Every September it seems like a new and very slightly improved edition of SPSS is released — this year is no exception, and in just a few weeks SPSS 15.0 will hit the streets with a few new minor features that may (or may not) improve the way your charts and graphs look; change the way you organize your data, and even provide you with a few additional statistical tools and programmatic capabilities that you never knew you were missing. So, am I going to rush out to order this new and exciting version? Probably not.

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The Digivey Survey Suite from Arizona-based Diatouch, Inc. is probably one of the most full-featured, flexible and friendly touch screen survey systems I’ve had the opportunity to play with. In addition to supporting a wide range of Windows XP-based hardware platforms ranging from touch screen kiosks to pen-based tablets, the survey creation software is extremely flexible, thoughtfully designed and easy for just about anyone to learn and use. Surveys can be quickly customized in just about any way you choose and can include audio, video, and images. Digivey also supports several advanced features such as branching, skipping, and piping and comes with some very strong reporting capabilities that may for some users eliminate the need for further analysis. The cost of the software is fair and should be within the budget of most companies who seek to develop an on-going on-site survey program.

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U.K. based ITWeek IWR Labs recommends six internet survey packages including 2ask, Demographix, QuestionBuilder, SurveyMonkey, Sysurvey, and WebSurveyor.

2Ask: ITWeek liked the ease of survey creation and the packages to suit every budget; they didn’t like the limited support options and the fact that pacakges were differentiated by the number of questions you could ask and the number of responses you could collect.

Demographix: They liked the fixed cost, user-friendly, powerful analysis tools and the impressive free trial. They didn’t like the high price of the software.

QuestionBuilder: ITWeek liked the easy of survey creation, the variety of templates, powerful analysis, and the great value. They didn’t like the fact that phone support was on U.S. time.

SurveyMonkey: ITWeek liked the inexpensive starting costs for unlimited surveys and the free basic service. They didn’t like the fact that there wasn’t a full-featured evaluation and that the number of responses you could collect was capped.

SySurvey: They liked the low cost per response, the data sharing and the CATI support. They thought survey creation could be easier, and didn’t like that there was no phone support.

WebSurveyor: ITWeek liked the "superb" template range and the powerful analysis and reporting tools. They didn’t like the fact that support was offered on U.S. time.

Read the full review at the ITWeek web site.

SurveyCore is a fairly simple web-based survey system that provides a range of basic features including multiple question types, multi-page surveys, and even some moderately advanced features such as piping and branching. Design capabilities are limited, and the fact that it does not provide an off-line editing module may be annoying to those who are not always connected to the Internet. The system does feature a built-in e-mail invitation/tracking module, and it offers an interesting reporting system that may prove useful especially for ongoing studies. While the system is not overly expensive compared to some advanced systems, it may be out of the price range for many who may be satisfied with the feature set.

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In the July, 2006 issue of the Market Research Society’s Research Magazine, Tim Macer reviewed Perseus SurveySolutions 2.0, a multi-user online survey solution with integrated sampling, invitation management, report preparation and publishing, which is aimed at large enterprises wishing to consolidate and co-ordinate all their research and feedback activities.

Tim liked the Word-like interface for designing surveys, the centrally controlled ‘profiles’ that allow direct links to enterprise databases to provide "real-time and moment-of-truth sampling" and the simple results portal; he didn’t like the fact that there was no intelligent support for coding or consolidating open-ended data, the limited range of statistics, and the fact that it was labourious working with open-ends.

Read Tim Macer’s full review of Perseus Survey Solutions EFM 2.0

In the June, 2006 issue of issue of the Market Research Society’s Research Magazine, Tim Macer reviewed Monitor Group’s MarketSight, a web based survey analytic tool for researchers and end-users, with an emphasis on interactive hypothesis testing.

Tim liked the expert-system approach which automatically applies appropriate statistical tests, the highly intuitive interface which makes analysis quick and easy, and the simple import and setup from SPSS or SAS formats. He didn’t like the fact that it doesn’t support multiple response questions, that it works only in IE6, and that there is no local support in Europe.

Read Tim Macer’s full review of Monitor Group’s MarketSight.

In the May, 2006 issue of issue of the Market Research Society’s Research Magazine, Tim Macer reviewed Merlinco’s MerlinPlus, a powerful end-user analysis suite which can be fed either by surveys in industry-standard formats or by data collected using built-in modules for web surveys, handheld CAPI, touchscreen self-completion or simple standalone CATI.

Tim liked the easy but versatile analysis and cross-tab capabilities, the support for touchscreen kiosk interviewing applications and the fact that it is easy to import or export data in many formats and that it outputs directly to MS Word, Excel, and PowerPoint for reports. He disliked the fact that there were no charting capabilities and less than friendly file management system.

Read Tim Macer’s full review of Merlinco’s MerlinPlus.