SurveyGizmo is among the most easy to use, best priced, feature packed internet survey software packages I have seen. And I’ve seen a number of them. I highly recommend it. And if you’re conducting fewer than 250 responses a month, it is absolutely free and includes just about everything you need. And it’s easy…very Web 2.0ish.
Confirmit 12 has been officially released and it features a variety of interesting features that look like they will have a positive impact on both survey developers and users.
For those who don’t know, Confirmit is one of the most prominent online survey software packages. It is used by a number of market research agencies and allows for pretty complicated, interesting surveys. Frankly, I would probably use Confirmit if I could except for the fact that the price tag is higher than I want/need/can afford to spend.
Points to Confirmit for making part of their new release about improving the user experience: some of the new features include a new hierarchy selector (which could be used, say, to let you pick a state and then narrow it down to the city); a new slider for entering numbers (not the first time such a feature has been implemented in a survey software package both GMI and Vovici offer sliders too) which could be fun for scale-type questions; a card sort feature, which allows the respondent to drag and drop responses into different piles. Two improvements I especially like are the "highlight required grid input field" which can be used to show the user precisely which answer they forgot to fill in and the AJAX dynamic content, which makes it possible for other questions to appear or disappear on the page depending on the results of other questions on the same page (without a page refresh).
Confirmit 12 also allows for different images to appear in answers depending on the state of the response. Simply put, this means that you can have one image shown when the answer is not selected (such as an empty check box) and replace it with a different image when the image is selected (such as a checked check box).
Confirmit 12 has new security features as well, although to my untrained eye they don’t seem all that exciting. That is, they’re not so much about protecting the data as much as they are about encrypting the information that is shown to the respondent (so they can’t figure out your secret methodologies). Confirmit 12 does make it possible to set an option that requires the survey to be conducted over a secure, encrypted connection.
Confirmit adds new survey development features, including additional information within the context of the project overview, the ability to increase the size of text box text, and an easier to use URL setup page. The scripting editor also includes a code completion feature similar to what you might find in Visual Studio or Flash. This feature makes it easier to write code by suggesting functions, methods, and properties that are context appropriate.
On the back-end, Confirmit 12 includes a new data processing engine which adds new data import features, data cleaning, recoding and merging features, and new data exports.
Confirmit Express, the simpler version of the survey system, also includes a variety of new features such as a new user administration interface, MS Word export and the ability to quickly and easily test surveys.
For a full list of new features, see the Confirmit web site.
Conducting an online survey yourself is fairly easy, but it does require a few ingredients (other than the survey itself). If you can come up with these three things you can probably execute your own customer survey online:
1. You need to select some a survey system. This part is fairly easy to come by as there are all sorts of options out there to choose from. If you don’t expect to do a lot of surveying then you are probably OK to use a fairly low cost option. If you’re doing it for a real life professional business I would be careful not to do it on a free system that doesn’t let you remove their branding (there is nothing more tacky then having your survey end on the surveymonkey signup page – your survey should end on your home page or something similar). If you’re going to show images, make sure that you choose a system that makes it easy for you to upload and insert images – don’t choose a system that makes you upload the images to your own web server since that will make things too complicated (especially if you don’t have a web site).
2. You need respondents. This is often the most tough part of conducting a survey online – you need to find people, preferably customers, to take your survey. If you have a web site you can definitely solicit your web site visitors to take your survey, keeping in mind that you don’t want to do anything that will stop them from making purchases. One option is to invite past customers to take your survey – hopefully you have plenty of e-mail address from past customers, and a carefully worded, friendly e-mail to them may get enough of them to take your survey – especially if you make it clear to them that you’ll be using their feedback in the development of your new products. If you don’t have any e-mail addresses and you want to get your feedback from a group of non-customers, then what you may want to do is rent an outside survey panel. You’ll pay upwards of $5 or more per response, but if the feedback is important enough, it may be worth it to you.
3. You need to offer an incentive. There are probably many people who will take your survey for free. Maybe they like you, maybe they like your product, or maybe they just like to take surveys. In most cases, there won’t be a enough people like this to give you a fleshed out sample. By introducing a simple incentive – the chance to win a drawing or even some kind of an exclusive discount – you can greatly increase the number of people who will take your survey without significantly increasing your costs. For example, one of my favorite incentives is to offer a chance to win a $200 gift certificate to giftcertificates.com. You’ll double or even triple your response rate which means that the quality of your responses will be significantly higher without spending significantly more money overall.
