Description:
Internet surveys allow for both close-ended and open-ended questions just as on a telephone survey, but in addition respondents can be presented with and evaluate advertising concepts or messaging components. We recommend using internet surveys when trying to complete:
- Surveys among a very specialized audience, such as physicians or business leaders;
- Surveys among harder to reach audiences, such as opinion elites;
- Membership or customer studies; or,
- A quantitative measurement of an advertising concept or testing detailed messaging that cannot be done over the telephone.
Some examples of this work include:
- Advertising recall and content assessment surveys for on-going ad campaigns in support of public policy issues. This allows us to gauge recall and ad performance in multiple markets and among a range of customer segments.
- Extensive membership or customer surveys for several organizations and leading associations. These surveys probe members/customers about organizational performance, information use/needs, perceptions of a client’s mission statement, and an assessment of their needs. These surveys have been used for extensive internal review and improvement for our clients, allowing them to make customer-focused changes to their organizations.
- Test the appeal and effectiveness of websites. For some of these projects, we conducted two parallel surveys – one testing our client’s website, and one that tested a similar questionnaire with a competing website. This technique allowed us to have control data for our clients’ results, as well as allowing a variety of comparisons on comparable attributes.
- Evaluate several advertisements from a quantitative perspective by drawing large sample sizes at very reasonable costs. Online ad testing can be utilized during the development phase by testing various ad concepts or executions in an online platform where participants can view the full ads. Online ad testing surveys are very useful for comparing competing versions of ads through a multi-sample testing model and testing against a control group that has not viewed an ad.
Logistics:
Respondents are asked to log onto a website with secured password protection either via their desktop computer or mobile device. Depending on the audience being interviewed, an online study can be in the field for a few days or up to several weeks.
Applications:
Internet surveys are frequently used for targeted research purposes, particularly when trying to reach a very specific, difficult-to-reach constituency. Entirely customizable, online surveys offer clients the benefit of interviewing specific audiences not always possible by telephone (doctors, C-level executives, membership surveys, retail shoppers, etc.) Internet surveys are best used in researching specific, targeted audiences that would otherwise be difficult (and cost-prohibitive) to reach by telephone.
