Construction Informer

Web surveys are nice tools for getting the sense of something. Usually they aren’t really excellent indicators of much, but they do provide a general guideline of what people are thinking about topics.

I was asked to take a survey at a news site and because I appreciate the fact they make the news available for free I decided to spend some time answering questions. Now, I’m thinking maybe five minutes or so.

The first thing that happens is the questions turn on something I’m not even interested in – What TV shows have I heard of before? No problem. I read the names and checked the ones I had heard of. Then it asked of the shows I said I had heard about, which ones were aired on what channel, and on what day, and at what time of day. Now I’m beginning to feel like I’m taking a test. There were ten shows that I had previously said I knew the name of and so before I could move on I had to basically click on 30 drop down boxes and make 30 selections. Because I don’t have any idea when these programs air, or on what day or time, I had to click the drop down boxes 30 times and select Don’t Know – because really I have no idea when they air. If I come across them and I want to watch them, I do, otherwise I don’t.

Next the survey wanted to know of the ten shows I knew the name of how likely it was that I was going to watch them again. This was on a scale with five choices. Remember now, I never said I had watched them, only that I had heard of them. So now I’m wondering just what value this survey is going to produce, and I’m beginning to question whether I want to invest any more of my time in it.

The next question wanted to know what TV services I had. These included things like DVDs, DVRs, Satellite TV, etc. Finally another easy one. But next came the fatal question. If I was going to watch the 10 shows again, how would I watch each one – on satellite, DVD, DVR, etc.

I looked up at the progress bar and I was only 15 percent done. What a bummer. I was already exhausted and still had 85 percent to go. Forget it, I thought. I closed the window

For what it’s worth, here is my advice if you’re going to craft a survey for your website.

• Keep it tightly focused. Don’t try to find out everything, just a little bit. Through successive surveys you can get the bigger picture.
• If you use drop down boxes keep them to under six per question, and limit the choices in the drop downs to no more than three.
• If you are going to provide a pop-up box or page that asks the person if they want to take the survey then tell them what it’s about, how many questions, and about how long it should take them.
• Eliminate those who don’t fit the profile right off the bat. In the case above if the first question had asked me if I paid attention to the days and times TV shows aired I would have responded No. At that point it could then thank me and let me know I don’t fit the profile of people it wants to have answer the questions.
• Ask questions that people have a reasonable chance of being able to respond to.
• Keep it short, less than five minutes.
• Every question should give the responder a chance to skip it. So what if the data is useless, it’s better to accept that then to alienate someone because you forced them to answer something that has no value to you anyway. Forced responses just skew the data.

I am sure there are some seasoned survey pros out there who might have other suggestions. I only offer these as a perspective from the survey taker.