Julie Lemaster, an MBA student at the University of California- Riverside, has written an interesting paper (which is posted to the Sloan Center for Internet Retailing web site) entitled "Online Panel Management and Strategies: An Introduction for Managers." It is an introductory guide to managers who have been asked or have decided it is time to start looking into online market research for their companies.
Lemaster contrasts full-service providers, such as M/A/R/C and SSI against complex and potentially expensive "self-serve" packages from Confirmit, Globalpark, GMI, and SurveyZ to low cost providers such as QuestionPro, Survey.com, SurveyMoney, and Zoomerang.
The abstract of the paper summarizes it as providing…
"…an introductory guide to managers who have been asked or have decided it is time to start looking into online market research for their company. The size of the company you work for does not matter, as we will discuss several methods that can be used for any size company or investment level. This paper is for managers who want to quickly learn the basic issues of online market research panels. It will also be useful to managers who need to become familiar with some of the major providers of online panel management."
In addition to reviewing the providers and the various strategies for organizing your panel, Lemaster discusses a variety incentives that can be used to motivate and retain participants, such as lotteries, bonus points, and raffles.
SPSS recently put out a news release (which has been picked up by at least two news sites CRM Today and TMCnet) whose sole purpose appears to be to scare companies away from using the plethora of survey research tools in favor of their multi-modal survey system. How can you begin to know what your customers are thinking, reasons the release, if you only ask those who are online when hardly anyone is even using the Internet these days?
"Web-based surveys may appear to be less intrusive and easier to conduct, but without pen and paper or a good ‘old-fashioned’ telephone, organizations miss the opinions of many, including those without a computer, the forever and selectively computer illiterate and a large part of the senior population that simply missed the tech revolution."
The release goes on to remind everyone that paper and phone survey are "in many cases essential, if organizations expect to present clients with the most accurate and complete view of customer attitutes and opinions."
It then proves its point by referring to a recent Pew report:
"In fact, the Pew Internet & American Life Project recently found 49 percent of Americans only occasionally use modern gadgetry and many others bristle at electronic connectivity — the Internet."
Wow. Who would have thought that in 2007 more than half of the US population either doesn’t use and/or extremely dislikes the Internet. We all may need to rethink our online programs and go back to the phone banks, door-to-door solicitors and shopping malls many of us have mostly abandoned.
…but before we do, here are some stats not included in the SPSS release:
The Pew study that SPSS refers to in their release is called "A Typology of Information and Communication Technology User." The study measures not whether or not people have internet access (as implied by SPSS) but instead tries to categorize people by the degree to which information and communication technologies are utilized and enjoyed.
According to the report, only 15% of the population can be characterized as "Off the Network" — that is, individuals with neither cell phones nor internet connectivity. They tend to be in their mid-60s, nearly three-fifths are women. Only 7% have college degrees (vs. the US average of 27%) and only 4% earn over $75K a year (vs. the US average of 22%). They are the heaviest users of "old media" such as radio and TV but do not have the inclination to try new information and communication technology.
Obviously, not everyone is online and if you’re looking for a particularly special group you may want to revert to paper, pencils and phones. However, I’m thinking that for most purposes you’re going to be able to find who you’re looking for online.
But the implication of the SPSS release is that unless you use (expensive) multi-channel research techniques (provided by them?) you will be collecting bad information and misleading your clients. This isn’t true and is in fact extremely misleading.
TopTenReviews recently published their evaluations of ten "value-priced" survey software packages (I say "value-priced because they are all below $600 for the entire system).
The systems they looked at were Survey Crafter Professional from SurveyCrafter, StatPac by StatPac, The Survey System by Creative Research Systems, FormArtist by Quask, SumQuest by SumQuest, EZSurvey by Raosoft, Survey Said by Marketing Masters, Survey Gold by Golden Hills Software, Survey Genie by William Steinberg Consultants and iMagic Survey Pro by iMagic Software.
The reviewers at TopTen selected Survey Crafter Professional as their favorite because it has "the perfect balance of creative freedom coupled with strong statistical analysis." StatPac Survey Software was rated second highest followed by The Survey System which was given third place.
Although the reviews are fairly short, if you’re looking for a fairly inexpensive system ranging from $100 to $600 these reviews are probably enough to get you started.
