Word cloud is a beautiful visualization of your audience’s thoughts. You simply ask your participants a question, they submit a one or two-question answer into an app, and all their submissions gather in a word collage – a “cloud” made of words.
Word clouds are great icebreakers and presentation openers. They’re awesome for checking the mood in the room, re-engaging people during meetings or events, and crowdsourcing what’s on their minds.
They look impressive when displayed on the screen and they’re very versatile tools in your arsenal if you want to create your presentation or speech more interesting and interactive.
Get inspired by these 35+ word cloud questions examples. Pick your favorite ones for your next meeting or event.
- Openers & Icebreaking word clouds
- ‘Get to know your audience’ word clouds
- Word clouds to spark a discussion
- Heart-warming & people celebrating word clouds
- Just for fun word clouds
Openers & Icebreaking word clouds
These word clouds are great for breaking the ice at the start and setting the tone for your meeting or event. Collect your audience’s thoughts in a nice word collage and use their insights as a springboard for your main presentation.
#1. Where are you joining us from?
Tip: This word cloud is suitable for larger meetings or events. At Slido, we use it often as an opener during our user education webinars.
It’s a great way for us to kick off our webinars with a little interactive activity and welcome our attendees in a more personalized way. Plus, it looks great seeing all the locations and places where our participants are tuning in from!
#2. Which emoji best describes your current state of mind?
Tip: Have your word cloud open as your participants are joining in. It’s great for filling the waiting time with an interactive activity. On top of that, you’ll get your participants into Slido right at the start so it will be easier for them to use it later.
For example, this word cloud is a great example of such activity. Submitting emojis is simple, doesn’t require any hard thinking, but will get your participants interacting with you straight away.
Create your own word cloud in Slido.
Sign up below and try it for yourself.
#3. In one word, how would you describe your past week/month?
Tip: Word clouds look best with one-word or two-word answers. To make your participants submit such short answers, consider starting the word cloud question with “In one word, what do you …” or “Using just one word, which is your…”
More word cloud ideas:
#4. Using one word, how are you feeling right now?
#5. Use one word to describe how 2021 has been for you so far.
#6. What’s your favorite country to visit?
#7. What is your next dream holiday destination?
#8. Where are you planning to go for the summer vacation?
Read also: 30+ Virtual Icebreakers for Your Online Meetings
‘Get to know your audience’ word clouds
Learn something more about your audience at the start. What are their expectations? What topics interest them the most? It will help you understand them better and make your presentation more tailored to their needs.
#9. Which topic would you like to learn more about today?
#10. Using one word, what do you expect from this event?
Tip: Once the word cloud starts to fill in with words, comment on the individual entries and use them as a bridge to your main content.
More word cloud ideas:
#11. In one word, how would you describe yourself?
#12. What’s your favorite way of travel?
#13. What is your favorite book?
#14. What was your first job?
Word clouds to spark a discussion
As a speaker, you can use a word cloud to crowdsource insights from your audience that you can use to kick off a discussion with your audience. Use one of these thought-provoking word clouds to make your presentation more conversational.
#15. In one word, what’s the biggest challenge you’re facing when working from home?
Tip: Running a word cloud is a great interactive activity for virtual or hybrid meetings and events because it allows everyone – remote or on-site – to join and chip in with their idea.
More word cloud ideas:
#16. What is currently the biggest challenge in your work?
#17. What’s your biggest strength?
#18. What’s your biggest weakness?
#19. Which global brand do you admire?
#20. What’s the first thing that comes to your mind when you hear the word ‘leader’?
#21. What personality traits should a great leader have?
#22. Which skills or qualities make one a good manager?
#23. What’s the best tech invention of the 21st Century?
#24. What makes a great webinar/event/meeting?
Heart-warming & people celebrating word clouds
These ones make your participants think, feel, and give your meeting or event a bit of a personal touch. And we mean that literally – some of these word clouds are really quite touching.
#25. Who was your silent hero last week/month?
Tip: This word cloud is perfect for large all-company meetings such as all-hands and town halls. We use the silent hero activity at each of our all-hands meetings to give a shoutout to our colleagues who went the extra mile.
#26. Who is your ultimate female role model?
More word cloud ideas:
#27. If you’d like to say thanks to someone, you can do it here.
#28. Which industry figure is your personal hero?
#29. If you could go for a coffee with one historical figure, who would it be?
#30. What do you value most about our company culture?
Read also: 80+ Best Poll Questions To Ask Your Online Audience
Just for fun word clouds
The purpose of these word clouds is to help your event attendees or colleagues loosen up, exchange some funny ideas, and have a little laugh. We all need that sometimes, don’t we?
#31. As a child, what did you want to be when you grow up?
#32. Which color would best describe your current state of mind?
Tip: In Slido, the word cloud poll has a profanity filter on by default which means that swear words won’t go through at all.
More word cloud ideas:
#33. Which sport would you like to be an Olympic champion in?
#34. Who was your childhood celebrity crush?
#35. If you had to eat only one food for the rest of your life, which one would it be?
#36. Which superpower would you like to have?
#37. What’s your favorite animal/food/flower/ice cream flavor?
Over to you
So, which one of these word clouds is your favorite?
In Slido, creating a word cloud and running it during an online meeting or event is as easy as 1-2-3.
If you don’t have a Slido account yet, create one below and you can try it for yourself. It’s free. Just like all good things in life.
