James Murray is principal of Seattle IT Edge, a strategic consultancy that melds the technology of IT with the business issues that drive IT solutions. When James gave me a list of things that are central for IT professionals, I thought it might be fun (and hopefully useful) to connect these terms with online surveys for market research. [Warning: if you are a technical type interested in [...]

We asked entrepreneurs, consultants and small business owners how they were spending their time over the holiday period. The question asked about the TOP activity, so people needed to prioritize. The most popular [...]

Whether you are a political junkie or not, recent articles and analysis about mobile phones as part of data collection should be of interest to those who design or commission survey research. Cost, bias, and predictability are key issues. In years gone by, cell phone users were rarely included in surveys. There was uncertainty about likely reaction of potential respondents (“why are you calling me on my mobile when I have to pay for incoming calls?”, “is this [...]

Proctor and Gamble UK has been forced to pull a TV ad due to misleading claims based on a poorly designed survey.

The UK's Advertising Standards Authority felt that the survey results were too likely to biased by the invitation process, which included providing free samples of Clairol Nice 'n' Easy (the advertised product) prior to the survey and a entry in a drawing for a photo shoot in New York. The ASA also felt that surveys might have been completed by [...]

Showing question answers in a random order reduces the risk of bias from the position.  

To understand this, think of what happens when you are asked to choose a question by a telephone interviewer.  When the list of choices are presented for a single choice question, you might be think of the first option as more of a fit, or perhaps the last option is top-of-mind.   The problem is even more acute when the person answering the survey has to comment on each [...]

One of the interesting presentations at yesterday's Puget Sound Research Forum conference was from LinkedIn, covering their recently introduced sample services. Key advantages for sample from LinkedIn as I see it: Profiling information is entered by the LinkedIn user for reasons unconnected with survey taking. Regardless of of how much of a [...]

Business people generally know that satisfying customers is a good thing, but they don’t necessarily understand the link between satisfaction and profits. This is partly because much of the original work was done so long ago that contradictory cases and nuances have created confusion to build up. Additionally, some companies have appeared successful for a time despite poor satisfaction, generally in industries where there is limited or no competition such as airlines. But [...]

I just came across an interesting issue with validation in an online survey using a Van Westendorp pricing model.  Van Westendorp is one of the common ways to test pricing by directly questioning prospective purchasers.  This post isn't about Van Westendorp, also known as the Price Sensitivity Meter (you can find plenty of references online, including  a starting point on Wikipedia) but you [...]

The Pew Research Center has tracked broadband adoption for several years; the most recent study shows that the adoption rate has dropped. As of April 2008, 55% of the adults in the U.S. have access to broadband at home, with just 10% using dial-up connections. As you might imagine, broadband usage is unevenly distributed. People living in rural areas are less likely to have a high speed connection, as are lower income and African Americans (Hispanic broadband access is similar to the overall [...]

I asked myself this question the first time I saw a survey invitation with the following warning: Please note, this survey contains media that is not compatible with Firefox Internet Browser The invitation continued with instructions to copy and paste the link into an Internet Explorer window if Firefox is my default browser. Let's look at this in more detail. To dispose of the [...]