Let’s face it: an online survey is, at its heart, simply a collection of forms. Super long forms with many pages and twisty questions yes, but still forms. And built into the very architecture of the world wide web are the tools that are needed to build forms (and ultimately, surveys). So what is the point of building a service that’s only point is to build forms? Who would use it?
Enter Wufoo.com, the Web 2.0 answer to online forms. Creating forms has really never been so easy or so much fun. Or so much fun to look at. Or so smooth. As someone else pointed out somewhere else, this service makes you wish you had a need for a form so that you could use Wufoo to build it. It really is that neat.
Can you make surveys using Wufoo? Not really. I mean, I suppose if you had a really simple survey that you wanted to execute, you probably could. It does let you do multiple choice questions, open-ended questions, and single-response questions. It even has special fields that help respondents enter prices, addresses, e-mail addresses and dates (all of the things one might regularly enter in a form). But there are also a lot of survey-related things that it doesn’t let you do, like create multiple pages, or validate responses in a meaningful way (other than to require the fields). I would hazard to say that as far as survey capabilities go, SurveyMonkey and Zoomerang have more features, as well as libraries of templates you can use to get you started. These are, after all, programs that were specifically designed to help you create surveys.
One thing that was a little annoying — I spent about five minutes designing a form and clicked the "Themes" button to make it look extra pretty — only to discover that my form had completely disappeared! I had assumed that my changes were being saved as I went and never even noticed the "Save Form" button at the bottom-right corner of the page. Make sure you push it when you are done or your simple survey will end up be simpler than you intended. And then you’ll have to start over from scratch.
With that said, I wish SurveyMonkey, Zoomerang, and even the package I use, GMI Net-MR, would take a page from the Wufoo design/survey development book and create an interface that is as fun and as easy to use. I would get a lot more work done.
Wufoo offers a variety of pricing plans, ranging from free accounts (the "gratis" plan) which lets you create 3 forms with up to 10 fields each and accept up to 100 entries a month. The next plan up (the "ad hoc" plan) costs only $9 a month and allows you to have up to 10 forms with an unlimited number of fields and accept up to 500 entries. There is also the "bona fide" account (unlimited forms, 3000 responses a month), the "carpe diem" plan (15,000 responses a month) and the "ad infinitum" plan (no limits, total cost is $199 a month).
And if you are trying to create an online form to collect data, and don’t want to mess around with the basic HTML building blocks, and if you want the chance to play with the newest and greatest of what’s out there, then give Wufoo a try.
A couple of days ago Richard Kassiasieh of Kassblog posted an interesting commentary about Markettools’ Zoomerang product in which he expressed some concern not about the functionality of the service (which he thought was pretty straightforward) but about the branding, pricing, and control one loses over data by using an outside resource.
In terms of the branding, Richard was concerned because the free version of Zoomerang ends with a message inviting respondents to use the system to create their own services, and one could argue that this would be somewhat unprofessional-looking way for a "real" company to end an exchange with a customer (although to be fair, a company that at least goes to the trouble to collect feedback from customers — even free online software — is much better than all of those companies that don’t collect any feedback at all). And to be completely fair, the paid version of Zoomerang does allow you to remove the branding.
But Richard raises a good point — if you are going to go to the trouble of collecting invaluable data from your customers, you at least owe it to yourself to use a process where you control the look and feel of the experience from beginning to end (which, I should again point out, is possible using the paid version of Zoomerang. But even there you need to make sure you change the settings appropriately and test your survey to make sure it looks exactly as you want it to look).
Richard’s second point is that services such as Zoomerang store your data on their servers. This is, of course, true for all web-based survey systems and there is no getting around it unless you only use survey software installed on your own computers that are maintained in your own facilities. You can to some degree mitigate the risk by making sure you understand the level of security and regular backup procedures of the company that you choose to use for your survey research.
Zoomerang doesn’t say precisely how your data is stored other than to indicate that information on members and panelists are stored in "secure databases" protected by passwords, and that data from surveys is stored at "a secure hosting facility with both physical and software-based security systems." For most people, this probably sounds secure enough but if you want to know more and if security really is a concern you may want to contact the provider before you start your survey.
Data retention policies are also important to consider. For example, if you use the free version of Zoomerang they say that your data will only be saved for 10 days following the start of the survey. The impression I get is that they do retain it longer than that and it can be accessed again if you sign up for a paid account, but it is always important to understand the data retention policies before you get started as well as whether or not it will be easy for you to download your data in a managable format when you are finished. Richard expressed concern that Zoomerang only allows a flat file format — well, I think for most people that is probably enough. There are a few services that will allow you to download your survey into a relational file format (such as an Access data file), but these services tend to cost more and frankly I’m not sure what most researchers would ever do with the data in that format anyways. SPSS takes only flat files.
