you must copy and paste it into your email marketing platform (or that handy spreadsheet) before clicking "Approve." This is a manual but highly effective process.

Best Practices for Managing Your Questions and Approvals

Once your questions are live, the work is about process, not just setup. Putting a few simple systems in place will make your role as an admin much easier and more effective.

• Establish a Clear Approval Policy: Create a baseline for your admin and moderator team. For example: "Applicants must answer the rules question and at least one other question to be considered. Blank applications are automatically declined." This keeps your team aligned and ensures consistent moderation.
• Check Profiles for Red Flags: Even with great questions, take a few seconds to review the applicant's public profile. A brand new profile with no photo, no friends, and strange activity is a huge red flag for a bot or spam account.
• Keep Your Questions Updated: Your community will evolve, and your questions should too. Re-evaluate your questions every six months to a year. Is the "researcher" question still giving you useful information? Could the wording be improved? A small tweak can make a big difference.
• Designate an Onboarding System: Have a system for grabbing the data from your answered questions. As mentioned, a shared spreadsheet works wonders. You can create columns for "Date Joined," "Biggest Challenge," and "Email Address." This transforms join requests from a simple admin task into a valuable data collection process that fuels your growth.

Final Thoughts

Implementing membership questions is a simple technical task that pays massive strategic dividends. It helps you protect your community's integrity, gather invaluable audience research straight from the source, and build an audience beyond the confines of Facebook's platform. Taking the time to craft the right questions is one of the highest-leverage activities a Group Admin can undertake.

We know how much work goes into managing a social media strategy across different platforms, including keeping a group active and engaged. Often, the challenge isn't creating content but staying organized across calendars and platforms. That's why we built Postbase with a clean, visual calendar that helps you see your entire content plan at a glance, so you can focus on building your community instead of fighting with spreadsheets.

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