Category Archives: Feature Enhancements

How Does Export To Cloud Work?

In order to know how Export to Cloud works, you will first need to understand what Export to Cloud is all about. It is pretty simple. It is a tool or an option that allows you to export excel reports into your DropBox and Google Docs account.

The Export to Cloud can be accessed once you log into your account. From the main page, you can subsequently select Surveys Ø Reports Ø Export Data ØExport to Cloud. Here are the steps you will need to follow:

Exporting your survey reports to Google Docs

Step #1:

Once you select Surveys, click on the Reports tag and look through the items listed at the right side of the screen to find Export Data and click on it. Once you’ve clicked it, you’ll see three main tools listed, the “Raw Data Export”, “Charts & Analytics Export” and “Export to Cloud”. Click on the Authenticate with Google Docs button and log into your Google Doc account. If you are already signed into your Google account, this step will automatically be omitted, taking you to the next step.

Step #2:

Once you’ve logged in, you’ll be taken to an authenticating page, where you will need to click on Grant Access button at the lower left side of the screen to authenticate your account.

Step #3:

You will then be redirected back to the Export Data page, where you will then be able to click on the Export to Cloud button to post your Excel Report in your account. If you want to remove or disable the association of your Excel Report with your Google Docs accounts, you can click the Delete Association button to do so.

Exporting Your Survey Reports to DropBox

Exporting your survey reports to DropBox is pretty much the same as exporting your reports to your Google Doc account.

Step #1:

On the main Export Data page, click the Authentiate with DropBox button and log into your DropBox account.

Step #2:

Click on the Allow button from the DropBox authenticating page to authenticate your account.

Step #3:

Once you’ve been redirected to the Export Data page, you can then click on the Export to DropBox button and post your report to your DropBox account. If you want to remove or disable the association of your survey report with your DropBox account, click on the Delete Association button.

Whether you are using a Google Doc account or a DropBox account, there are certain license and Access options available with each of them. These include no long term commitments, unlimited surveys, responses, questions and advanced toolset and features.

4 Measurement Scales Every Researcher Should Remember

One of the standard features offered by QuestionPro’s online survey software is a wide variety of scales that you can use to measure customer response.

At a first glance all the different scales that might seem similar and easily replaceable by each other. However, as you study them in depth, you realize the diversity of their natures and differences in their uses and their findings. There are over 20 different types of scales that are used by researchers in online surveys.  They can be categorized in two classes – comparative scales and non-comparative scales.

There are a number of factors you might consider when deciding on which scales to incorporate in a questionnaire and which ones to use while analyzing data. Some of the factors are:

  • The type of data that is required from the respondent – ratio, interval, ordinal or nominal.
  • How the information will be used once it is acquired.
  • Number of divisions in the scale – odd or even.
  • Types of statistical analysis methods to be used after data is acquired.
  • The physical form of the scale – vertical, linear, horizontal, etc.
  • Details to be provided in the scale as labels.
  • Whether or not response to a question is mandatory.

Since non-comparative scaling techniques are easier and simpler to understand, we’ll introduce to you the most important four scales. You’ll be delighted to see how easy it is to understand and use them. Those who already know about it them are encouraged to comment on the post and let us know any tips that might further help our readers in using these scales.

1.     Graphic Rating Scale

A graphic rating scale, also known as a continuous rating scale usually looks like the figure drawn above. The ends of the continuum are sometimes labeled with opposite values. Respondents are required to make a mark at any point on the scale that they find appropriate. Sometimes, there are numbers along the markings of the line too. At other times, there are no markings at all on the line.

2.     Likert Scale

A Likert scale typically contains an odd number of options, usually 5 to 7. One end is labeled as the most positive end while the other one is labeled as the most positive one with the label of ‘neutral’ in the middle of the scale.

The phrases ‘purely negative’ and ‘mostly negative’ could also have been ‘extremely disagree’ and ‘slightly disagree’.

3.     Semantic Differential Scale (Max Diff)

A semantic scale is a combination of more than one continuum. It usually contains an odd number of radio buttons with labels at opposite ends.   Max Diff scales are often used in trade-off analysis such as conjoint.

MaxDiff analysis can be used in new product features research or or even market segmentation research to get accurate orderings of the most important product features. The SurveyAnalytics platform help’s you discriminate among feature strengths better than derived importance methodologies. Like other trade-off analyses, the analysis derives utilities for each of the most important product features which can be used to derive optimal products, using market segmentation to put respondents into groups with similar preference structures, or to prioritize strategic product goals.

You can have your respondents perform Forced-choice nature of the tasks, where in SurveyAnalytics MaxDiff can disentangle the relative feature importance in cases where average Likert-style ratings might all have very similar ratings.

4.     Side-by-Side Matrix

Another very commonly used scale in questionnaires is the side-by-side matrix.  A common and powerful application of the side-by-side matrix is the importance/satisfaction type of question.