Finally Richard raises the question of cost and why there aren’t more open-source alternatives. He speaks the truth when he notes that survey software isn’t really that hard to write and to that I really don’t have that much of an answer. I imagine it will happen eventually.
Triexa, a Toronto-based company formerly know as Sensation Designs, is presently beta testing a new web-based survey software system called AskItOnline. Although I haven’t had a chance to play with it yet (the software is in "private" beta with only some screenshots posted), what makes it fascinating is 1) it is a "Web 2.0" type program that utilizes a drag-and-drop web-based interface and a particularly reasonable pricing structure (four levels: "basic" which gives you very little functionaliy but it allows you to collect 100 surveys for free; "standard" which adds themes, some additional survey/design features and a cost of $7 a month for up to 5 surveys with 750 responses each; "professional" which gives you up to 10 surveys and 2500 responses per survey for $15 a month and "enterprise" which allows you to do an unlimited number of surveys with up to 15,000 responses each for $25 a month.
If you’re looking for an easy-to-use package that has a very low cost, this pacakge may be for you. Although each level contains different features, the enterprise version allows multi-page surveys, an unlimited number of questions per survey; "star ratings"; randomized responses; the ability to insert images and video; response validation; question piping; skipping/branch logic; and up to a terabyte of data storage. You can also review your results online, download your results, and receive e-mail notification whenever someone completes your survey.
The software is still in "private" beta, but it appears that they are still accepting new testers and it’s always fun to participate in the development of a new program.
SurveyGold from Golden Hills Software is an easy to use Internet-based survey software system that has been around for some time and has to some degree mastered the art of making online research a simple, don’t-have-to-think-to-hard-about-it process. Although the software is limited to a basic set of question types, it does allow for some basic skipping based on responses and if you’re looking for a program that will get you the results quickly with very little training, this package may be worth exploring.
I’m not going to go into an entire review of the software package here at this moment (although I did just download it — Golden Hills offers a free 30-day trial), what I did want to say is that version 8 of the software was just released a few weeks ago and it offers a variety of features such as:
Several bugs from the previous version of the software have also been fixed.
SPSS recently announced the release of SPSS Dimensions 4.0, the latest incarnation of its enterprise survey and analysis suite that does everything from helping you create surveys to analyzing the data to generating reports. Before looking into the new features introduced in version 4.0, I thought it might first be interesting to explore the basic features of the system. In other words, what is SPSS Dimensions?
SPSS Dimensions isn’t so much an individual software package as much as it is a platform of several independent software packages that are able to work together in a relatively seamless fashion. Sort of like how each of the programs within Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access, etc) can work independently (and be purchased independently) but also work very well together. Like Office, most of the packages that work with Dimensions are published by SPSS — although the platform has been designed to accommodate the integration of software written by 3rd party developers (and several such packages do exist).
Some of the programs that work with Dimensions include:
At the core of SPSS Dimensions is the Dimensions Data Model, a set of components (openly documented and supported) which allow for accessing information about questionnaires and respondent data. It also deals with keeping track of changes to the questionnaire (versioning), translating both questions and data from one format to another, and managing data stored in multiple formats and platforms.
Visual representation of the Dimensions Data Model
(from the SPSS presentation "Using the SPSS MR Data Model")
The table above describes the role of the data model well. Data can be collected from multiple sources. Instead of each collection program storing the data in its own database, it instead sends it to the Dimensions Data Model which puts it into its own special format. When another program, such as a data processing program or a data analysis program needs the data it requests it from the Dimensions Data Model using standardized request formats (that just about any program can use).
Consider a project in which you need to collect data using three different survey techniques including a phone survey, a web-based survey and a paper survey. Even though you’re going to ask the same basic questions in each survey, you are still going to have to develop three completely different questionnaires in order to compliment each of the mediums, which further means you’re going to have to program the survey three different times (perhaps four, if you consider that you may be using scanning software to read some of your paper surveys).
Even though the question is the same, it needs to appear different
across modes and across functions (from the SPSS presentation
"Improving Government Programs with Comprehensive Data Collection")
After you’ve finished collecting the data (using three separate data collection tools, all of which store the data in their own, separate proprietary format that exports into the frustratingly simple CSV format, you’ll then have to combine all of the data into one file which you’ll then need to clean and prepare for analysis. Following analysis, you’ll export your results into yet another program.
Using the SPSS Dimensions Suite (or more specifically, software that is integrated into the Dimensions Suite) makes the process go much faster by optimizing the mechanics of designing and fielding your questionnaire and analyzing and reporting on the data.
Dimensions reduces the time it takes to conduct a complex research project
(Source: SPSS presentation "Discover it with Dimensions")
SPSS Dimensions has been developed based on the notion of "Design Once, use Many" so once you have created your initial questionnaire (either using a simple, graphic user interface found in mrInterview or the more advanced script driven interface provided by mrStudio — either package will allow you to import the text of your survey from MS Word), you can then quickly (and easily) set it up to deploy using multiple modes (paper, web, CATI, etc).
Perhaps one of the most exciting features of SPSS Dimensions is its multi mode deployment capabilities. Most surveys today require some amount of programming to deal with skipping, piping, the incorporation of outside data, and other advanced options. Ordinarily, each mode would require its own programming. SPSS Dimensions is designed so that you only need to write the script once and it will work the same in each context.
SPSS Dimensions allows you to program your survey once
and have it work on multiple platforms. (from the SPSS presentation
"Improving Government Programs with Comprehensive Data Collection")
Dimensions not only helps you design and execute your survey, it also manages security, translating the survey into multiple languages, and manages multiple versions of your survey as well.
External databases containing participant details can be added at any time, and it can be used both in the survey and during analysis. Data from outside sources can be reviewed during the survey to check for inaccuracies, and it can even be updated based on responses given in the survey.
All of the data that is collected, regardless of how it is collected, goes into one SPSS Dimensions database where it can then be analyzed and reported on. Although Dimensions is an open platform that will allow analysis to be conducted in any program (it will export data into a variety of formats for other programs to use), the suite is optimized to work with several SPSS-published programs, such as mrStudio, mrTables, SPSS for Windows and Clementine. Results can then be automatically turned into interactive web-based reports or analyzed using Excel, Word or PowerPoint. Dimensions integrates all of the major capabilities provided by SPSS’s various data analysis packages, including SPSS Base for statistical analysis; Clementine for data mining, and SPSS Text Analysis for Surveys for text analysis and categorization as well as a variety of SPSS and 3rd party data collection and reporting tools.
For those of you tired of simple multiple choice radio box, check box kind of online survey questions, RelevantView has created a new online survey tool that offers the ability to have users participate in an online card sort much like what they would experience if they were participating in a real-life exercise.
Although I can’t tell from the image precisely what technology is being used to power the sort, it does have a very Web 2.0 feel to it that hopefully gives a sense of the types of fancy new user-friendly online survey technologies we can expect to see in the future.
Grapevine Surveys announced today the release of a new version of Employee Evaluator, a 360 degree feedback web-based software package specifically designed for performing HR evaluations of all types, including employee evaluations, team assessments, performance appraisals, job reviews and multi-rater feedback.
The new version features a number of enhancements, including a start-to-finish Wizard-based system to guide and manage the entire process, a comprehensive survey approval process, and a totally revamped graphic interface. Grapevine Employee Evaluator continues to include in-depth multi-level reporting and distribution control, an extensive selection of professionally-designed survey templates, automated system distribution and collection of evaluations, custom branding and control over evaluation variables.
Grapevine is offering a free trial package to the frist 500 Corporate users who try the service. Sign up here.
Zoomerang recently announced the creation of a new "Education Resource Center" which will provide practical tips and best practices to educators interested in revitalizing their academic initiatives. The program, which is closely integrated with Zoomerang’s online survey service, is designed to give educators the tools they need to use survey research to drive curriculum decisions and increase student performance; incorporate faculty imput into the decision-making process while increasing teacher satisfaction; and eliminate cumbersome paper processing allowing educators to spend more time on classrom development.
Perseus Development Corporation and WebSurveyor, combined under a newly formed holding company funded by Austin Ventures, announced today they were selected as a winner of the CRM Rising Star award by the editors of CRM Magazine. Perseus Development Corporation is the originator and leading provider of Enterprise Feedback Management (EFM) solutions, while WebSurveyor is the leading provider of online survey software for business professionals.
Read more at the Boston Daily Business News.
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