First, ask the respondent how important an attribute is, then ask them how satisfied they are with your performance in this area.  QuestionPro’s logic and loop functions also allow you to run through this question multiple times with other alternatives that the respondent might consider.  This yields benchmark data that will allow you to compare your performance against other competing alternatives.

Here is an example of data from an importance/satisfaction question.  The importance rating is the line and the performance ratings are the bars.  With this type of data, you can actually see where your company needs to increase its efforts to more closely meet the needs of the customer.

While there are many online survey tools and online survey software to choose from, you’ll find that not all of them have these different types of scales available to them.

As you’re designing your survey, be sure to offer a variety of scales.  Using different scales in your survey will engage the respondent more fully and prevent them from clicking the highest, lowest or middle rating all the time.  Another benefit to using different kinds of scales in your survey is that each scale provides you a unique perspective on the data that you are analyzing.

Before designing your survey, review the different types of scales and question types inside of your online survey tool and be sure to pick the one that will best help you make your decision.

Use Survey Timer to Spice Up Engagement and Response Rates

Survey Timer has been a feature on Survey Analytics for a while but it’s now moved over to those of us who use and love QuestionPro.

I have to admit that when I heard about it, I didn’t quite get it.  I didn’t understand the potential benefits that having a timed survey would offer.

So to get a little more information and clarity on the subject, I talked to Aditya Bhat, our director of sales.  Here’s a peek at our conversation.

What is Countdown Timer?

Countdown timer is a feature that actually sets a time limit on a survey.  Respondents literally have to complete the survey within a certain period of time.  When the timer runs out — the survey closes and the responses are marked as incomplete.   The minimum time limit is 1 minute and the maximum is 60 minutes.

Why would you ever want your survey to time out?  

Believe it or not, answering a survey under a given time frame actually increases the quality of responses in terms of capturing the first thing that comes to the respondents mind. A classic use case would be a quiz survey.

A Quiz Survey?  

Of course, surveys aren’t just for finding out what people think, they can be an ideal tool to find out what people know.  And using a timer increases their concentration on the material.  Too often, respondents are disengaged from surveys – they simply click on the extreme ratings; lowest, highest or right down the middle.  Often these responses can’t be used. Adding a timing feature increases their engagement and full participation.

What’s the benefit of this?

The biggest advantage of this feature is to reduce drop out rates. The respondents have to complete the survey as soon as they start it as there is a timer. They can not leave it and walk away from their desk etc.

Who do you see using this feature the most? 

Market Researchers and people running Employe satisfaction surveys.  When you have the employee answer the survey in a give time frame will get you more precise data as they dont have much time to think and alter their answer.

Countdown timer follows the gaming trend

If you’ve been reading our articles, you know that we’re big fans of making surveys more engaging and more fun — the industry calls it Gamification.  Big brands are using games to get their customers and fans more involved and online and mobile surveys have jumped into the fray as well.

If you haven’t tried the countdown timer feature in your surveys — be sure to give it a try.  Follow the help link to set it up: http://questionpro.com/help/610.html

Spotlight Report – How much “sharing” is good?

Since we are kids, we are taught to share as much as we can. When we launched Spotlight Report a few years ago – we figured – either share all the data or none. We’ve now added in some more granular sharing options as part of our Enterprise License — By default all the questions in a survey are shared as part of the Spotlight Report – Enterprise customers can choose to omit sharing some sensitive questions etc.

See the screenshots below to see how to enable/disable Spotlight Reporting on a question by question basis:

To force or not to force

We’ve added in an option on MicroPanel to force users (panel members) to update (and fill out) their profile before they can start taking surveys. We’ve internally struggled with this – while on one hand, a deeply profile panel is very useful, on the other hand we are generally not big fans of forcing users to do something. We’ll – who are we to decide. We just gave everyone the option of going one way or the other. By _default_ panel profile update is not “required” – but then we added in an option in the Profile Setttings to require as needed:

MicroPanel – Points are now configurable

We’ve added in some more configuration options in MicroPanel to give administrators more power to configure their communities :

Rewards & Points Configurable:

This requirement is especially valid in cases where public policy and gov. folks are running panels for research. Typically most regulatory environments like state and federal government rules prevent agencies from “compensating” respondents for their opinions. Of course this is subject to interpretation, but none-the-less this poses a challenge in some cases when you don’t want to issue points for surveys. With MicroPanel, we added in an option to disable (or enable) points for your panel:

Free Webinar Wed 8/24/11 @ 8AM PST: How To Create Your Own Panel Management Solution in 30 Minutes

Wednesday August 24th, 2011

8:00 AM PST

Click here to sign up now

Panel management solutions are popping up everywhere for companies to explore. The main objectives to getting started is that it’s too difficult to learn, It’s too time consuming, or it requires to much dependent on the software company and slowing down the panel debut. With SurveyAnalytics solution, MicroPanel,  implementing your own panel management solution doesn’t have to be difficult and require 2-3 months of set-up time to get started. The webinar “How To Set Up a Panel Management Solution in 30 Minutes” will help familiarize you with the following:

-Trends & Advantages of creating and managing your own panel solution

-How to get started : 5-point focus to kick off your panel solution

- Customized site behavior: Get Your panel & Panel Portal the way you want it to

- Profiling Surveys: Capturing panel info while you ask questions in your survey

-What Are Knowledge Bank Questions: How to Implement them and connect them to your Panel profiles

- Sampling Portal: Pulling specific data for your surveys

A Question and Answer session will follow prior to the conclusion of the webinar.

A recording and webinar slides will be posted on this blog in the afternoon. Make sure to check back and download your copy to view.

To learn more about http://www.micropanel.com

Click here to sign up now

SurveyPocket: The First Field Research App With Branching Logic Available Offline

Yes, it’s true – SurveyPocket is the only mobile field research and data collection app that supports both offline and online survey functionalities.

If you are familiar with setting up branching logic in SurveyAnalytics via the online survey tool, you will now be able to branch survey questions and use it in SurveyPocket’s offline iPad app and take it anywhere you want in the world for your field research needs.

Are you looking to target specific questions for specific respondents in the field and don’t want to worry about your field team needing to be tethered to wifi connection? SurveyPocket’s branching capabilities has got you covered!

How to set up Branching in SurveyPocket?

It’s easy to set up branching to use in SurveyPocket. Make sure that before setting up branching logic you should set up the entire survey with all the field research questions.

In our example below we want to target respondents who state they cannot live without wireless internet. If they selected wireless internet we want to ask them a follow up branching question on why they cannot live without it. If they do not select this as an option they will be branched to another question in the survey.

Step 1: Click on the Add/Update Logic link for the question on which you wish to set up (base) your branching logic.

Step 2: Select the Branching / Skip Logic option and click on the Setup Logic button to go to the next screen.

Step 3: Select the destination question from the jump to list for each answer option and click on Update Branching Information button.

Step 4: Create a device key to test on the SurveyPocket app.

Step 5: Pull up the SurveyPocket App on your iPad or iPhone and type in the device key.

Step 6: Test out your survey on the iPad. Selecting Wireless Internet will branch to the open-ended question about why they cannot live without it.

For this example we are using Branching Logic: Open-Ended text Question

If selecting other options should skip the open-ended question and move to another question topic.

Branching Logic: Skip to rating scale question.

Step 7: Click on the Synchronize button on SurveyPocket when online connectivity is available. This will allow you to view report faster than ever and begin the analysis process.

To learn more on how to use SurveyPocket for field research or data collection, or to set up a free trial demo of SurveyPocket go to http://www.surveypocket.com or click on the logo below to view & download SurveyPocket to your iPad today!

Enhanced Trend Reports: Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly, & Annual Reports Now Available

The Trend Analysis tool available under the Reports tab have been enhanced. You can now create weekly, monthly, quarterly, and annual reports.

Trend analysis tools are used for comparing and analyzing trends in aggregate survey data. With trend analysis you can plot variables like the mean, standard dev., variance and mean percentile over a period of time and see how the data changes over time.

To get started click on:

  • Login »  Surveys »  Reports »  Advanced Analysis »  Trend Analysis

You can also perform “drill downs” to find out more details about a particular time-period. Here is where you can specify if you want a weekly, monthly, quarterly, or annual report.  In this example we have gone with the monthly report.

Screenshot
Survey Software Help Image

For Online Trend Analysis option click on the View Online Trend Tool link.

Screenshot
Survey Software Help Image

You can specify different Reporting Options and generate the Trend Report

What kind of a report will I get? Can I see a preview?

A. You will see an excel generated report which will show the percentage of change over specified time. See screenshot below:

Screenshot
Survey Software Help Image

Maps are worth a thousand words…

Here is a great new way to get attention in SurveyAnalytics!

Working on the idea that a picture is worth a thousand words SurveyAnalytics has introduced a great new feature for respondents! Now you can use a set of predefined maps to ask location information of your respondents, for instance where they currently live or were born.  Using maps such as the one above is a great way to make a survey more interesting and engaging for a respondent.  The predefined maps currently cover the USA, United Kingdom, Australia, Europe and the World with more being added all the while. By simply moving the mouse over the map respondents can indicate with a mouse click. Mouse over text (such as shown above) makes sure that they make the right choice by giving a longer name for the area the mouse is over. This new feature is available under available under the “Add on Modules” section, subheading “Image/Multimedia” “Maps”.

It is all as simple as point and click !